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However, this new channel, RSS, is quite different. Here you have an exact view of what you subscribe to. You see exactly which content publishers are on your list and you can remove any of them immediately, without even a second thought. It's quick, easy and comfortable.
Compare this with
relative difficulty of unsubscribing from e-mail lists, and even with
e-mail mindset where you just don't care to be bothered anymore with unsubscribing, since you don't have a view of what you subscribe to anyway.
This new channel takes
democracy right out of content delivery for publishers and brings it back for end-users.
If RSS content publishers want to keep and grow their readership, they cannot afford to do
things they could have easily been doing with e-mail.
Instantly, all
content needs to be highly relevant. You can no longer afford to send out blatant advertising messages or too much content that is of little interest to your target audience. If you want to survive you need to tailor all of your content specifically to
needs of your target audience.
RSS content delivery must in nature be more relevant than content delivered by e-mail.
RSS content publishers know this and most are providing exactly this, very relevant content, usually more relevant than what most e-mail publishers are doing, since they are taking in to consideration
specific characteristics of
channel.
And there are more publishers like this every day. And eventually, even those that use both e-mail and RSS to deliver content, change
way they are delivering content using e-mail. Their entire content production becomes more relevant to
user's needs.
It's quite easy to imagine
larger-scale implications of this.
Since more and more publishers are starting to offer more relevant content, that also raises
bar for other content publishers, even those not using RSS.
Our expectations are increasing every day. We are no longer content with mediocre content, we actually expect and even demand more relevancy.
And so
circle is completed.
Early RSS publishers have started raising our expectations of what to expect from internet content and have thus affected our internet content consumption habits. Users, in affect, are starting to demand more, which in turn forces other publishers to comply with
increased demands.
This process has just begun and still has a long way to go, but it has begun and will not stop.

Rok Hrastnik is the author of »Unleash the Marketing & Publishing Power of RSS«, acclaimed as the best and most comprehensive guide to RSS for marketers by leading RSS experts. The complete guide on RSS for marketers: http://rss.marketingstudies.net/index.html?src=sa12