RollingStone.com is Very Smart

August 18, 2003

A couple weeks ago RollingStone.com released XML feeds (towards the bottom of the page) for a reviews, news, photos and videos. Immediately I thought, "yes." This is what I had been waiting for. Tonight, they introduced an XML artist search that allows you to create an XML feed for any of the artists they have in their database.* It is awesome. I already have six in NetNewsWire and I think that every news site should have something like this.

Aside from these features Rolling Stone has a very robust site with a lot of original content. I would definitely frequent it more if I listened to a lot of mainstream music. Already I'm tempting to go there more often solely because of this great service, but I digress. Compare and contrast this to the site of my former employer, Spin (I was an intern). Aside from the site having an ugly, cookie-cutter design and being user-mean (not user-friendly), it offers up only a few things that are interesting. It is the perfect example of a company feeling forced to have a website. I don't mean any disrespect to Spin people as I think they write well, work hard and I still enjoy the magazine, but the site is crap.

In order for get me to come back to your site I want to have something that is useful and I don't feel that Spin is providing that to me. Rolling Stone is. On the other hand, I subscribe to Spin and I haven't bought a copy of RS in months. But, that is because of the content of the magazines and not their websites. So, if the purpose of the website is to promote the magazine then I think Rolling Stone is blowing Spin out of the water.

*Link via the Shifted Librarian

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