Thursday, February 05, 2004

Gene Smith: Six tips for better RSS feeds. 

Jim Moore reports that Dean has raised $438,000 so far today. 

What is OpensourceNovel.Net? "I want people to change it around." 

I must be crazy. I forgot that Lessig is a lawyer. Oy.  

Chad Dickerson touts the benefits of simple syndication. 

States I've visited are shown in red on this map. 

For the record, I wrote the RSS 0.91 spec from scratch, starting in June 2000, to document current practice. There was no claim of compatibility with the format described by Netscape's document, as practice had already deviated, and it was made clear, in public, that I had created a new document. Some say that I stole the spec from Netscape, replacing their copyright notice with my company's. That's a very serious charge, it's being taken seriously, and it's not true. 

Mark Pilgrim: "Userland took Netscape's RSS specification, removed Netscape's copyright statement, made several incompatible changes, added a Userland copyright statement, called it RSS 0.91 and claimed that it was compatible with Netscape's RSS 0.91." Note, if you want to visit that page, you'll have to copy the URL and paste it into a new browser window, Pilgrim's server is configured to bounce links from Scripting.  

Don Hopkins: "The Sims pie menus were something I whipped up one night and just checked into the code base, and then gradually evolved over time." 

I heard the NPR interview with Ralph Nader yesterday, after leaving a long interesting meeting with two ex-Dean operatives. Nader is considering another run for the presidency. The interviewer asked repeatedly if he wasn't hurting Democrats by running, assuring a Republican victory, a repeat of 2000. After coming out of a meeting mostly about the press and how they manipulate us, I really felt for Nader. If I were him that kind of pressure would make me more insistent on running. Nader responded that those who call for him not to run are trying to censor him. I agree. One might argue that Kerry should shut up because every time he opens his mouth he might say something that would serve to elect Bush.  

The Democrats should nominate someone who inspires. A person not a toothpaste. The Democrats are responsible for the tie in 2000. It should shame them into waking up that they couldn't beat a man who can barely complete a sentence, who inspires so little confidence that it took a national disaster for us to begin to see him as a President. I agree with Chris Heilman, below, that with Kerry as the presumed nominee of the Democratic Party, there's little to look forward to. Luckily, it's still not too late to fix this. And if we should nominate a Democrat as uninspiring as Gore, for all we know Nader's presence in the election will serve to inspire, and in turn get us better government. My friend Larry Lessig argues too linearly. No, Nader was not responsible for the war in Iraq. That's two levels too complicated. He wasn't even responsible for the tied election in 2000. But I love a good argument, so let's keep this one alive. I hope Nader runs for precisely that reason. 

Last year on this day: "It's great to be a kid because they don't have to pretend they're not crazy, like adults do, if you know what I mean." 

Six years ago: "If we could have let her live, even considering the horror of what she did, it would have made us greater. I feel deep shame at being part of a country with such a shallow collective heart, with such a brutal response to brutality, with no sense of forgiveness." 

Boston Globe: "Howard Dean told his supporters today that he must win the Feb 17 Wisconsin primary or else he will drop out of the Democratic presidential race." 

NY Times: When a Search Engine Isn't Enough, Call a Librarian. 

Chris Heilman: "Kerry won in AZ, and just about everywhere else. He's like Bush with shaggy hair, so it's 4 more years no matter who wins. On NPR, EJ Dionne said the only difference would be the judicial nominations."