Although we have many people subscribing to the AgWired rss feed (http://feeds.feedburner.com/Agwired) what happens if you don’t want all our news? Wouldn’t it be cool if you could just subscribe to the content you’re most interested in?
Well you can. Here’s how:
Let’s say you work for an advertising agency and would just like to subscribe to news we give the Agency category to. That’s easy to find using our drop down menu of Categories which you’ll find in the left sidebar. The Agency category is this: http://agwired.com/category/agency/.
So to make that into a news feed (rss) that your news reader of choice will recognize, just add the word feed to the end of the url. There you go. A custom rss feed of all our agency categorized news. The url now looks like this: http://agwired.com/category/agency/feed.
This works for any of our categories and we’ve got 177 to choose from! So perhaps you’d like to just subscribe to news posts for John Deere, just add the word “feed” to that category url and here’s the url you use to subscribe with: http://agwired.com/category/john-deere/feed
Make sense? Easy isn’t it?
Let me add one more little item of trickery for you. Since you know we post so much audio and you may or may not want to listen to it on your computer how about if you create a podcast of our audio. Yes, you heard me right. Do the same thing I described above but use iTunes or some other podcatching software to subscribe. It will only search and pull from posts that have audio posted in them and by category or from our main rss feed, your choice. Try it. Then your iTunes will pull the audio into your computer and you can sync it to your iPod to listen to when and where you want.
Let me know if you have any problems. So for those of you who still aren’t using a news reader or subscribing to and listening to podcasts, here’s a few suggested links for you:
News Reader Software:
NewsGator – Has a web, PC, Mac and iPhone version and they all sync with each other. My favorite.
Internet Explorer – Yes your browser will do this for you. Here’s a How-To.
Firefox – Same goes for this browser.
Google Reader
Most email programs do this now to.
Podcast software:
iTunes – The best in my opinion and for either Mac or PC. Here’s a How-To.
A media event at World Pork Expo sponsored by 
Dr. Greg Stevenson with the Iowa State University Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory discussed swine influenza testing and USDA surveillance for swine flu. It was a pretty technical presentation that detailed the genetic difference between the H1N1 virus in humans and in swine. “When the USDA is going to be talking about surveillance, they’re going to be calling it H1N1 Flu Outbreak Virus (FOV), trying to distinguish it from the H1N1 that is in the swine population now in the U.S.,” said Dr. Stevenson. “We’ve got to talk about it intelligently and we’ve got to be careful to distinguish the two for the sake of the swine industry.” To talk intelligently about it, he says we’re all going to have to become virologists, and he proceeded to give a crash course in virology in 25 minutes. Learn more here. 
On the PCV2 control front, there is some good news for producers. Dr. Joe Connor, president of Carthage Veterinary Service, gave an update on PCV2 vaccines. Specifically, he talked about the efficacy of 
Attendance was down a bit at World Pork Expo this year due primarily to the impact of the H1N1 virus or “swine flu,” which kept away many international visitors who would normally attend. Washing and sanitizing of hands was stressed more than normal and the flu was a topic of press conferences, media interviews and general conversation.
As we all know, the “epidemic” started in Mexico, and I talked with Jorge Gonzalez, Novus International sales manager for northern Latin America, about the impact it has had on the pork industry in Mexico. “The name of the virus, swine flu, affected the consumption in Mexico,” Jorge said. “Consumption decreased 30 percent so the pork producers are in a very bad situation.” Like the U.S., Mexico has also been impacted by restrictions on pork imports from North America imposed by China and Russia.
Seriously, what would a pork expo be without racing pigs? While World Pork Expo is a serious event for producers who want to find out the latest information about their industry, it’s also a family event with fun stuff like pig races. 
Dr. Laura Greiner, who does research for Innovative Swine Solutions and 
On the production side, we heard from Kathy Chinn with Chinn Hog Farm in northeast Missouri. Kathy is a former Missouri state representative who is very active in the agriculture and pork industry on both the state and national level and a real positive voice and face for agriculture. It was very interesting to hear her talk about their family operation, which includes her two sons and her grandchildren, and how they faced the challenges of farming in their community and grown better because of it. She is a strong advocate of telling agriculture’s story and being involved on a community level – and she is really a neat, impressive and interesting lady.
A packed house gathered within the historic walls of the Kansas City Club, May 22, 2009, to celebrate four of the region’s most inspiring business leaders being honored by The Agricultural Business Council of Kansas City. The 2009 Award for Agricultural Leadership and Excellence, named in honor of the late Jay B. Dillingham, was awarded to R. Crosby Kemper, Jr., UMB Financial Corporation; Joerg Ohle, Bayer Animal Health and Morton Sosland, Sosland Publishing for outstanding contributions to agricultural and food related businesses. The Outstanding Volunteer of the Year went to Gina Bowman, CVR Energy.
Another simply gorgeous day for the World Pork Expo. Today is the last day for the event – a change from previous years. The expo used to start on Thursday and end Saturday afternoon, shortly before judging of the