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Story: Microsoft tries to calm nerves over RSS

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What's the big issue here? I think it makes sense for someone to finally step out and give the RSS acronym a name that the general public might stand a chance of understanding.

After developing 'social software' for a year one of the biggest obstacles I've seen is that things like RSS have grown out of the 'geek' sector, bringing lots of meaningless terms and acronyms that people just don't understand. What you techie types often fail to understand is that half of the general public don't know what 'syndication' means, so if RSS functionality is ever to be widely accepted it needs to be made simpler and easier for Joe Public to understand.

I think that if anyone other than Microsoft had said this (e.g. an open source tree hugger) everyone would be in agreement, but as it was a Microsoft employee it has generated this reaction.

Do you want RSS to be used as widely as email? If so, you'd better wake up and think like a punter, as it's still way too complicated for your average user.

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