Director of Digital Publishing for the UK's The Guardian Simon Waldman gave a publishers view of RSS and aggregators at the 12th World Editors Forum. Having implemented a branded RSS readers in February (see former posting), Waldman presented an experienced view of the pros and cons of RSS, but was not able to provide any specific statistics as to how RSS has boosted or hindered The Guardian's online traffic. However, he predicted that RSS will become a standard and essential element of any successful news website due to the extremely positive reception of RSS by techies and, maybe more importantly, investors. Thus, there seems to be no way out of adopting an RSS strategy. In this adoption, Waldman gave a few recommendations:

1. the content should be different, diversified and the quality of journalism should remain superb if not improve; content needs to be designed, not just web pages

2. newspapers need to consider RSS as an opportunity, not an obligation

3. every online story page should be considered as the front page because through RSS, the front page is normally avoided. story page should be considered as the front page