Feed Pirates: Gray Market XML Syndication
The current model for content syndication is about to change and so will the web – are we ready? More and more content is being offered as syndicated XML feeds (RSS/Atom) to which consumers are encouraged subscribe. It has been generally assumed by content creators that their feeds will be consumed directly by their subscribers and offered only by the feed aggregators they submit to, i.e. Technorati, Feedburner, MXNA, Feed-Squirrel, etc. However, there is now a significant trend in RIA development toward applications that consume, combine, republish and potentially re-brand both syndicated content and web services. When this idea of ‘mashups’ originally surfaced a few years ago, it was generally applauded as a positive advancement to an otherwise stagnant web model and has played a key role in what we now call Web 2.0. But the original mashups centered primarily on exposed/public web services offered with expressed permission from the service owners. The eventual inclusion of syndicated RSS/Atom feeds was more of an afterthought and raised few eyebrows. Today, we are beginning to see the culmination of past mashups into a new generation of powerful tools and enterprise level applications that allow not only individual users, but also 3rd party commercial ventures to repurpose syndicated content.
Similar to the effect BitTorrent/P2P has had on file sharing, syndication mashups are poised to wreak havoc on the world of copyrights. In its simplest form, this can be as innocuous as a cloned blog or web portal. But the real potential of this technology is much more insidious. The Web is very much driven by content – text, photos, audio and video – and companies make billions of dollars leveraging their content with advertising and sales. The modern mashup, however, can circumvent this economy and serve content with or without advertising and for purposes not intended by the content owners. Granted, this has always been possible on the web, only now there are tools and infrastructure in place to automate this process. Whereas before, there was a very deliberate action required to steal someones work, now there is software that does it automatically and because the content is extracted from a ‘public’ feed, it can be implied that the content is free for unrestricted use. Also of note, many web service APIs require users to sign a TOS agreement in order to receive an access key. If the user fails to meet the terms of the agreement, the key can be revoked. Aside from the ‘opt-out’ policies offered by services like Dapper and Y! Pipes, there are no such safeguards in place for RSS/Atom syndication.
Ok, so this post is getting a little long-winded (for me) and the hyperbole is likely wearing a little thin (for you), so I’ll wrap it up (for now) with some links to the kinds of tools and services I described. Please note, I am by no means slamming these applications or their creators. I actually think these tools are quite useful and I wish nothing but the best for the clever folks creating them. My intention is only to state how powerful these tools are and that if we’ve learned anything from the Web in the last 15 years, it’s that the responsibility inherent with this power is likely to be abused. Regardless, it should be a fun ride (until the lawyers pull the plug). 
Check out:
Y! Pipes : Dapper : QEDWiki : openkapow : RSSBus : Grazr
