ILog in to Dave Winer’s blog.
script news
you’ll see constantly updated notes that tell you how many years, months, days, hours, and seconds your blog has been running.
The year field will switch to 30 sometime tomorrow morning. That means Dave’s blog will be stirring things up every day for 30 years.
He really
notable person
a talented hacker and software developer who embodies the spirit of the early Internet.
In the 1980s, he created a new type of software called ThinkTank.
“Outliner”
It’s a computerized version of the hierarchical list we all use when planning articles and presentations, but until then was scrawled on paper.
Like Dan Bricklin’s spreadsheets, this was a novel idea at the time, but nearly every type of writing software now includes an outliner.
Surprisingly, Microsoft Word also has this feature.
In 1983, Winer founded a company called Living Videotext to develop and commercialize the outline idea, and six years later sold it to Symantec to earn enough money to do his own work for the rest of his life.
I got the funds. One of them is to play a leading role in development.
RSS
(Very Simple Syndication) is a tool that allows users to track different websites in one application (a news aggregator), constantly monitoring the site for new content.
(Think of this as the hidden wiring of the web.)
As the use of RSS feeds became commonplace, someone had the idea of being able to attach audio files to RSS feeds, and Dave implemented that idea with a nice geeky touch.
I attached a Grateful Dead song. Initially, this new technology was called audio blogging, but eventually a British journalist came up with the term “podcasting” and the word stuck.
So, while Dave was there to create some cool stuff, it was his blog that brought him to a wider audience.
“Some people are born to play country music.”
he wrote
At some stage.
“I was born to blog. When I first started blogging, I thought everyone would become a blogger. I was wrong. Most people don’t have the urge to say what they think. I don’t have one.’”
Dave was just the opposite. He was (and still is) articulate and forthright.
His formidable track record as a technological innovator meant that he could not be dismissed as an eccentric.
The fact that he was financially secure meant he didn’t have to pander to anyone and could speak his mind. And he did.
That made him a prominent presence on the web from the moment he launched Scripting News in October 1994.
Like many of us, he realized that what became known as the blogosphere might be a modern realization of Jurgen Habermas’ ideas.
“Public sphere”
Because it was open to everyone, everything was up for discussion, and social status did not determine who was allowed to speak.
But what he – and we – underestimated is that tech companies like Google and Facebook have surrounded their public realm with their own walled gardens, where “free speech” is algorithmically enforced.
The speed and comprehensiveness of the central monitoring of speakers and their data. Mined for advertising purposes.
In my experience, most journalists fail to understand the importance of the blogosphere.
This is partly due to the fact that they thought, like Dr. Johnson, that “no one but a blockhead writes about anything other than money,” so bloggers must be weirdos.
(This is difficult for those of us who happen to be in this situation, but
both bloggers
)
But that was largely because the mainstream media was hypnotized and blindsided by the dizzying rise of social media.
Journalists have come to believe that the blogosphere must be a meeting place for old hats, relics of the past, weirdos in Cornish pasty shoes, nerds and ponytailed men. Social media was key.
If that’s really what they think, Winer has news for them.
The blogosphere is alive and well and thriving.
In fact, much of the best writing and thinking of our time is found here.
I can say this because I use tools and read them every day.
feedland.org – Something Dave made to make it easier to drink water from a fire hose.
Clay Shirkey, an early Internet sage,
Please put it down once
There is no such thing as information overload, only “filter failure.”
And there’s no excuse to ignore the blogosphere.
what i was reading
100th anniversary celebration
Jimmy Carter turned 100 this week, and his former speechwriter James Fallows wrote the following message:
generous rating His stuff on his Substack.
Look, I don’t have any hands…
Our ubiquitous future is astonishing.
blog post
By Allen Pike: I think self-driving cars will become commonplace.
The truth about monopoly
Antitrust Revolution: Title
great essay
in
harpers Barry Lynn, on democracy’s awakening to the dangers of corporate power.
Source: www.theguardian.com
