RSSMicro and FeedCamp have been out since 2006, trying to measure hot topics, popular RSS feeds and offer a broad search engine through millions of feeds. (See Search Engine Journal for a 2006 review.) In the last week, RSSMicro introduced a new measure they call FeedRank, which utilizes an algorithm they claim taps into a feed's updating frequency, quality of content, and whether the sites are "known", to deliver a numerical score, graded on a steep curve.
The new FeedRank is said to have eliminated many spam Web sites through ensuring the quality of the content on the source, and its unique information across articles. But even if you think you are a top content producer, you might be surprised at how poorly you're rated. In fact, only 1% of all feeds rate better than 7 of 10. 3% rank as a 6, 6% as a 5, and 9% garnered a score of 4. The vast majority of blogs (including this one) get a score of 3/10 or less.Given the preponderance of low scores, I'd be surprised if most bloggers would want to display their FeedRank.
But outside of that single measurement, RSSMicro, and its companion site, FeedCamp, could give the much more popular Google News and Google Trends a run for their money - if anybody knew about them, or if they worked harder to make their site look current.
Today's Top News and Images are Political, Of Course
The main RSSMicro page highlights top news, videos and images from almost 6,000 different news sources, on top of the more than 4 million RSS feeds they say they scour with their search engine.
The FeedCamp site, powered by RSSMicro, shows the top terms across the many feeds they cover. Unsurprisingly, you see terms like Obama, McCain, Election, Palin and Voters atop today's list. You can also delve into the archive to find out what terms were popular at any date, starting with June 9th of 2007. At that time, Bush and Iraq were top topics, but today's presidential candidates were nowhere to be seen. Flash forward to November 1, 2007, and Clinton ranked as the #7 topic, with Obama as #43. McCain didn't crack the top 100.The sites are worth checking out, especially for trends, assuming somebody can crack the code and track keywords over time.
If you are interested in seeing where your feed sits in FeedRank, use the FeedRank Checker on this page. And if you crack a 4 out of 10 or higher, consider yourself privileged.