 | In part 2 of this series, I will look at resources that will allow you to find news items on topics of interest, and to receive them as RSS feeds. Just a reminder - links to all of the hacks in this series are available as a OPML file and as a HTML directory for later ease of use. If you have any hacks you wish to contribute, feel free to add comments or trackbacks to the posts, and I will add them to the list. |
| 11. Finding news of interest using NewsIsFree |
| 12. Finding news of interest using Moreover |
| Like NewsIsFree, Moreover collects RSS feeds in multiple categories. You can view a list of the category RSS feeds with links to the individual feeds. In addition, you can select categories from a drop down-box, or create a custom RSS feed based on search terms. |
| 13. Finding news of interest using Google News |
| Google News searches over 4500 news source and displays top headlines on its main page in various categories. From the main page, there are RSS and Atom links to the RSS feed for the main page. A feeds overview page gives links to RSS feeds for eight major news categories. You can also create feeds for search terms by entering search terms on the Google News main page, then using the RSS or Atom link on the left side of the page to subscribe to the results for that search. Finally, you can create a personal news page that can have its own RSS or Atom feed. |
| 14. Finding news of interest using Yahoo News |
| On each section of Yahoo News, there are links to RSS feeds for that section. A RSS overview page also lists RSS feeds for the major sections, and has a search box through which you can create a custom RSS feed based on your search terms. |
| 15. Finding news of interest using Topix.net |
| Topix.net surveys 10,000 news sources and classifies stories by topic and location. You can browse the topic directory to find a topic of interest or enter a US zip code of interest. Once you get to a topic, you can click on the orange XML button to get the RSS feed for that topic, or subscribe using buttons for other RSS readers/aggregators. From the Topix.net front page (or any topic page, for that matter), you can enter a US zip code, city name, or a search term or terms to get a list of stories. As with any other Topix.net page, you can add the link from the orange XML button to get the search results as a RSS feed. An advanced search feature is also available, giving you options to restrict your search to specific media sourcs, location, countries, etc. |
| 16. Finding news of interest using IceRocket News |
| The IceRocket search engine also has a news search capability. You can enter search terms and get links to stories matching those search terms. on the right side of the search results page, there is a link to a RSS version of the search query, and links to add the RSS form of the query to several RSS aggregators/readers. |
| 17. Finding news of interest using RocketNews |
| RocketNews is a RSS search engine searchin 16,000 web sites and 70,000 RSS feeds and weblogs to provide searches for news or weblogs. The main search page offers a single text box for search terms. After performing a search, more options for searching appear on the results page. You can search for News or Weblogs, when the items were published, and sorting by date or relevance. At the top of the results page, there is a orange XML button with a link to the RSS form of the query. A nice feature is that if you change the search options and repeat the search, the RSS form of the query will reflect those changes. |
| 18. Finding news of interest using MSN Search |
| The Microsoft Network (MSN) has a search engine with an option for performing news searches. Type your search terms into the text box and click on the News button to perform your search. At the bottom of the results page, there will be a orange RSS button with a link to the RSS form of your search query. MSN Search has a help page on using RSS and search, as well as another help page on MSN newsbots for different world regions. Finally, MSNBC.com has a collection of RSS feeds for top stories in different categories. |
| 19. Finding news of interest using Gada.be |
| Gada.be is a metasearch engine collecting search results from 140 search services. To use the service for news searches, you can go to the main page, type in a search term or terms, select the news option from the drop-down box, and click on the "Go" button. The search results page will show headlines from a number of news search engines for the search terms. After generating the results page, you can add a "/opml" to the end of the search URL and get a OPML file with search queries for a number of search engines using the the search terms you entered in the gada.be search. This file can then be imported into your favorite RSS reader to generate more search results on demand. Chris Pirillo has more information on using Gada.be in his announcement of the Gada.be service. |
| 20. Finding news of interest using Feedster |
| Feedster is a search engine which focuses on RSS feeds. From Feedster's help page, "The type of content available in feeds makes Feedster great for finding the latest news and opinion on any topic." |
| To perform a search on news RSS feeds, go to the Feedster news search page and enter a search term or terms in the text box and press the Search button. A results page will appear. You can subscribe to your search query as a RSS feed by using the link from the orange XML button at the top of the results page. |
| I will talk about other uses of the Feedster search engine in future parts of this series. |
| Other Resources |
| The BBC has a set of RSS feeds for major news categories. |
| Media Drop - List of newspapers with RSS, includes college papers |
| SIDEWALK/theory - Big list of newspaper websites, has RSS links, but not as a separate list |
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Tuesday, December 6, 2005
