# Why RSS matters - Host: [werd.io](https://links.thingelstad.xyz/hosts/werd.io/) - Saved: December 11, 2025 (2025-12-11T13:10:16Z) - Record: https://links.thingelstad.xyz/links/8eb936e8d1b8/ - JSON: https://links.thingelstad.xyz/links/8eb936e8d1b8.json ## What Jamie wrote If you've been reading the Weekly Thing for a while you know nearly everything in here I get via an RSS feed. RSS and a feed reader is my jam. If a site doesn't publish RSS, I’m not reading it. It just is how it is. And RSS can do so much more. > If we want an internet where publishers retain autonomy and readers retain agency, we need to treat RSS not as legacy plumbing but as strategic infrastructure. That means three things: > > 1. Protect and optimize our existing RSS infrastructure. > 2. Build and support better, more sophisticated RSS-powered applications. > 3. Consider the intersections between RSS and the wider social web. The issue to me for RSS and why companies choose to not support it is the same stuff that makes it amazing. It is open. No company can control it. They cannot wrestle it down behind a paywall. They can’t force you to engage with it in a certain way. It shares much of that with email. These mediums give the user power, and sadly for many services they don't like that. Nearly all social media sites supported RSS when they launched. And they all shut it off after they get enough users. Because they have the power then. Cue [enshittification](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enshittification). ## Facts - Kind: [Page](https://links.thingelstad.xyz/kinds/page/) ## Appears in - [WT336: Weekly Thing 336 / Culture, Retention, Transmission](https://weekly.thingelstad.com/archive/336/), Notable ## Same host - [Everyone should blog](https://links.thingelstad.xyz/links/727b7d79c7a6/) (werd.io, January 6, 2022) ## Saved the same week - [The Land of Giants Transmission Towers](https://links.thingelstad.xyz/links/95cedc822bcc/) (choishine.com, December 11, 2025) - [Engineer proves that Kohler’s smart toilet cameras aren’t very private - Ars Technica](https://links.thingelstad.xyz/links/d373e5d7a0ff/) (arstechnica.com, December 11, 2025) - [Commerce Operations Foundation - A Common Language for Modern Commerce Operations](https://links.thingelstad.xyz/links/0e70b120a19e/) (commerceopsfoundation.org, December 11, 2025) - [How HubSpot "Fixed" Retention | Brian Halligan | LinkedIn](https://links.thingelstad.xyz/links/9fc7fc15d1f7/) (linkedin.com, December 11, 2025) - [10 Years of Let's Encrypt Certificates - Let's Encrypt](https://links.thingelstad.xyz/links/2b8649ff1caf/) (letsencrypt.org, December 11, 2025) ## Elsewhere - Wayback Machine: https://web.archive.org/web/*/https://werd.io/why-rss-matters/