>There are too many unexplained steps, and the benefits are unclear.
You are 100% correct with this. But not only that is the problem. There are too many sites that don't offer obvious RSS feeds. Like YouTube. I don't have a google account, but I still want to follow some channels. What would be the best way? Right RSS, but YouTube doesn't offer that really obviously. So here is how you follow a youtube channel with RSS:
1) Klick on a YouTube Video from a channel you want to follow
2) From there click on the youtube channel (Doesn't work if you directly click on the channel from the serach)
My favourite rss reader NewsBlur (no affil, just very happy user) allows subscribing to YouTube channels just by entering its URL - no need to digging for RSS feed :)
You are 100% correct with this. But not only that is the problem. There are too many sites that don't offer obvious RSS feeds. Like YouTube. I don't have a google account, but I still want to follow some channels. What would be the best way? Right RSS, but YouTube doesn't offer that really obviously. So here is how you follow a youtube channel with RSS:
1) Klick on a YouTube Video from a channel you want to follow
2) From there click on the youtube channel (Doesn't work if you directly click on the channel from the serach)
3) Then you have the url https://www.youtube.com/channel/<channel-ID-here> (for example colinfurze's channel ID would be UCp68_FLety0O-n9QU6phsgw
4) Now the last thing left is combine that channel ID with the following: https://www.youtube.com/feeds/videos.xml?channel_id=<channel... and add it to your RSS feed! (For example the full colinfurze url would be: https://www.youtube.com/feeds/videos.xml?channel_id=UCp68_FL... ) Easy, isn't it? :)