Has the RSS Wagon Stalled?

Thanks to Nick Bradbury, I was in San Diego today giving a hands-on tutorial in blogging and news feeds to a group of foundation execs at the Council on Foundations' annual conference. Mindy, the Mommy Blogger, was there - so I didn't feel like the only citizen from the blogosphere in the room.

During the 90-minute session everyone in the room learned how to launch a Blogger weblog and read some RSS feeds in FeedDemon. The group did an excellent job grasping the benefits of RSS as well as the process of finding and subscribing to feeds. Still, as any discussion of RSS always necessitates, it took a lot of explaining - even for this sophisticated group. So I have to wonder, will the RSS adoption wagon stall because it requires too much effort?

Last week when I Starbucked with Dave Winer, he emphatically said that "we" don't have to push RSS more mainstream. Some will choose to use it, others won't - just like some still pooh pooh the Web. I also separately had the chance to connect with Don Loeb at Yahoo. It's clear his team is always thinking about how to make RSS easier.

Still, the question gnaws at me - what's it gonna take? What's going to "tip" it? Will RSS tip further? I sure hope so. However, if one-click subscribe links to the two largest portals in the world can't tip it on the user side, what will?

At one time I thought it would be commerce feeds, but now I am not so sure. The info junkies may already all be on RSS and the rest of the world might remain content receiving their email newsletters. Of course, maybe Dave is right. It's alright if RSS adoption plateaus. My concern is that if the feed consuming population doesn't grow then maybe publishing on the corporate side won't take off as hoped.