I’ve reached a lull in the activity for the Burningbird Network Co-op, though I still have additional work to do reorganizing my own stuff. That’s the fun about moving from tiny, cramped quarters to brand new spacious digs.
I guess this means I need to go out any take many more photos. I’m heading to San Francisco again on Sunday (finally, the long awaited trip), and will see what I can find along the way.
Clay Shirky has joined the discussion at the, I guess we could call it the Echo Initiative, with the following:
I find it significant that this page was empty until now. What _is_ the motivation? Is just it to save RSS from the Personality Wars[tm]? If so, would the ideal solution to be to take some flavor of 0.9x and call it PIE 1.0, and then start working from there?
Right now, the conversation looks muddled, because a lot of questions that were asked and answered in the development of RSS itself (it should be 7 bit; it should be represented in XML; _required_ metadata should be kept at a minimum; it should not try to be an input to the Semantic Web) are coming up again, to no good effect, imo. If the goal is to get something that works like RSS, but is more richer, and more extensible, and defended in advance from the new type of standards war of which RSS seems to be an early harbinger, then that probably ought to go in a charter statement somewhere (and the HP would be a better place than here, I think), in order to keep it from being a pile on.
Whenever you see people proposing to base something on OWL, you know the Ted Nelson quotes are not far behind.
I copied the quote entirely because Clay also added RefactorOK next to the quote, which I believe means that people can edit it.
I like Clay – the man is not afraid to say, “Hey! The f**cking King is nekkid!”, but usually using much more polite language. Yes, what is the motivation.
I do know that once an XML syndication format is designed, and the aggregators prep for it (I can hear them, yet another syndication format), the only button, and hence the only syndication format, supported at this site will be one of the following:
[image lost]
Why? Because I think the Personality Wars, as Clay so aptly put them, are a waste of energy and time, both of which could be turned to something more constructive. Because I wouldn’t mind getting involved in this technology, but the ownership angle irritates me – not to mention multiple flavors of the same thing.
Because don’t we all have something better to do? Like create fun techie things to play with? Have great discussions about literature, politics, and philosophy? Talk about our family and friends? Share a giggle?
Like take more bandwidth stealing photos? Write more “…For Poets” essays?
Like, have a life?