Scripting News

Thu, 30 Jan 2003 02:22:25 GMT

Peking Duck: "I've been trying to access The New York Times and the Washington Post all morning, only to get the Cannot Find Server message for both sites."

Thu, 30 Jan 2003 05:20:55 GMT

Tripod now has weblogs.

Thu, 30 Jan 2003 02:14:34 GMT

Great stuff tonight on the Salon blogs.

Wed, 29 Jan 2003 23:25:49 GMT

News.Com is supporting guids in their RSS feeds. Yes. We've got forward motion. Bing bing bing.

Wed, 29 Jan 2003 23:22:44 GMT

Here's a clue why Steve Case stepped down when he did. $99 billion lost in 2002. Oy oy oy.

Wed, 29 Jan 2003 23:19:37 GMT

Sjoerd Visscher: "I now include the referrers using XInclude." I've always wanted an element in HTML.

Thu, 30 Jan 2003 00:05:57 GMT

Jake Savin: "I'm working on a new backup/restore feature for Radio UserLand, and have hit a bit of a snag."

Wed, 29 Jan 2003 20:18:06 GMT

For sale: ZDNet Tech Update staff.

Wed, 29 Jan 2003 20:40:26 GMT

Joi Ito: "If you need to get inebriated to 'bond' you've got a psychological problem."

Wed, 29 Jan 2003 15:56:45 GMT

George Bush, US President, often says how serious going to war is, but I'm not sure he really gets it. Sure we're sending our young boys to die. That's relatively easy. But we still live in a nuclear age, and every time we go to war, that ups the odds that today is the last day for the human race (and everything else on earth). Ooops. Old people die too. Makes you stop and think. Either Bush thinks a war with Iraq isn't likely to lead to a nuclear exchange (why?) or he welcomes the idea (oh geez).

Wed, 29 Jan 2003 17:15:18 GMT

Some people think that not going to war is a prescription for nuclear war. Sorry for not representing that pov in the above. It is a possibility I suppose. Another possibility is using the goodwill we've gotten with Hussein's neighbors to solve some other problem that saves lives instead of killing people. Wouldn't that blow people's minds? But don't pay attention to me, when it comes to war I'm usually the one arguing against it. I guess I was wrong about Kosovo, for example. I thought it was another Vietnam, for sure. It wasn't.

Wed, 29 Jan 2003 15:55:02 GMT

Ever wonder how viruses get their names? It looks pretty random. The reporters need a handle for each virus. So why don't we use a system like the one they use for hurricanes and typhoons? First a woman's name, then a man's name, starting with A, then B, round and round we go. It's good because we don't let the virus writer add a name to the common vocabulary. Why should they get rewarded for being jerks, or worse. What do you think?

Wed, 29 Jan 2003 20:29:23 GMT

Lawrence Lee: \"Most virus companies seem to follow the CARO virus naming convention developed in 1991 by Fridrik Skulason, Alan Solomon and Vesselin Bontchev.\"

Wed, 29 Jan 2003 14:45:46 GMT

To Tom Matrullo who wonders what good RSS is if it just shovels the same old crap he reads in newspapers. Tom, t's better than that. Much. RSS creates a level playing field that's open to all. Amateurs and pros, young and old, rich and poor, the homeless, the uninsured and people with AIDS, you name it -- they all can slug it out for readers in the same venue. If you subscribe to Scripting News, today you've already heard about a new peer-to-peer network, you've learned a little math, and read an amusing Glenn Fleishman piece about skiing in Montana (if you clicked) and heard that Dubya is borrowing a few lies (oops lines) from Teddy Roosevelt. And it's not even 7AM. Sure the NY Times, BBC, News.Com, etc are all worth reading. But now you're getting more variety, and they're getting competition, which are good things, imho.

Wed, 29 Jan 2003 15:14:22 GMT

Another way to look at it. A old style journalist interviews a couple dozen people for a week, and then produces an article that you can read in five minutes. He includes a few quotes. That's one way to do it. Another way is DIY or Do It Yourself. A news event. I think to myself "Who would know what this means?" I go to their weblog. See what they think. Link to them from my weblog. Then I think of another person. I go to their weblog. Etc etc. This is good because it routes around the soundbite-creating and dumbing-it-down processes. Who cares if the expert said it in a clever way (actually I do care). But what I really want is to know what they really think, not what the editors of the pub want me to hear.

Wed, 29 Jan 2003 14:56:19 GMT

The Open Content Network is a "collaborative effort to help deliver large, freely-downloadable content using peer-to-peer technology."

Wed, 29 Jan 2003 09:05:43 GMT

Jason DeFillippo: "I am blogholio!" ";->"

Wed, 29 Jan 2003 09:02:41 GMT

Scott Rosenberg illustrates the difference between mean and median in Bush's hype about tax cuts. "This average is a convenient fiction; it's a statistic that exists only because the enormous benefits accruing to the dividend-owning super-rich skew the 'average' -- and camouflage the fact that the cuts most middle class taxpayers will receive under Bush's proposal are piddling."

Wed, 29 Jan 2003 16:56:00 GMT

If you've written an article about RSS recently, please suggest a link in the section of the RSS directory. I included JD Lasica's article because, imho, RSS is not just for geeks anymore. But it is still for geeks too. I'm working this morning on the developer evangelism I promised yesterday.

Wed, 29 Jan 2003 17:04:32 GMT

RSS Feeds for the Fusebox.Org Forums.

Wed, 29 Jan 2003 09:09:29 GMT

Glenn Fleishman: "Yeah, well, none of us have jobs!"

Wed, 29 Jan 2003 09:24:35 GMT

BTW, I was impressed with Bush's talk about war in Iraq. Very inspirational. As Teddy Roosevelt said, there are some things you have to go to war over. I bet his speech writers read a lot of TR. Anyway I was not impressed with what he said about health insurance. I don't believe he has a plan to get every American health insurance, although he said that was his goal.

Wed, 29 Jan 2003 15:00:14 GMT

Jon Udell: "A lot of this stuff is much worse than it needs to be."