Archive of UserLand's first discussion group, started October 5, 1998.

scriptingNews outline for 6/8/2000

Author:Dave Winer
Posted:6/8/2000; 6:00:11 AM
Topic:scriptingNews outline for 6/8/2000
Msg #:17641
Prev/Next:17640 / 17642

What the Web Wants

DaveNet: What the Web Wants.

BTW, this piece will not go out via email. If you know someone who reads DaveNet via email, please send them a pointer.

It's an important piece, imho, but I no longer wish to distribute essays via email. I want to be able to edit as the day goes by, as I do with Scripting News, because I expect to learn a lot as people read it. I want DaveNet to become a way for me to write whitepapers that have more lasting value.

FAQ

Mike Seaman: "Do you really believe that it is possible to create a viable business (BrowserCo) as you described it? Where would it get its revenue from, given that people are used to getting their browser for free and are (it seems to me) pretty unlikely to be willing to start paying?"

Answer: They would be free to go anywhere they want. Think about a browser tightly integrated with Linux, intelligently, thoughtfully, around a vision of the Two Way Web. They could also compete with Yahoo, who desperately needs competition.

Themes

Last night Themes shipped! Yay Brent.

All the pointers are on inessential.com, Brent's weblog.

A Manila site that's adopted one of the new themes.

What does RSS stand for?

It looks like the RSS 0.91 spec is sticky.

No flames yet, some good posts on the Syndication mail list and a few bug reports which I have fixed. I think I've got them all. Please have another read and post a report.

The number one FAQ is What is RSS an acronym for? Good question. On every revision it's stood for something different. It started life as a dialect of RDF, Netscape was the leading proponent of RDF in W3C, but when Guha left, the interest waned. So I'm pretty sure that the R stood for RDF. And I think the two S's stood for Site and Summary.

Then in the second rev, with RDF behind them, the R was changed to stand for Rich. Why rich? Sounds pretty Microsofty to me. So I think it should stand for Really. Or maybe realllllly? It's easier than Rich. ";->"

Then what about the two S's?

Well, seems to me that one of the S's should stand for Syndication, because that's what the format is for. Right?

And then what does everyone say about RSS?

It's really simple.

And there you have it.

You decide

Survey: What does RSS stand for?

More serious notes

Edd Dumbill: "Things currently look like there may well be two threads of development: an 'RSS2' format, and a longer-term effort to provide useful, practical applications of RDF that work well over the Web--hopefully learning from the success of RSS."

Jason Levine highlights the portions of Scripting News that don't appear in the RSSization of Scripting News.

Microsoft pointers

Cameron Barrett: A World Without Microsoft.

WSJ: Microsoft damaged its own credibility in court.

MacWEEK has an excellent collection of links on Microsoft.

NY Times editorial: "Judge Jackson sided completely with the government in part because he mistrusts the company."

Washington Post editorial: "Judge Jackson has alleviated the time problem somewhat by imposing interim restrictions on Microsoft's business practices. Microsoft has asked that these be stayed, but they should not be. They should go into effect to provide the public with protection from Microsoft misconduct while the appeals are pending."

Dan Gillmor: "Microsoft and its leaders continue to operate in state of denial. Perhaps they'll turn out to be correct, that the antitrust laws don't apply to what they do. That would be a fearsome finding for competition in the Internet Age, and I find it difficult to believe the higher courts will make such a ruling once they fully understand what's at issue here."

Bruce Ramsay: "McKenzie argues that the browser battle was a sideshow, and that the main battle was over their own turf, the server market. The rivals' aim was to neuter Microsoft, making a hard-driving warrior into a tea-and-crumpets competitor."

SF Chronicle editorial: "Guessing the future is tricky business, a hard challenge for any federal judge to take on in Microsoft's case. Yet that is precisely what federal regulators are asking in this case. Careful thought about the future is missing from the legal equation in drawing up new ground rules."

WSJ: Dividing Microsoft in two isn't just simple arithmetic.

Links

News.Com: "International financier George Soros today said the Russian Internet is a hot investment and he would consider again investing in the country where he made what he called the worst bet of his career."

Surprise: "In Europe there are no blocks, we simply don't think in blocks. We explain which streets to take and the streets have names, which I don't always remember, but I know how to get there: I remember specific buildings, shops, an old church , a nice little bakery where you can smell the fresh bread from a distance, that is how I find my way through the cities."

Wired: NSI's Webjacking Epidemic. "After several days of wrangling with Network Solutions and Open SRS -- the Canadian registrar to which the stolen domains were transferred -- Meckler has his domains back, but not his confidence in Network Solutions."

Dale Dougherty: Frontier a la Neuberg. "His writing is very accessible to the non-programmer -- he really believes that anyone can learn to program, and a scripting language should make it even easier. Some of this can be explained by the combintation of Matt's interests in the classics and computing, which makes him a kindred spirit of quite a few editors at O'Reilly, including Tim."

Check this out: http://www.spellchecker.net/.

Andrea has discovered the magic flow-building properties of Wiener Schnitzel.



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