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Saturday, August 23, 2003
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Web 2.0. WEB 2.0 ( Personal Broadcast Networks) is starting to get some traction. Adam Bosworth (the CTO of BEA) is writing extensively about the Web Services Browser and Kevin Lynch (CSA at Macromedia) has written a white paper on rich Flash applications that utilize Web Services (he calls them Rich Internet Applications). Each takes a different approach to solving the same thing: how to build new client (desktop PC) software that realizes the vision of Web 2.0?
What is Web 2.0? It is a system that breaks with the old model of centralized Web sites and moves the power of the Web/Internet to the desktop. It includes three structural elements: 1) a source of content, data, or functionality (a website, a Web service, a desktop PC peer), 2) an open system of transport (RSS, XML-RPC, SOAP, P2P, and too an extent IM), and 3) a rich client (desktop software). Basically, Web 2.0 puts the power of the Internet in the hands of the desktop PC user where it belongs.
So far, we have made excellent progress on the first two elements necessary for Web 2.0, yet the remaining element has undergone an abortive development path. The primary reason for this is due to Microsoft's dominance of the browser market which has resulted in stasis. Additionally, both VCs and developers have been frozen in fear of fighting Microsoft on the desktop. Regardless, the Web 2.0 desktop applications I had hoped for years ago haven't arrived in sufficient numbers. Fortunately, the tide is about to shift.
Three development paths are now in contention. The first is a desktop Web site approach (Radio). A second is an enhanced browser method (Flash, see picture). A third is a custom desktop application (.Net and nifty custom apps like Brent's NetNewsWire). I suspect that all three approaches will gain traction over the next couple of years, but my personal preference (for a myriad of reasons) is to put a CMS (Web site content management system) on the desktop and leverage the limitations of the browser to provide an enhanced experience. This makes it possible for a seamless transition for users from the Web 1.0 to Web 2.0. Regardless, it is extremely nice to see motion.
Note: I changed the name of this post to Web 2.0 to make it more understandable. [John Robb's Weblog]
3:43:46 PM 
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Note: to publish any PowerPoint or Word doc to my Radio weblog, all I have to do is save the file as a Web page to Radio's WWW folder. In a couple seconds, the files are uploaded. I click on the link for the uploaded document in Radio's "events" page (on the main menu) and it takes me to the link I can use in my weblog. Simple. Given that the doc is both on my desktop and up at my site, I get an automatic back-up as part of the process. [John Robb's Weblog]
3:43:21 PM
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Jim McGee. A shift from managing knowledge to coaching knowledge workers. Excellent.
The fatal flaw in thinking in terms of knowledge management is in adopting the perspective of the organization as the relevant beneficiary. Discussions of knowledge management start from the premise that the organization is not realizing full value from the knowledge of its employees. While likely true, this fails to address the much more important question from a knowledge worker's perspective of "what's in it for me?". It attempts to squeeze the knowledge management problem into an industrial framework eliminating that which makes the deliverables of knowledge work most valuable--their uniqueness, their variability. [John Robb's Weblog]
3:42:30 PM
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Actually, this whole terrorism futures thing was kind of an outside-the-box idea - might have worked. The markets as an aggregate of otherwise withheld/partial opinion can be surprisingly accurate. It tells us something uncomfortable about us that the most vehement responses mostly decried how unseemly the idea was; what's bad taste got to do with it? The government shot themselves in the foot (again) with the clumsy presentation...if they'd had the right front, they could have gotten the data without the complaints. Maybe this one will be successful.
The Terrorism Futures Market is back...
...sort of. Bereft of DARPA's $8m budget, but also of the political correctness now hanging around that institution, the folks at Rantburg - an open intelligence site that is definitely not fair and balanced - have decided to cook up their own. The first sketchy implementation is here. I expect they will have some fun figuring out how to get meaningful input without troll overrun, but it should be amusing and informative to watch. No funding, no oversight, no shit - the blogosphere in action. [Due Diligence]
3:41:34 PM
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On the Internet, they know when it's a dog
The movie industry starts to feel the bite of greater inter-personal communications. It's not P2P, but instead text messaging of instant reviews by movie goers. Word of mouth is swamping out opening week marketing blitzes, spreading the word if the flick is a canine.
Hunters, not sheep. Get used to it.
Via Smart Mobs [Due Diligence]
3:37:31 PM
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Eric Raymond on cognitive stress and knowledge work.
A Taxonomy of Cognitive Stress: I have. A Taxonomy of Cognitive Stress: I have been thinking about UI design lately. With some help from my friend Rob Landley, I've come up with a classification schema for the levels at which users are willing to invest effort to build competence. The base assumption is that for any ... [Armed and Dangerous]
Somehow, I missed this when it first appeared in May from Eric Raymond. I find his RSS feed erratic at best. It shows up at a good time, however, as I'm thinking through the implications of shifting focus to knowledge workers instead of knowledge management. Raymond is focused on user interfaces, but I think his perspective can be generalized to the challenges of doing and coaching knowledge work. [McGee's Musings]
3:37:12 PM
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Plus Magazine
http://plus.maths.org/index.html
"an internet magazine which aims to introduce readers to the beauty and the practical applications of mathematics." Among the articles: how medical statistics could have caught a hospital killer, how mathematical perspective allows us inside a work of art, the use of game theory in soccer, etc. Also includes a Careers Library.
[Neat New Stuff]
3:36:59 PM
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Spray-on Nanocomputers Are Coming.
Computing is about to really become ubiquitous if a research project started at Edinburgh University delivers its promises. In "A spray-on computer is way to do IT, the Edinburgh Evening News writes that "spray-on computers the size of a grain of sand are set to transform information technology."
Scientists at the institution have just been awarded a £1.3 million grant to develop the "ubiquitous computing" technology which uses tiny semiconductor specks that can sense, compute and communicate without wires.
Researchers are already working with staff at Edinburgh hospitals to develop a method of using the computers to monitor heart patients at home.
They plan to spray the nanocomputers on to the chests of coronary patients, where the tiny cells would record a patient’s health and transmit information back to a hospital computer.
And this isn't the only application envisioned by the scientists. Professor Arvid, who leads the project, thinks our current computer interfaces, typically a keyboard or a mouse, will completely be replaced by these nanocomputers.
Arvid said: "In the future, computers will be able to be diffused into the environment. There won’t be a sharp division -- barricades will just disappear into the background.
"One way to achieve that will be computers the size of a grain of sand. Just by spraying them on to objects, you can computerise them. They would create a network which can transmit wirelessly to each other.
"In a cubic millimetre, you can have a sensor for heat, pressure, light and so on, but also a computer and wireless technology."
And when will see these nanocomputers? Sooner that you think. According to Arvid, the technology should be ready within four years.
And these spray-on nanocomputers should be at work in hospitals, schools and shops in less than ten years.
Source: Fiona MacGregor, Edinburgh Evening News, August 14, 2003 [Roland Piquepaille's Technology Trends] [Handheld Instructional Technology]
3:36:33 PM
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© Copyright
2003
Gail Marsella.
Last update:
9/1/2003; 6:01:01 PM.
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