Using iGoogle to follow this blog, and other (less awesome) news feeds (beginner)

For those of you who still think that a homepage is just the first page in front of you when you open your web browser, I’ve got some great news for you. Your homepage can become a broad, informative, interesting, time absorbing creature in no time at all.

Enter iGoogle: RSS Reader extraordinaire. Because this is a blog for people who don’t computer good, I’m going to assume you don’t know what RSS is. Basically, most sites that have regularly updated info on them will provide “RSS feeds” that can be added to pages like iGoogle. It puts a little box on your page with the latest headlines on it that you can then follow to the story. So basically, if you can imagine a page covered in RSS feeds, with the top headlines from all your favourite websites on one page, you have iGoogle.

You have to have an iGoogle account, and then you just sign in at igoogle.com. From there it’s pretty straight forward to add Tabs for different categories of websites you like, change themes, add stuff, and a whole lot more.

Once that’s set up, you can add stuff on the fly. Say, for example, you want to add this blog to your RSS feeds on your iGoogle page. If you’re using Firefox, take a look on the right side of the address bar for this:

You probably don’t have the folder icon, (which is part of a sweet program i’ll be talking about another time), but you will see the orange RSS button. Click that, and you’re pretty much good to go.

If, for some filthy reason, you’re still using Internet Explorer, you can still do this. You want to look for the same button to the right of your tabs, below the address bar:

At this point, the process for either browser is about the same.

iGoogle is the first step to getting more of the news you want, when really all you wanted to do was check your email. Use this power wisely.

If you’re already familiar with iGoogle and have something to add, or if you have any questions, leave a comment!