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

scriptingNews outline for 4/3/00

Author:Dave Winer
Posted:4/3/2000; 5:48:42 AM
Topic:scriptingNews outline for 4/3/00
Msg #:15876
Prev/Next:15875 / 15877

UserLand is now a member of W3C.

Timezone support is working on the WorldLink site. Even though it's hosted at Exodus in Silicon Valley, the site thinks it's in the UK. (In British "summer" time.) All other sites on that server think they're in the Pacific time zone. The world gets more virtual all the time!

Now the timezone of your Manila site is a preference.

David Brown is working on getting Pike and Zope working together. Please help him. This is a Good Thing. ";->"

Joel Spolsky: Incentive Pay Considered Harmful. "You would get a big lucite tombstone the size of a dictionary when your product shipped. This was somehow supposed to give you an incentive to work, you see, because if you didn't do your job-- no lucite for you! Makes you wonder how Microsoft ever shipped software before the lucite slab."

This is interesting. We don't have formal reviews at UserLand. I always thought this was a shortcoming, but now, after reading Joel's piece, I don't feel that way. Also, I like to give new stock options to everyone in the company when the group achieves a milestone. One person's great performance can result in more stock for everyone. I do it this way to enforce my constant message that teamwork is what matters most to me. People relying on and helping others in the group. And no one is incentivized to watch a problem go unsolved.

A very annoying Encoding Bug in Manila Express has been fixed. If you use it all the time, as I do, it must have driven you crazy that it chopped off all of the URL after the ?. Goodbye!

NY Times: Judge Finds Microsoft Guilty of Antitrust Law Violations. "The question now is what remedies the judge will propose. They could include curbs on Microsoft's business practices to a basic restructuring of the 25-year-old company based in the Seattle area. Judge Jackson will now turn his attention to that phase of the case."

Other reports: MSNBC, News.Com, Wired, Washington Post, Seattle Times, TechWeb.

David Weinberger: "The days in which the CEO can stand up and make a CEO-like presentation and not sound like a frightened windbag are already here."

Jakob Nielsen: "Users hate redesigns. Even if the original design was miserable, any user who has suffered through the pains of learning it will rather continue to use what he or she already knows than learning something new." Amen!

You know spring is here when the wisteria blooms.

Yankee Fan Weblog: Happy Opening Day!

I can't tell you how many times I've gotten emails from people who start by explaining how much money they've spent on UserLand products and then tell me they want me to do this or that on Scripting News. If you create a link between the two, your idea will be rejected immediately, often with a stern response. Imagine trying to tell the NY Times what to cover editorially because you bought an ad from them.

The AppleScript Weblog shows signs of being frequently updated. Keep on going, we need more sites like this.

I wonder why Queso.Weblogs.Com is the #2 site on the Weblogs.Com Top 100 List? (It's just a redirect to Jason Levine's real site.)

Last night watching The Simpsons I saw my first Epinions TV ad. I want to heartily congratulate them on a very powerful story. I knew it was an Epinions ad long before the ad identified itself as being from them, and I had never seen one before, and had no reason to expect it. A guy in a tent, explaining how great the tent is. In the back of a pickup truck going through a car wash. The guy is a true believer. What a great way to demonstrate that. Epinions is a powerful idea. It's going to merge with TV. You'll see. Congratulations to the Epinions team for getting to the mass market first.

Epinions is a content management system on my Two Way Web Whiteboard.

Discuss: Let's talk about macros. "Macros can be very powerful. Maybe that's why people have trouble wrapping their minds around them."

Screen shot of Pike editing Weblogs.Com home page.

Dan Gillmor: Why Microsoft Couldn't Settle. "The qualities that make the company so great in many ways are part of the same corporate DNA that produces such famously mean-spirited and sleazy behavior."

Fortune: Fortune 1000 list.

Bill Joy: Why the future doesn't need us.

MSNBC: Microsoft Campus Bombed. "I've been after them for quite a while to open up their code, to tear down the walls, to let in the outside world. That it happened like this is quite humorous, actually."

MacInTouch: WINE and Linux Ports. "One big example is UserLand Frontier. According to the Scripting.com news site, UserLand is moving Frontier to Linux, but only x86 Linux. They are using WINE to do that, because they have a Windows version of Frontier. Frontier is the only application of its kind, particularly with its Manila software, that even runs on a Mac."

Paul Snively reveals an ancient security hole in Mac System 7 that's so big it's horrifying to even think about.

Andrea's Weblog documents the trip she and Andre took to the US last year. As usual, San Francisco looks prettier viewed through the eyes of a tourist! I forget how beautiful my hometown is, thanks for the reminder.

Track-PacBell says at 5:48AM there were 23 outages since 3:17PM yesterday. The line was down 13.8% of the time.



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