Social media and online social platforms have become an integral part of today's society. The majority of people in Europe use them on a daily basis, especially young people, who spend an average of up to 10 hours a day viewing content on social media platforms. [1]
It is hardly surprising that news consumption via social media platforms now accounts for a considerable proportion of total news consumption. This is either because all relevant news organisations are represented on social media and actively post content there, or because the platforms provide space for discussion and users share, comment on and forward news content themselves. [2, 3]
For many people, using social media as a news source has one decisive advantage: it allows them to bundle many different news sources in one place. This means they can find out about the topics they are interested in and use precisely those sources they trust or consider to be good. From the user's point of view, this makes perfect sense, as it makes consuming news very easy and can be done anywhere on the go and in a familiar app environment. [2, 3]
Why is news on social media a problem?
At the same time, however, this also has substantial disadvantages. One of these is algorithmic sorting, which is now standard on all commercial platforms. Instead of displaying posts in chronological order, social media content is usually sorted using complex sorting procedures that take a wide variety of information into account. This includes the time of day, the interests of the respective users, the interests of other users, the posting behaviour of the accounts that post a contribution, and many other factors that are kept strictly secret by the platform operators.
Furthermore, the use of social media as a news source also gives it enormous power over public discourse, the flow of information, and which news reaches people and which does not. This means that individual news items or entire topics can be either amplified or muted in their reach. There does not always have to be a political agenda behind this, but the possibility of it happening is a problem in itself. In addition, certain lock-in effects arise when people read news primarily via a single platform or a single provider. [4, 5, 6, 7]
Social media is also a frequent target of campaigns designed to influence public opinion. These campaigns may be state-directed or profit-oriented. In either case, however, this is not entirely transparent to users of the platforms, and it can sometimes be extremely difficult or impossible to escape this influence. In addition, social media feeds contain a wild mix of news from reputable and unreliable sources, as well as completely irrelevant content that has nothing to do with news. This makes it all the more difficult for users to classify content. [6, 8]
All these factors also have a direct impact on the media landscape itself. In order not to get lost in the flood of media news, posts from activists, friends and acquaintances, organisations, influencers and bots, even reputable media companies are increasingly resorting to headlines and images designed to attract attention. Sometimes this compromises objectivity or leads to misleading headlines. However, in order to remain relevant, media outlets often feel pressured by this attention economy. [6, 9, 10]
What if there was a way to enjoy the benefits of news consumption that users appreciate on social media without being affected by (most of) the disadvantages? It should be possible to read many different reputable news sources in one place in a simple way, without having to manually search through news websites.
One easy possibility: Really Simple Syndication!
In fact, there is just such a solution, and it has been around for decades: RSS! The technology behind ‘Really Simple Syndication (RSS)’ is simple, transparent and requires only minimal technical knowledge. The best thing about it is that RSS is offered by almost all news websites, blogs and online publications. [11, 12]
The concept behind it is similar to an email newsletter. The difference is that in order to receive a newsletter, you have to provide the sender with your email address. Newsletters are then actively sent by the sender to known recipients.
With RSS, it's the other way around. Recipients retrieve the news from the news sites or blogs themselves. The latter have no idea who the recipients are or how many there are.
The so-called RSS reader, sometimes also referred to as a ‘news aggregator’, is simply the software that receives the news and often displays it in a list format for reading. There are a number of really good, up-to-date RSS readers available for all kinds of devices, whether PCs, smartphones, tablets, e-book readers or web browsers.
Another advantage of reading news via RSS reader is that articles can often be read without distractions such as advertising banners, newsletter pop-ups or algorithmic suggestions.
Users can add RSS feeds from a wide variety of news sites to their news aggregator and receive news directly on their own device, without a centralised social media platform as an intermediary, without algorithmic sorting, without advertising and exclusively from sources they have chosen themselves.
The following RSS readers are free of charge and are also Free, Open Source Software (FOSS):
- NetNewsWire (iOS)
- Feeder (Android)
- Thunderbird (Windows, MacOS, Linux)
- NewsFlash (Linux)
- Alligator (Linux)
- FreshRSS (Web)
- und viele weitere...
Using RSS
However, the question remains: how do you find a page's RSS feed? Many websites have their own subpage where they list one or more RSS feeds of their own content. This is what public service news outlets in Germany and the BBC in the United Kingdom do, for example:
- https://www.tagesschau.de/infoservices/rssfeeds
- https://www.deutschlandfunk.de/rss-angebot-102.html
- https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10628494
If such a page does not exist, this does not necessarily mean that the site does not support RSS. Often, you can find lists on third-party sites that catalogue all RSS feeds, such as:
It is therefore very easy to use, even if it may seem a little new and complicated at first. Rediscovering RSS as an old technology will certainly not solve all the problems of the media landscape, but at least it can help to break away from the influence and control of monopolistic tech giants.
Sources
- Bayern Digitalradio (2024): Mediennutzungsanalyse 2023: Fast zehn Stunden tägliche Nutzung von Audio- und audiovisuellen Medien in Deutschland. URL: https://www.bayerndigitalradio.de/2024/02/19/mediennutzungsanalyse-2023-fast-zehn-stunden-taegliche-nutzung-von-audio-und-audiovisuellen-medien-in-deutschland/
- Schwegler, P. (2024): Das Internet wird Nachrichtenquelle Nummer eins. URL: https://blog.medientage.de/das-internet-wird-nachrichtenquelle-nummer-eins
- Harenberg, M. (2024): Social Media als Nachrichtenquelle der Generation Z. URL: https://mediennetzwerk-bayern.de/netzwerkwissen-social-media-nachrichtenquelle-generation-z/
- Leetaru, K. (2017): How Social Media Can Silence Instead Of Empower. URL: https://www.forbes.com/sites/kalevleetaru/2017/10/14/how-social-media-can-silence-instead-of-empower/
- Tanck, K. (2025): Soziale Medien als Zerrspiegel der Gesellschaft. URL: https://netzpolitik.org/2025/psychologinnen-warnen-soziale-medien-als-zerrspiegel-der-gesellschaft/
- Dachwitz, I. (2024): Soziale Medien gehören nicht in die Hand von Milliardären und Konzernen. URL: https://netzpolitik.org/2024/lehren-aus-dem-us-wahlkampf-soziale-medien-gehoeren-nicht-in-die-hand-von-milliardaeren-und-konzernen/
- Weichert, T. (2024): Soziale Spaltung durch Social Media. URL: https://netzpolitik.org/2024/tiktok-und-die-politik-soziale-spaltung-durch-social-media/
- Seiffert, J. (2016): Wie Social Bots Falschmeldungen verbreiten. URL: https://www.deutschlandfunk.de/meinungsmache-im-netz-wie-social-bots-falschmeldungen-100.html
- Frampton, B. (2015): Clickbait: The changing face of online journalism. URL: https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-wales-34213693
- Statista (2024): Entwicklung der verkauften Auflage der Tageszeitungen in Deutschland im jeweils 2. Quartal ausgewählter Jahre von 1991 bis 2024. URL: https://de.statista.com/statistik/daten/studie/72084/umfrage/verkaufte-auflage-von-tageszeitungen-in-deutschland/
- OpenRSS (2023): What are RSS feeds? URL: https://openrss.org/guides/what-are-rss-feeds
- RSS.com (2025): How Do RSS Feeds Work? URL: https://rss.com/blog/how-do-rss-feeds-work/