Yahoo's RSS Updates

John Furrier talks to Yahoo's RSS managers Scott Gatz and Ethan Diamond. Yahoo's Alerts were a key part of the discussion.

Scott brings up some of their research numbers, citing that roughly 31% of Internet users are now using RSS and some of the places they want to use it is for immediate notification, which is where their Alerts product comes into play. Client KnowNow's eLerts launched at Web 2.0 this year (available for free download), addresses the same need, which is a fabulous win for consumers needing to receive time sensitive information instantly.

Obviously mobile is a natural fit for this in the future, so you could be updated via a SMS alert on your phone and other handheld device. They also discuss Yahoo email and instant messenger notification, i.e., a window will pop up and say, “Hey we’ve got a message for you, would you like to read it?” And they'll have RSS integrated into email.

Diamond gives a few examples: "people sit in front of their email clients all day long. They get not just email, but photos from friends. They get favorite bookmarks or links from friends. So having news be a part of that and not making people leave their mail client is a good idea. It is natural. The second part of is that when you read a news story I think the most common activity you perform, besides sort of absorbing the information, is sharing it with friends. If you are inside a web browser it is always awkward to find or email this article link… if it exists at all. If you are inside of a stand alone RSS reader or aggregator, you don’t have your contacts there. Whereas, if you are inside your email client, you have got your entire address book. You can select a post and share it with a friend and have address auto complete."