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Permanent link to archive for Sunday, November 18, 2001. Sunday, November 18, 2001

Jake Savin on Outlining. "I told her no; I would not make an outline, unless she told me why." 

Dori Smith takes a contrarian view of Jake's experience.  

Sylvain Carle translated What Are Weblogs to French. "Les communautés de publications web personnelles." 

Jean-Louis Gassee: Windows XP, essai transformé.  

From Aaron Swartz, news of an XML-like way of representing RDF that is not XML. For a long time I didn't know that RDF isn't a form of XML. The XMLization of RDF is just a way of transporting it between RDF-handling apps. RDF purists eschew the XML form. "That's not the cool stuff," they say.  

Aaron Cope sent a pointer to Perl tools for working with N3. 

Slashdot: With XML, is the Time Right for Hierarchical DBs?  

Oh yes. I've spent my whole career getting ready for the Slashdot folks to ask this question. 

Simon Kittle: "TextRouter is a generic weblogging and text 'routing' client. It's main use is for posting to Blogger and/or Manila maintained weblogs." 

Seems like Michael Fraase has a pretty good case against a spammer, with the usual I Am Not A Lawyer disclaimer. 

Glenn Fleishman: "Apple Computer last week released a major revision to its AirPort wireless network hardware and software that improves security, enables direct dial-up access to America Online and makes the system compatible with corporate and education networks." 

CNN: "There are the little 'eeee' ones, then there are the 'ooooh' ones -- those ones you have to stand up and follow with your head," said Susan Kitchens, a writer and artist at the Mount Wilson party. 

Helen Thomas: "The Bush administration is using the national trauma and state of emergency resulting from the Sept 11 terrorist attacks to trample the Bill of Rights." 

Scoble: "I gotta get a Tivo." 

Camworld: "I'm so excited." 

Deborah Brancum: "I try to be a calm gal." 

Jim Winstead: "I'm not much of a soup person." 

Doc Searls: "I'm a happy camper." 

On sticking your neck out 

Adam Curry: "I felt like an amazing dickhead."

I love the way Adam writes. Many people would edit-out statements like that because a real dickhead somewhere is going to add that to his quotefile, saving it as "evidence" for some future insurrection.

This may seem like a small thing, but when you write publicly and quickly, as both Adam and I do, when you make a self-deprecating statement like that, you're asking for trouble from a very vocal minority. Most readers, I think, prefer writers to show a little vulnerability. I know I do. I smile when I read a statement like that. I have a pretty good idea of how he said it because he's a friend of mine.

Now I generally go through my fear and say what I think, and take the heat. To this day my detractors cite this DaveNet piece, written in 1995, as evidence of my flaws as a human being. The joke's on them of course. That essay is proof of strength, not weakness. Anyone who makes software who thinks their stuff doesn't suck is in for a rude awakening.

"It's the truth. We make shitty software. And so do you!"

Walking down the hall at Living Videotext I'd poke my head into a programmer's cube and say "We make shitty software." To which the programmer, if he was following the ritual, would retort: "With bugs!"

Of course if you don't even try to make software that other people use, it can't be very shitty. The people who make the most noise are people who don't show us their software, they don't stick their necks out. That's why their opinion about how software is made isn't very interesting! Show us your software that doesn't suck and I will bow down and worship at your altar.

Of course the critics are going to start scurrying to find out who's trashing Dave now. Heh. You won't find a pointer here. You may find one here. Lotsa luck!

One of the best lines in all of rock and roll is Mick Jagger responding to a bunch of idiots in the audience at the end of Little Red Rooster on Love You Live. "Everything alright in the critics section?" Then the band launches into a fantastic rendition of Chuck Berry's Around and Around. "I said the joint was rocking.."

     

Last update: Sunday, November 18, 2001 at 9:24 PM Eastern.

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