# RSS? **URL:** \ **Category:** About This Message Board\ **Created:** [May 17, 2009, 4:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rss/496722 "2009-05-17T04:46:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![georgebaily](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/c57346/32.png) [@georgebaily](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/georgebaily)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2009, 4:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rss/496722/1 "2009-05-17T04:46:03Z")
If Straight Dope is fighting ignorance, why doesn’t the main site have an RSS feed? ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2009, 5:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rss/496722/2 "2009-05-17T05:16:23Z")
> [@georgebaily](#): > > If Straight Dope is fighting ignorance, why doesn’t the main site have an RSS feed? I’ll take “False Dilemmas” for 500, Alex. ---
**Author:** ![TubaDiva](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tubadiva/32/507_2.png) [@TubaDiva](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TubaDiva)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2009, 1:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rss/496722/3 "2009-05-17T13:52:25Z")
Dunno. We’re asked for it but it’s not there yet. We’re hopeful that will change at some point. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2009, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rss/496722/4 "2009-05-17T14:44:59Z")
It was working as recently as 5/3/2009, that’s when I received the most recent feed. ---
**Author:** ![TubaDiva](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tubadiva/32/507_2.png) [@TubaDiva](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TubaDiva)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2009, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rss/496722/5 "2009-05-17T15:05:35Z")
On the main page of the website? ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2009, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rss/496722/6 "2009-05-17T15:07:31Z")
sorry, i misunderstood. No, on the forums of the SDMB. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2009, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rss/496722/7 "2009-05-17T15:24:13Z")
RSS invites hundreds of thousands of people to have their computer ping your server every couple of minutes so they can have the latest info, with none of the ads. Massive additional traffic, no additional benefit. Remember, the SDMB is not a profitable business. It might break even, or it might not. CNN it ain’t. ---
**Author:** ![alterego](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/6bbea6/32.png) [@alterego](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alterego)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2009, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rss/496722/8 "2009-05-17T17:46:12Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > RSS invites hundreds of thousands of people to have their computer ping your server every couple of minutes so they can have the latest info, with none of the ads. Massive additional traffic, no additional benefit. > > Remember, the SDMB is not a profitable business. It might break even, or it might not. CNN it ain’t. Nice opinion you’ve got there. I suppose this is why RSS became popular. ---
**Author:** ![ultrafilter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/3d9bf3/32.png) [@ultrafilter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ultrafilter)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2009, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rss/496722/9 "2009-05-17T17:53:11Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > RSS invites hundreds of thousands of people to have their computer ping your server every couple of minutes so they can have the latest info, with none of the ads. Massive additional traffic, no additional benefit. Unless, of course, you include the ads in the downloaded articles. ---
**Author:** ![Alan2](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ed8c4c/32.png) [@Alan2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alan2)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2009, 6:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/rss/496722/10 "2009-10-20T06:12:58Z")
[http://page2rss.com/page?url=www.straightdope.com/](http://page2rss.com/page?url=www.straightdope.com/) appears to be a usable RSS feed. [Cheesegrater + Portalizer](http://www.jwz.org/cheesegrater/) used to have a feed, but it was recently shut down. Lest anyone be mislead by LSLGuy, serving RSS isn’t quite the terror he makes it out to be. First, no RSS aggragator should be checking more frequently than hourly. Second, many people are using web aggragators like Google Reader or Bloglines; such a service actually decreases the number of RSS downloads as the site downloads the RSS once for all users, not once per user. Third, the cost to serve an RSS feed is negligible, especially since most readers will use a cheap optional request to only retrieve the full feed if it has changed. Trust me, compared to say, a forum system, serving an RSS feed is trivial. Fourth, as ultrafilter notes, nothing stops you from serving ads in your feed. Finally, you can offload your RSS to sites like Feedburner who, last I heard, still had a free option. Feedburner is willing to do it for free because the cost is so very low. Setting up an RSS feed will take some time, and may be a nuisance if you rolled your own content management system. But beyond the price to initially set it up, it’s pretty much all good for the publisher.