Chapter . Design Guidelines: RSS/News Feeds

News Feed Content

Focus on one topic in each item

Similar to information sent through social networks, RSS is a good way to deliver discrete chunks of information rather than summaries or recaps of multiple items. Users didn’t expect one headline to include links to multiple items; when it did, it made it more difficult for people to use the information.

One user in our field study said, “An RSS feed with a bunch of links does me no good. I know they’re doing it because it’s difficult to get a full article for each item, but it’s a pain.” He liked to quickly review each item and click through to any story he wanted to read. When multiple items were listed together, it slowed him down.

Another user, while ...

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