MSIE To Adopt Firefox Feed Icon

An anonymous reader writes " Forbes article is reporting that Microsoft 'forthcoming Internet Explorer 7 browser will adopt Firefox's RSS feed icon, the company announced on a blog--effectively making the orange square with white radio waves the industry standard.' "

Comments

Good News

[Necrotica]

I really like seeing Microsoft conforming to a standard instead of attempting to create one. It may just be an icon, but it's something!

Re:Good News

[Giometrix]

Is it a standard? From the blurb it seems like it is now effictively a standard because all of the major browsers are using it.

Heh

[pHatidic]

Only with Microsoft is it the icon that becomes the standard and not the technology. It's funny because now this "standard" will represent both Mozilla's normal RSS and Microsoft's embraced and extended RSS.

Re:Heh

[pHatidic]

The reason XML is extensible is so that you can use it to create standards like RSS. If you then extend RSS then it is no longer really RSS. It's just like language. The English language is extensible, you can make up new words to describe new things. But that doesn't mean you can change the definitions of words without telling people during a debate and then act like your opponent is an idiot, a la Clinton with the defition of "is."

Re:Heh

[Niten]

The RSS specifications are specific subsets of XML, and RSS readers have to know how to interpret that XML. When Microsoft starts to change the RSS spec, and if others decide to use Microsoft's features, then there's a good chance that users of non-Microsoft RSS client software will be effectively locked out of these feeds. It really doesn't matter whether it's XML or not (or more generally, human-readable or not), because by trying to shove new features into the RSS specification outside of the official channels for doing so, Microsoft is trying to tell the independent developers "now you need to conform to OUR standard, or our large user base will ensure that your software becomes incompatible with all that content your users want to access."

Fortunately, I think there's a pretty good chance it won't work this time. A great deal of news feeds are generated by open source software such as LiveJournal's engine and Wordpress, and I think the authors of such software would be less likely than most to cave in to a new "standard" just because Microsoft says so. There's already a huge amount of RSS content out there, even if Microsoft users have been missing out on it so far. Hopefully, when all is said and done, it will be Microsoft following the standard, and not the other way around.

Re:800 Lb Gorilla

[Billosaur]

Who says this is suddenly an industry standard? Firefox and IE will use it ad they have a corner on the market, but has any standards organization said "this shall be the RSS icon?" It's a pretty big leap from Microsoft adopting something to it becoming a standard, despite their dominance of the browser market. And in case anyone has forgotten, MS tends to make hash out of standards it does adopt.

I think I've worked it out

[FluffyWithTeeth]

People always complain about dupes on Slashdot, and I think I've deduced the reason.

Now, back in the day, they ran this site as a standard tech blog, not really making any money off it. Just a side hobby. However, when it got purchased, and the popularity really flew off, the Slashdot team discovered they didn't actually need to work anymore.

Now personally, if I'd discovered that what was a fun hobby now fed and clothed me, and there was practically no work involved, would I spend as long as possible on it, carefully checking each thing?

Of course not, that would invalidate the whole point. Instead, I'd look through the titles and occasionally the summaries of submitted stories, and let through whichever ones sounded vaguely interesting. Then I'd spend all my free time and money pissing around, and relaxing.

I don't hold it against them, Slashdot still works, we still get good comments, and damn, I'd do exactly the same thing.

Kudos to you, Taco and the rest of the gang! Live the dream! I know I would...

Slashdot RSS Feed

[brianerst]

If only there was a technology that the editors could use that would show them a list of current Slashdot stories prior to posting... A real-time feed of some sort would be nice.

I don't want Microsoft to join the club anymore.

[keezer]

So far, they've mangled:

• Basic (made it a "legitimate" language)
• HTML
• e-mail
• Java
• C++

...and those are just the instances that I've had to put up with @ work.

Re:Standardisation is nice but...

[Ezku]

Who says streams will always be broadcast in RSS format? We already have Atom, and others will undoubtedly follow. A graphical icon is both timeless and more international.

Re:800 Lb Gorilla

[brontus3927]

Well, there's a difference between someting being a de jure standard (a standards body decides on a specification) and a de facto standard (something that is standard by the fact that (mostly) everyone does it that way). By MS adopting Mozilla's RSS icon, it gives it the weight of being a de facto standard.

Re:ARRGH

[zootm]

The Firefox team realise that a unified symbol is of benefit to everyone, and happily allowed MS to use the logo.

how interesting!!!

[melfid]

This is about as relevant as Firefox using CTRL-C, CTRL-V, and CTRL-X

Re:Super Dupe

[NanoGator]

"This is one of those articles that should be deleted real quick"

You're like the fourth person to bitch about this dupe. How come the dupe gestapo doesn't take extra care to make sure somebody else hasn't posted a gripe about the dupe?

Re:Dupes allow off topic posts, right?

[bcmm]

That's a good idea. Slashdot is full of techy people with nothing to do, and dupes mean we have nothing to talk about. If everyone decides that dupes are for computer help, we could make Slashdot useful!