this post was submitted on 23 May 2025
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RSS-only lemmy instance (rss.ponder.cat)
submitted 17 hours ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
11 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

I know RSS bots in the threadiverse are somewhat controversial, but I found this instance that is RSS feeds only. (I think there are others?)

Here is the text of Introduction to rss.ponder.cat the pinned post with links to all current feeds, which isn't available on hb because it was posted before anyone here subscribed to [email protected]. This way the links resolve properly within hb.

spoiler

Welcome to Ponder.cat RSS!

Welcome to our Lemmy instance dedicated to RSS feeds! Here, you can easily subscribe to a variety of news sources presented as Lemmy communities. We have two bot users posting content:

If you don’t want paywalled content, you can block the paywall user. Or, if you don’t want any of this, you can block both or the whole instance.

If you don’t see a community for an RSS feed you would like to follow, create a post in [email protected] or send me a DM. I’ll post announcements to this community when new feeds get added, so subscribe if you want updates. Available Communities News & Journalism

Science and Technology

Ars Technica

IT and Tech

Nature and Environment

Culture, Politics & Society

Gaming & Entertainment

Streams

In addition, you can add any RSS feed to any community which you moderate. Send a DM to [email protected] with any number of the following commands:

  • /add $rss_url $community@$instance - Add a new RSS feed
  • /delete $rss_url $community@$instance - Unlink an existing RSS feed from the community
  • /list $community@$instance - List all feeds for a community
  • /help - Show this help message

For example:

/add https://hackaday.com/blog/feed/ [email protected]

Welcome! Glad to have you with us. If you have questions or want a new feed added, you know what to do.

Not a well formulated proposal, just an idea:

It might be interesting to create RSS-based communities, for example a sibling to /c/podcasts that subs itself to a bunch of podcast RSS feeds, then the user can browse recent episodes of shows recommended by the community.

Or a /c/news sibling, same as above.

Other potential RSS feeds: reddits, youtubes, peertubes, share your notification inbox publicly--- endless really.

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 17 hours ago (4 children)

Umm... embarrassing question here but...

What is an RSS?

[–] [email protected] 7 points 13 hours ago (1 children)

Fuck I'm getting old

[–] [email protected] 4 points 13 hours ago

No you're not, I'm just dumb. It's one of those things I've seen around but never bothered to learn about.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 15 hours ago

Skipping the description since a comrade already gave a great explanation.

...the best way to consume news media and updates from a wide variety of sources.

Lemmy comms and Mastodon users also have associated RSS feeds. Podcasts are pretty much just RSS feeds with audio files.

Comment below other interesting shit that provides RSS feeds.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 16 hours ago (2 children)

I hope someone else can give a more coherent answer.

This is the icon for RSS, you have seen it everywhere on the internet.

It is the fundamental technology behind "subscribe to the feed". When you see an RSS feed, you can copy the link into any compatible reader/client and get the content. The client will format it nicely for you, so you can efficiently read/watch/listen. The RSS link is an XML file which is automatically updated whenever new content it added. A podcast is an RSS feed containing an audio/video file.

To use a more concrete example, here is the comm for 404 media on that instance: https://rss.ponder.cat/c/[email protected]

The URL of the actual RSS that 404 publishes is https://www.404media.co/rss which you can find in the footer of their website. If you try to open that link directly, it'll likely download an xml file to your device, which isn't very useful. But if you use an "RSS client" on your phone or computer you can automatically get updated whenever they publish. You can combine an unlimited number of sources in a single client.

If you remember subscribing to blogs, that's how it was done.

I'm sorry this isn't a very good explanation. But don't worry about not knowing in the first place. It is a protocol which resists tracking, monetization, walled gardens, algorithms, etc and has been under steady attack.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 16 hours ago

its as old as the web basically

[–] [email protected] 6 points 16 hours ago

Fantastic explanation, thank you.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 16 hours ago* (last edited 16 hours ago)

it's a link to a feed of internet stuff that you can shove into your preferred reader app
the "stuff" can be almost anything from a podcast, news bulletins, youtube channel, etc.
i use them to listen to bootleg podcasts and keep track of youtube subscriptions