I noticed that issue with the news.opml for the google feed, as well.  When, I looked at your code and that code, I think I found out why.  Somewhere in the rendering scripts, the length of the content needs to be specified, otherwise it does not work correctly.  Still not completely through the code, but take a look at the example below:

Doesn't show the 'pictures' issue - actually gifs or images or other types of linked content

  <outline text="World News" type="rss" category="Category" xmlUrl="http://feeds.reuters.com/reuters/worldNews" />
  

Does render the 'pictures' and linked content

<outline text="World News" type="rss" category="Category/@@3000px" xmlUrl="http://feeds.reuters.com/reuters/worldNews" />

The difference being that the code appears to use the '/@@####px'  qualifier in the category attribute to specify length of the content.  I suspect without it, the missing links can't be rendered properly.

Change your opml to include that specification and it works.

Now, you could try placing a News.opml file in your Portals/0 area to see if it picks up that text file for you.  Remember, the opml text in the custom text area only uses the outline parts of the opml, and the text file has to have the opml header and end tags, as I showed earlier.

Try it out, and let me know how it goes.

Well, it's a browser object, though I can see why you say iframe, because that's what it looks like.  Category/@@####px is the page length of the content, not the width.  If you change it to 600 rather than 3000, you'll see that a scroll bar show up to allow vertical scrolling not horizontal, at least that's what my implementation shows.

As far as adding value, well that's a personal assessment.  I see it as a very useful module, if for this reason alone - it allows me to place catergorized content in a news agregatted format on my site.  What you do with it is up to you, but if you don't think it has value, you don't have to use it, I'm just offering my views on it, and helping document the setup, and config stuff that folks won't find easily.

If you read my blog, the value I find in using this type of module is that I need that type of functionality to help keep up with all of the technical information that encompasses my job as an administrator. Could I do it with other apps, yes.  The thing that I like about it, though, is that DNN includes it.  I've got my own news application agregattor windows application, but this module allows me to have access to my custom opml from the web, not tied to my laptop, or desktop workstation.  So, I'll be exploiting it as long as it is available.

If you have a site that markets products, you can create a custom opml file that lists them and links to product descriptions, just like the Solution Explorer does.  I think that is more than value returned enough for me.  But as in all things, you have to decide for yourself.

Cheers