A web feed is an XML-based document which contains a sequence of information content items, each of which is a short story or "post", possibly with a link to a more extensive story on a web site. Web logs or blogs are a common source for web feeds, but web feeds may also be associated with information sources other than blogs.
Web feeds are commonly in RSS or Atom "feed" format. They may also be in RDF format.
The term syndication is used to describe the availability of a web feed for an information source, such as a blog. This is also known as "publishing" a feed.
The term aggregation is used to describe the process of combining the contents of multiple web feeds, such as for display on a single web page. This is also known as "subscribing" to a web feed.
Web feeds are designed to be machine readable, so there is no requirement that they be destined only for user consumption. For example, business partners could use web feeds to exchange information without any user intervention.
See also: Atom (standard), RSS (protocol)
