Scripting News

Sun, 28 Jan 2007 18:21:06 GMT

There's a new quote in the right margin, from a 2005 white paper written by Tim O'Reilly. It's one of the most accurate paragraphs on the origins of RSS, even though the chronology is a little wrong. The term "Really Simple Syndication" didn't come until 2002, and the confluence came in 1999, not 1997. But more importantly, the beginning moment for RSS is 1997, and RSS 0.91 was the result of the joining of two forks, which is a unique moment in the evolution of formats. Usually they splinter, they don't coalesce. 0.91 grew into 0.92 and then 2.0, which is the format most people use today.

Sun, 28 Jan 2007 19:02:37 GMT

I don't read Wikipedia pages on subjects that I'm close to, and I never go near my bio page, but sometimes I come across discussion about it in the blogosphere. Mark Bernstein says someone wants to delete my bio. Not sure that would be a good or bad thing.

Sun, 28 Jan 2007 17:43:31 GMT

Steven Levy is looking for the best tech writing of 2006.

Sun, 28 Jan 2007 21:07:48 GMT

Every week or so the crowd that's gathered around TechMeme goes crazy about something. Last week it was social networking and press releases and how some people get it and others don't (as in I get it and he doesn't). Do you care? So many do. Today it's something even more inane. I had a long talk with Gabe Rivera on Thurs night. Blogs are great, I said to Gabe, because they're not mail lists. The problem with TechMeme is that it drives blogs into becoming a mail list, where everyone feels compelled to comment on whatever inanity is driving the herd at the current moment. It doesn't much matter what the topic is, as long as you get heard (sorry for the pun). To which I say, bleh, that ain't what blogs are about senors and senoritas.