Do you prefer RSS or Atom?

[Saif]

I maintain both an RSS and Atom feed for reasons unknown to even myself, but something I've noticed is that Atom feeds are just not popular at all from what I've seen.

I think the reason why is because there's a surprising lack of anything that talks about Atom feeds or explains how to make one besides using a static site generator. It makes me pretty sad because Atom feeds support relative URLs which is a huge plus for me!

The only tutorial I could find used invalid markup as an example which made my feed unusable, and the other page I could find was the W3C page about it, which is nice, but it'd be really nice to also see more cool guides about how to make an Atom feed, which I did make one, but still. :'(

I do admit that RSS is easier to use overall, though. You dont have to create a specific type of ID, and then try to figure out the weird format you have to use for the date, and stuff like that. There also aren't as many tools like RuSShdown for Atom (or I haven't seen any. Sigh.)

Anyways, enough rambling. Let me know your thoughts! If I had to choose between the two, I'd say Atom.

[schlime9k]

It's all a matter of preference, but for simplicity sake, I prefer standard RSS, though Atom is generally considered a better, more "standardised" protocol.

The thing is, around 99% of readers (very fake percentage) all read both RSS and Atom perfectly, so it doesn't matter in the slightest which one you use on the consumer side of things. So whichever one you wanna use, go 'head! It's probably a good thing Atom is very strict when it comes to validation, because my RSS is, unsurprisingly, not up to RSS validation standards :(

[lakes]

I only know how to code standard RSS. So when it comes to my personal website, I just use that. But if I'm subbing to a feed and it lets me select between Atom and RSS or even those 2 and RDF, I always choose Atom.
It doesn't matter too much. But I hear it's more secure so * shrugs *

[Dan Q]

Atom is the better-written standard. RSS is the better-established standard.

I don't think it matters much nowadays. Readers tend to be agnostic. Pick one for your site; both only if you're using an SSG or CMS!

[Xyphien]

I've grew up with RSS so I'll always prefer that to be honest!

[Saif]

Yeah, it doesn't really matter in the end, but Atom feeds are pretty nice. I'll always have love for RSS in my heart, too. :-)

Pick one for your site; both only if you're using an SSG or CMS!

Sigh... I might have to forfeit my RSS feed after all, haha.