10 Questions with Niall Kennedy on Content Syndication
10AM and it’s time for 10 Questions. I am so excited to today because I finally can share with you the first of 2 interviews with Niall Kennedy. This one is on Content Syndication and it is a great one like all the rest. If you have not heard of Niall Kennedy where have you been? He is the Community Manager for Technorati. I hope you all enjoy this interview. But, enough of me talking lets get on with this interview.
Content Syndication is an area that a lot of people tare talking about right now. Why do you think there is so much talk about it right now?
Content sydication is enabling more customized delivery of content to people in a variety of settings. Just as TiVo changed the way we watched TV, syndication allows us to keep track of more sources of information on a flexible schedule.
The standardization of syndication formats such as Atom (IETF RFC 4287) and RSS allow developers to build new applications using structured content in defined vocabularies. We’ve only just begun to discover what structured content in syndication is capable of.
What formats of content syndication do you see leading the way?
I think the Atom syndication format will be widely used throughout governments and their contractors, introducing a whole new world to the benefits of syndication. Microformats will introduce new ways of describing the content within a feed for interpretation by an intelligent agent such as a search engine or browser plugin. Syndication will disappear into the infrastructure of our applications and be even more simple to integrate with applications than we experience today.
In 5 years where do you see content syndication?
We will have many more rich media experience enabled through content syndication. Expect high-resolution images delivered to your HDTV, or the latest Netflix movie queue to your home entertainment center. Software updates may be pushed using digitally signed syndication technologies. E-mail will blend with syndication for items with a large distribution list or data that changes over time.
There will also be more syndicated data available in more places. Expect traditional offerings such as TV and print media to be made available in more customized formats unique to each user. We will gather some personalization smarts on the aggregator side and better be able to handle the increasing flow of inbound information.
How do you see marketing groups using content syndication?
Syndication is an opt-in method of communicating to end-users. Marketing groups should look at syndication as a way to keep people informed of the latest news around a company or product. If you produce a cell phone, consider reaching out to that potential market with a blog and/or video demonstrations. Enable users to subscribe to a product support page to receive the latest news and software updates for their phone. Show me the latest content and accessories all available via syndicated feeds and allow me to be excited about your products and give you more money.
Marketing groups can also use syndication to listen in on the conversations happening around their brands or products. Subscribe to watchlists on blog search engines such as Technorati so you can follow consumer sentiment and common questions about your product. The wisdom of the crowds may produce new features and clever ideas for your company and introduce new ways to create brand ambassadors.
What do you think is needed to take content syndication to the next level and what do you think the next level is?
The next level of content syndication is more personalization and better handling of rich media. We need to develop smarter feed aggregators that can suggest new sources of content, prioritize the items we read, and identify the people behind the feeds. We also need to develop new ways of understanding, describing, and subscribing to rich media content such as photos, audio, and video. Content consumers such as search engines and feed aggregators need to work together on the best ways to describe and format such data without overwhelming the content creators too much.
What affect will content syndication have on an individual’s perspective of the world?
Syndication will flatten the world a bit as we are more easily able to consume information from all over the globe. Bloggers may seek an edge by following the news in a far off place as it develops such as the latest Skype news from Estonia. We will be better able to follow how news from a far off place affects our lives and interests on a daily basis.
How can we educate the average user about content syndication?
We can make it a lot easier for average users to subscribe to a syndicated feed. XSLT rendering of a feed page provides part of the answer but if syndication is to become the behind-the-scenes plumbing then the average user needs to take an action to deliver “more things like this” types of content to their daily news experience.
Average users might be afraid to give out their e-mail address and confront the waves of spam in their inbox. Syndication is an opt-in process that can be easily cancelled at any time you no longer want to receive information from that source. Syndication puts the user in control.
What benefits does content syndication have for the average user?
The average syndication reader can track more information than ever before using feed readers or syndicated content consumers depending on the appropriate content. The average user might download the latest NPR news story from iTunes never realizing it is powered by content syndication technologies.
The average producer of syndicated content is able to reach more users wherever they may be and create a stronger relationship with that user. I can place my feed on someone’s personalized homepage and it will be displayed every time that person logs in or opens his or her browser. I can become an audio track for someone’s morning run or commute to work by creating a podcast. I can send the latest videos of a new baby across the world and have them show up on my relatives’ PCs.
How can Technorati help people with content syndication?
Technorati helps expand the reach of content producers by exposing their content to interested search and directory users. People can also track their favorite searches, links to a web page, or comments about a topic by subscribing to a syndicated feed delivered to them on a regular basis.
What else would you like to mention about content syndication that I might not have asked?
Syndication is still in the early stages of development. I think we can achieve a lot through standardization and cooperation as we look at building the publication and consumption systems of tomorrow.