RSS from a Content-Provider's Perspective

From a technical perspective, an RSS feed is a small data file (typically under 10KB) that a site (or subsection of a site, whatever) makes available, which lists the most recent items at that site. The file is in a simple dialect of XML; the file is meant to be autogenerated from the rest of the site -- say, from the site's content-management system, or by having a little program that just reads part of an HTML page (like the site's main page) and summarizes it in RSS.

By notifying people interested in your content, as well as Web sites that collect and package content announcements (called aggregators), you are "feeding" them your content – hence the term RSS feed.