As the author of an RSS reader, I would agree with most of that article, except the HTML / Styling section. It is full of misleading information.<p>1. You can use CSS, but expect that most readers will completely ignore it. Even widespread ones, like Feedly. Those that do support it will only offer a small subset, like text styles. No layout styles (positioning or flex-layouts), often not even colors. If you want to try the capabilities of your reader, this is a test feed: <a href="https://test-rss.downread.com/styles.rss.xml" rel="nofollow">https://test-rss.downread.com/styles.rss.xml</a><p>2. Don't just prefer inline CSS, use it, because any sane RSS reader will filter <style>.<p>3. Yes, semantic elements will generally work. And not only those listed: also things like <table>, <figure>, and sometimes <aside>.<p>4. Agree about JavaScript. Don't use it.<p>5. Decent readers will support <video> and <audio>. But <iframes> are even better, as long as you use common providers, especially YouTube. Embeds from X, Instagram, and Facebook are also relatively widely supported.<p>6. Agree about forms. At best, they will be used as rendering hints, but forms won't work.
I’d be interested to hear a bit about your reader.<p>I keep coming back to RSS, but that sadly also means I keep forgetting about it. How do you build the habit and routine?
Well, it's downread.com, still in beta, but very usable and nearly feature-complete. Not sure what else to say. I strive to make it better than the competition :) HTML/Styles is one aspect. I am not aware of any other RSS reader that supports styles in articles as well. Downread even supports CSS, CMS-specific CSS classes, Tailwind, and custom styling for difficult, popular feeds.<p>Regarding the habit... I don't know, doing it forever. Whenever I have a moment to read, I open it. Before Downread, it was Feedly, and before Feedly, Google Reader, and before Google Reader, I don't know, some desktop app. It's pretty much the only way I read, and I read a lot.
I didn't know I could insert iframes, but now I see that I can I'll update my RSS feeds with this, thanks!