A Little Good News: Using RSS Feeds in Library Outreach and Instruction
Poster presented at American Library Association 2006 Annual Conference
New Orleans, Louisiana - June 2006
by Tiffany Hebb (thebb@depauw.edu), Kathryn Courtland Millis (millisk@depauw.edu), and Krista Knapp (kknapp@depauw.edu)

Abstract:

Most librarians have heard of RSS feeds, and a number of us now use news readers and aggregators to get our favorite news sources delivered to us for one-stop viewing. At DePauw University, librarians are exploring ways to deliver information to our patrons via RSS feeds. We have changed our “Library News” headlines on our home page to be created from a blog that generates RSS feeds. Patrons with news readers can now add the library news to their aggregators, where they’re more likely to see it. Additionally, we are finding useful feeds already created by others, and delivering them to our patrons via subject guides, Blackboard, and pathfinders created for library instruction sessions. For example, a class guide created for a “Media, Culture & Society” library instruction session contains New York Times Media & Advertising feeds as well as up-to-date headlines from organizations such as FAIR (Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting). This poster will provide a basic introduction to RSS feeds and news aggregators, but will primarily focus on how to use them to get the most current information to your patrons.

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Helpful RSS-related links:

Finding Feeds:

Feeds based on keyword searches of multiple sites:

General feed directories:

Library and higher education feed directories:

DePauw Libraries class guides that use RSS feeds:

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