Thursday, June 30, 2005

According to the NY Times, Microsoft is in talks to buy Claria, "an adware marketer formerly called Gator, and best known for its pop-up ads and software that tracks people visiting Web sites." 

WTOP in Washington, DC is podcasting. 

Macromedia is podcasting. 

News.Com has a tag cloud or "a visually interesting display of what stories are about." 

Hacking Netflix says the reason movies are in decline is that people in the theaters are rude. I've noticed that too. But the theater owners are even more rude, showing commercials before the movies. I'm amazed more people don't object. It's like a conference with sponsors who speak. It's one thing if they let you in for free, then sure, show a few ads. But I paid to see the movie. Sorry, you don't get to run ads if I pay. Maybe if they stop running ads, people will start going to the movies again. Of course, then, there are some commercials that I would pay to see.  

Mark Bernstein writes: "Tinderbox -- our hypertext tool for making, analyzing, and sharing notes -- now reads OPML." 

Chris Janton says what we found is not the iTunes subscription list but the playlist. It may be that Apple does not export its subscription list, in which case, back to the Roach Motel theory.  

John Palfrey, executive director at Berkman Center (where I used to work), announces a new venture capital fund that focuses on investments in "tagging, RSS, OPML, search, social software, and related next-gen standards." According to Jim Moore, another former colleague of mine and JP's partner, they have raised $20 million from Ritchey Capital, and plan to raise another $80 million.  

Silicon Valley Watcher: "We're off to the races." 

WSJ: Podcasting for Dummies. 

Google Maps has a documented API. Good move. 

The San Francisco Chronicle is podcasting. Interesting that their feeds use the category element. You don't often see this. Thanks.  

Don Park: "Blogging and syndicated data technologies in general have yet to fully test the fires of hostile computing world. As their prime time nears, they will be subject to abuse and exploitation." 

Scoble: "I'm playing with some secret new technology that makes the tech blogging world even flatter." 

Apple explains how to create a podcast with GarageBand. 

Ethan Zuckerman is skeptical of Live 8. "This is yet another reason why I don’t get invited to cocktail parties." 

Morning coffee notes 

It turns out that iTunes does export its subscription list, in a weird format I've never seen before. It is XML, so it's process-able. But why not use the standard same one everyone else does? (Thanks to Denise Howell for providing the example.)

I've been having a back-channel conversation with Larry Lessig about software patents, and why they may be worth the trouble (my position, not his). Here's another reason. If we had a patent on podcasting, one of the terms of the license would be using the same export format we did.

BTW, I've been watching for any evidence of acknowledgement from Apple, haven't seen any yet. Do they acknowledge that they didn't invent this? Or do they only look out for the creativity of those who force them to? (Or their own.)

It's important for the bigco's to get that they're receiving innovation, for free, from the small developers and bloggers they often have such disdain for. Whether they acknowledge it or not, however, let's not us forget it.

Because they pay big bucks for conference sponsorships and buy ads, and consulting, they tend to get the juicy speaking slots, quotes and, testimonials. But in all these years, nothing has changed. The engine of creativity lies outside the corporate structures and brand names we admire so much. Someday a technology company will build on this simple idea and clean up.

Travel notes 

It's the end of June, and the beginning of a month of travel. I spent a bunch of time last night packing and cleaning, and getting ready to move today. I'm now ready. (Using the wifi at a local restaurant to write this.)

I'll stay in Florida for a couple more days, and then head north, through DC and NYC, on a vector for maritime Canada, then west across Quebec and Ontario, and then who knows.

Hopefully I'll find places to stop for a few days at a time to work on the OPML Editor. I have a list of things to do to get to 1.0. Now with things heating up in the podcasting world, I feel an urgency to get to this milestone, asap. And yet I have many more goodies to bring over from Channel Z and other outline programming projects over the years. And my dad is busy with his book about outlining. Did I tell you about that yet? I don't think so.