What is RSS?
RSS is the de facto way to follow hundreds of websites without having to traipse round each one every day
How RSS works
Using RSS is like using social media platforms, essentially you're consuming a stream of content. With RSS though, instead of following people or groups or conversations, you are following websites.
Instead of opening Twitter and getting depressed with all the hate or opening Facebook and getting swamped with all sorts of adverts and crap, you open your RSS reader and simply enjoy the content you've selected, in the order you choose. You add the website RSS feed to your RSS reader and it shows you the content by category or by date.
RSS readers
Like the most popular social media apps, many RSS readers can be installed on your mobile phone or simply accessed via a web browser or browser extension. Here's three examples to give you an idea of the various approaches:
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Feedly
This is primarily what I use to keep up-to-speed with all the music websites I like to read. The main draw is synchronisation. I use Feedly in two ways: via the web interface and, when I'm on the move, with the Feedly App, so when I've been accessing my feeds via one interface, the other is automatically updated, meaning I'm never left reading the same news twice. The service carries a monthly cost (with three pricing tiers) but there's a simplified free version which is perfect if you're starting out with RSS
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Feedbro
Feedbro is an excellent Firefox browser extension (i.e. free) which offers all the functionality of Feedly, including many of the paid-for features
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Thunderbird
You may already know about Thunderbird from Mozilla (makers of the best and only trustworthy web browser Firefox). Thunderbird is an email aggregator and comes with a built-in RSS reader. I use Thunderbird to access all my email accounts so on occasion use the RSS reader for testing (I'm a full-time web designer innit). If you never need to access RSS feeds on your mobile, then this is a perfect solution. Here's an article on how Thunderbird RSS Reader works
Grab our RSS feed and get started
Once you've chosen an RSS reader, grab our feed and always keep up to date:
or copy-and-paste: https://theletter.co.uk/feeds/log