Atom (standard): Meaning (information, definition, explanation, facts)

Atom is a web standard similar to RSS. It was created to solve the problem of confusion created by having parallel standards for RSS (namely Really Simple Syndication and RDF Site Summary) and create a new more flexible web syndication format and API. However, critics would argue that rather than resolving the issue of competing standards, it has merely created an additional standard to compete with those it was meant to replace.

This is a work in progress and has gone through many names including Echo and finally settling on Atom. As of March 2004, the latest Atom standard is Atom 0.3.