What is an RSS Feed?

As stated in http://www.whatisrss.com/,

RSS (Rich Site Summary) is a format for delivering regularly changing web content. Many news-related sites, weblogs and other online publishers syndicate their content as an RSS Feed to whoever wants it… RSS solves a problem for people who regularly use the web. It allows you to easily stay informed by retrieving the latest content from the sites you are interested in. You save time by not needing to visit each site individually. You ensure your privacy, by not needing to join each site’s email newsletter. The number of sites offering RSS feeds is growing rapidly and includes big names like Yahoo News.

Sites with RSS Feeds

You can tell if a site has an rss feed if in your toolbar(internat explorer) or address bar(firefox) you see the orange rss feed symbol (on left). You might also see this some where in the site itself. There are two types of feed technologies, Atom & RSS. Most feed readers can read either or both.

Just about every national and local paper has an RSS feed(e.g. New York Times, USA Today, Fort Worth Star Telegram, google your local or interest paper and look for the feed symbol) as does most online version of magazines(e.g. Christianity Today, US News & World Report) websites(e.g. Crosswalk news, Internet Evangelism Bulletin), and other media outlets (e.g. CNN, Fox News, etc.) .  Other pages that have constantly changing content also use RSS feeds. The most ubiquitous use of RSS is in blogs. Blogs use RSS to let people know when new posts have ben published. There is not definitive directory of RSS feeds because new ones are produced every day and many sites have multiple RSS feeds. This site for example has at least 5. You can SUBSCRIBE TO THIS BLOG’S FEED HERE (see on right for way to subscribe via e-mail too) A podcast is a specialized RSS feed of audio items.

How do I read all these feeds?

The beauty of RSS feeds is that you can read all the articles that you are interested in one place via a feed aggregator. Picture getting updated news from all the sources that you are interested in once place to scan an read all in ONE PLACE. An Aggregator, takes all the updated articles, blog posts, updates, etc. and puts them in a single location in a form that you can scan, browse and read. If you use Gmail, MSN, Yahoo, sbcglobal, att, or Hotmail as your primary e-mail providers, there is a good chance you already are using RSS technology without even knowing it. MyYahoo is essentially a RSS feed reader as is GoogleReader, and my.MSN.com. There are other dedicated web and application based feed aggregators like Feed demon, Bloglines, and Newsgator.  (The top 10 free aggregators) Most of these have mobile phone versions as well for when you are on the go. Also many e-mail readers like Mozilla Thuderbird, Windows Live Mail, Microsoft Outlook have the ability to aggregate RSS feeds. As a beginner, it is probably best to use one of the RSS readers that come with your e-mail service. For example, I primarily use MyYahoo but when I want to do heavy ready, I use GoogleReader. GoogleReader is actually the most used feed aggregator on the internet because of its power and its simplicity.

How do I subscribe and read my feeds?

When you find a site with the ubiquitous RSS symbol, merely click on the symbol either on the site or on your browsers’s toolbar or URL bar and you will be given a choice of types of feeds. It really doesn’t matter which you choose. Select one.

In internet explorer, you will be shown some of the feed and there will be a link to subscribe to the feed.

When you click on the link, you will be asked which feed aggregator that the computer knows about to use, chose one and put the “subscribe” button.

In Firefox, on clicking the Feed logo, you will be immediately asked what aggregator you want to read the feed in,

Then your aggregator will ask you if you want to keep the feed and once you confirm that you do, the feed will become one of the many feeds that you track on a regular basis.

Reading the Feed

Once you have subscribed to several feeds, all you have to do is go to your feed aggregator to look at your feeds in one location.

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Is Twitter a website? Not exactly. It can be accessed using the web and many people access it that way, but it can also be accessed using e-mail, text messaging, desktop applications, smart phone applications, web widgets, etc.

“Is twitter the same as an instant messenger?” No, Twitter is not an instant messenger, though you can send and receive messages to people and more importantly groups of people in real time.

“Is twitter text messaging?” No. You and send and receive 140 charater limited tweets (as twitter messages are called) using text messaging but it is not, nor is it designed to be as private.

“Is twitter blogging?”No. While twitter self-describes itself as microblogging, it limites it updates to only 140 characters and most people don’t use it as the columnistic tool that blogs are. It is more designed for short update statements, quick questions for answer by friends, etc.

“Is twitter an e-mail blast?” No. What is posted on Twitter is publicly shown to anyone who goes on your twitter page which is publically accessable to everyone though people can subscribe to your changes as they come to be listed on their twitter page.

“Is twitter the same as Facebook? “ No. Not exactly. While the updates in Facebook are very similar to twitter, facebook is so much more and so so much more cluttered and big. Twitter only focuses on the quick messages and shares them with people who are following you but they are publicly available so other interested people can see it too.

So what is twitter? Here is Wikipedia’s take,

Twitter is a free social networking and micro-blogging service that enables its users to send and read other users’ updates known as tweets. Tweets are text-based posts of up to 140 characters in length which are displayed on the user’s profile page and delivered to other users who have subscribed to them (known as followers). Senders can restrict delivery to those in their circle of friends or, by default, allow anybody to access them. Users can send and receive tweets via the Twitter website, Short Message Service (SMS) or external applications. The service is free to use over the Internet, but using SMS may incur phone service provider fees.

Maybe that makes things more clear, maybe not. In general, twitter is a kind of a “push to talk” system to send information, questions, status updates, your latest recipies, whatever to a group of friends instantly who can then access it using many different ways and then either act on it or ignore it.

So why is this relevant to me?

• Well, twitter is becoming an important communication tool for many people. In the period between December 2008 and May 2009, people who send monthly twitter messages skyrocketed from 1.2 million to nearly 24 million.
• Twitter is a great way to communicate quick information to a large number of people instantly. Lets say all your students are on Twitter, you can let them know of quick changes to plans with one quick message rather than many text messages, e-mails or calls.
• Twitter is a great way to share ideas, solicit for advice, etc. from colleagues. e.g. If you want to know how many Chinese are in Dallas as you prepare for a meeting but you don’t have internet access, just send a tweet to your colleagues and someone might know off the top of their head or might be able to look it up.
• Like free push to talk, Twitter is a great way to coordinate with colleagues, volunteers, students, etc. at a large event that you are either attending, organizing, etc. (e.g. deciding on the fly what workshops to divide on conquer on at a conference or creating reaction to a talk at conferenc while it happens or planning ad hoc meetings at a conference on the fly, or using twitter as a way to get questions from the audience during a presentation that the speaker can answer – like the old index cards)
• Like Facebook, Twitter is another way to keep a pulse on what is going on with your students and what questions they are pondering and what life issues they are facing.
• You can get raw data updates about disasters, weather, news, etc. as it happens. When the earthquake hit ChengDu in 2008, the news hit Twitter before it hit CNN. In addition, when there are disasters, many agencies are using twitter as a way to let people know what is going on, where to go, what to do, how to contact friends, family, etc.
• If you need more private communication, especially within your ministry organization… a push to talk for your team,  there are parallel services like yammer.com. Yammer.com connects you only to people with the same e-mail domain name (e.g. all the people with e-mail ending with isiwebnet.net) This presumably makes all your messages available to people only in your organization or company. This allows you to ask question, share ideas, etc. with your whole ministry, local team, ad-hoc teams, etc. This greases the skids for cross-talk and dialogue and it can be instantaneous or delayed depending on how often a staff member gets updates. We have used it extensively for our Dallas ISI team which is geographically spread out but coordinates much on many things.

Anyway, as I said, Twitter (or Yammer) is hard to understand unless you use it and find a bunch of followers and friends. Play with it, and try it out. Go to twitter.com. I’d be willing to be your friend. My twitter page is, http://twitter.com/rmyabuki. Follow me and give me a tweet.

Here is another great article about Twitter and its uses in Ministry. Little dated but great way to get more ideas on how to use twitter in ministry, some of the specific applications, advice, etc.

Here is a list of other articles related to twitter from this page…

See discussion on the potential of Twitter from Christians or other users:

• The Digital Sanctuary [http://thedigitalsanctuary.org/how-micro-blogging-will-win-converts]
• Leadership Network. [http://digital.leadnet.org/2008/04/how-to-use-twit.html]
• Michael Hyatt [www.michaelhyatt.com/fromwhereisit/2008/05/12-reasons-to-s.html]&
• Rhett Smith [www.rhettsmith.com/?p=1439]
• Guy Kawasaki [http://blog.guykawasaki.com/2008/11/looking-for-m-1.html]
• 11 Innovative Uses for Twitter [http://www.sitepronews.com/archives/2009/jan/2.html]
• The Reason Your Church Must Twitter.

Other useful Twitter related posts and pages…

• Newbies Guide to Twitter
• Top twittering pastors (on twitter)
• A Twitter Ministry Strategy: Listening
• Twitter for Ministry and Church: A Business Perspective

Funding Your Ministry Conference

1. General Comments/info

1.1. Partnership development(PD) is Ministry and a deeply spiritual endeavor.

1.2. Every support appointment is a divine appointment, just as much as a witnessing opportunity.

1.3. In PD, we are challenging people and giving them the opportunity to be devoted to the Lord and invest in His kingdom work. PD is about connecting people to God’s heart.

1.4. God wants us to live dependent upon Him and interdependent with others.

1.5. Go to the right/worthy people who are deserving and feel privileged to be part of your support team. Matthew 10:5-16 1.6. Bless your donors and give of yourselves (Time, calls, notes, emails, gifts, meals etc.).

1.7. We represent Christ and are following Him in obedience. They’re rejecting Him, not us.

1.8. We bring powerful spiritual authority into fund raising. It is a two-way relationship – ”Freely you have received, freely give.”

1.9. We have a divine calling and are worthy of our wage.

1.10. No matter how desperate a need may seem, a Christian’s need to give is far greater than the one who has the need to receive.

1.11. We are blessing Brokers – Connecting people to the head of God and opportunity to transfer their earthly treasures that will not last to treasures in heaven that will last forever.

1.12. Need to use both email and printed newsletters to communicate with donors and prospective donors.

2. Recruiting and Keeping Anchor Donors

2.1, it’s all about relationships, ministering to people aid connecting with their heart.

2.2. Relationships that are caring and genuine.

2.3. More about them and what is going on in their life.

2.4. Key Factors:

2.4.1. Integrity

2.4.2. Effective Listening (builds trust and demonstrates interest and care)

2.5. Cast a bigger vision.

2.6. Donors need to know that I am walking with Jesus, loving Him and see the reality of His presence and work in my life.

2.7. Giving follows ministry. Minister to others deeply in their hearts and lives.

2.8. The road to a bigger gift, isn’t a bigger ask. It’s a process of developing the relationship and making a personal connection.

2.9. Need long-term funding strategy.

2.10. Give donors your time, regularly conned with them.

2.11. Major Donor Lists:

2.11.1. Who do you know that owns a business?

2.11.2. Professions like lawyer, doctor, engineer, archived, CPA’s, etc.

2.11.3. High-level executives

2.11.4. Inheritance (wealth being passed on)

3. Successful Support Raising in a Down Economy

3.1. Review your Calling (sense of conviction of the calling). During discus times God does a deeper work in our lives and draws us closer to Himself.

3.2. Don’t Panic – Look to God and trust Him (Psalm 73125-26)

3.3. Diverse your donors more broadly (Luke 8:2-3)

3.4. Focus on the Essentials, not the Electives (Needs vs. Wants). Reduce expenses, pay down debt, increase savings, etc.

3.5. Empathize with suppliers and pray for them (Galatians 6:2)

3.6. Keep the vision of your ministry in the forefront (Rev. 7:9). Supportraising is about vision and relationships.

3.7. Facebook –the support raisers new best friend. Great way to reconnect with old friends.

3.8. Get Back to the Basics – Communication, Face-to-Face meetings, Care and Prayer.

3.9. View it as a wakeup call – 1) Get finances in order, 2) Savings, 3) Budget 4) Giving

3.10. Get Donors personally engaged and involved in the ministry.

Jeff also shared Steve Shadrach’s Article, “The Most “Secure” Job You’ll Ever Have!” from http://thebodybuilders.net/srs/may08.html as an encouragement to us all.

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This is a place to hear about some great ideas in international ministry and how people are using technology to touch more students’ lives. We will also discuss how to use some of the key technology tools and answer some of your technology questions. (Please send us questions using the forum system) There is also a forum to throw up ideas and questions and see how people respond. We’ll try to post something new every week.