Home > Archive >  2009 >  October >  3

Why I didn't like ThirdVoice, and more

Saturday, October 03, 2009 by Dave Winer.

ThirdVoice was small and never got large.  

As long as very few people used it, it was no threat to free speech, but... 

What if Microsoft, who was then the dominant web browser vendor, decided to either acquire ThirdVoice or create their own? 

If we hadn't objected to ThirdVoice that would have provided all the excuse they needed.  

And it's not an imaginary thing. Microsoft did try to muck around with web content. But they backed down when the web community strenuously objected. 

Now fast-forward to Google and its Toolbar and the cutely named WikiSidebar. Clever trick. Could have named it PuppySidebar. Now we'd be seeming to criticize puppies. I imagine some people think that Google's neo-ThirdVoice is actually a wiki, but of course it's nothing like a wiki. 

And Google has more staying power than ThirdVoice. And they have ambitions to be the leading browser vendor and I'd say they have a chance. Then someday soon we may have the ability to annotate any page on the web. Sounds great that way, but do you want to have everyone viewing the annotated view of your writing? I don't.  

Phil Windley, who is (I guess) a libertarian, thinks everyone should have the right to view the web any way they want. Who could argue with that. He says my website is not a place, it's backward to think of it that way. Instead I should look at the components. It's actually a collection of documents that can be transferred from one machine to another over a network. His bank account, like my website, is just a collection of documents that can be transferred from one machine to another over a network. Does that mean he should have no say how those documents are used? I doubt very seriously if Phil would go for that. Let's see what he thinks. Phil, let have all your money. What say you? 

We buy into illusions that virtual things are real all the time, our way of life depends on it. The pieces of paper in our wallet used to be redeemable for bars of gold, they were virtual then, now they're not even virtual because the linkage no longer exists. Even the slats of wood and poured concrete that makes up a "house" is something that is given meaning by a piece of paper that says Phil owns it, and not a welfare mother in downtown Salt Lake City. Why should he get to live in that collection of wood and concrete, stay warm in the Utah winter, when other people are cold and go hungry? Because we have conventions that we all accept. 

The way people argue for the right to use my stuff is okay (I guess) as long as it doesn't effect the way I use it. I use my website to express my point of view. I get to take risky positions, ones that are complicated to explain because I know that here, unlike almost everywhere else, I get to finish my thought. There are so many places for "conversation" -- virtually everywhere. I like the web because it is not one of those places. 

Yes Phil, this really is my home. And I think the government should protect it, the same way the government protects your bank account. If Google wants comments, great, put it on their own site. But unless I ask for it, stay out of my space. And emphatically -- this is my space.