

If you find yourself competing with the Internet, find a way out. - olefoo
http://www.scripting.com/stories/2009/07/21/evanWilliamsVsTheInternet.html

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IsaacSchlueter
If Dave Winer's writing ability was half the size of his ego, he'd be the next
Shakespeare. I still get a kick out of the sheer arrogance of putting
permalinks on _every paragraph_.

This is a typical piece of his. Not very well thought out, kind of rambles for
a few paragraphs, ans basically says that so-and-so is lame because they're
not internetty enough. (Now, if Twitter could do something _really_ awesome
like inventing RSS, then maybe they'd be worth talking about.)

~~~
nir
To his credit, though, unlike many other Web celebs Winer at least has some
code to back his ego. Twitter has ways to before its impact is comparable to
RSS.

~~~
yayeditor
It's worth noting that the TechCrunch article goes so far as to call out RSS
(again), as seen through the eyes of Twitter.

"Don't just connect RSS feed," the notes read. "What if all feeds went through
twitter: would be expensive."

But Winer's also probably alluding to the "we're creating a new Internet" vibe
that's so palpable in Twitter's notes.

The Twitter meeting notes: [http://cache0.techcrunch.com/wp-
content/uploads/2009/07/tw-s...](http://cache0.techcrunch.com/wp-
content/uploads/2009/07/tw-strat-feeds.png)

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mikeryan
I read this twice - and I'm still not sure what he's trying to say.

~~~
MikeCapone
My thought exactly. I came back here to check the comments in case someone
explained it more clearly...

~~~
sounddust
He's trying to say that Microsoft refused to embrace the internet because it
was something that they had no control over (instead, Microsoft planned to
launch their own closed online service in 1995 called Marvel), and as a result
they fell far behind in the internet space.

He goes on to make a comparison to Twitter, and how they are concerned that if
they make the service too open, then developers might create something that
competes with the service or renders it obsolete. And he's saying that
reluctance to embrace the openness of the internet will result in failure in
the same manner that it did for Microsoft.

(not that I agree with this piece; this is just my interpretation)

~~~
MikeCapone
Thanks. Maybe it was building up on other posts that I haven't read...

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mrshoe
I'd be interested to hear his proposed solutions. If controlling a platform on
the internet is impossible, what is twitter to do?

Is their only chance at longevity to publish a protocol spec and allow twitter
to become a decentralized messaging system like email, for which anyone can
write and run their own server?

That might actually be the case. Internet services rarely last long, but
protocols often do (relatively speaking), for better or for worse.

~~~
stilist
He's been calling for a decentralized Twitter-like service since about late
last year, and seems to have recently begun work on his own out of
frustration.

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gojomo
I like this observation:

 _[The Internet] doesn't employ any engineers, and when they leave one company
to work for another they still work for the Internet._

This perspective also makes work histories much more straightforward. For
example, mine becomes:

    
    
      WORK HISTORY
    
      2003-2009 Internet, San Francisco, CA
      2000-2003 Internet, San Francisco, CA
      1999-2000 Internet, Austin, TX/Sunnyvale, CA
      1996-1999 Internet, Austin, TX
      1995-1996 Internet, Austin, TX
      1993-1995 Internet, Sunnyvale, CA
    

I may have to get business cards made up.

~~~
robg
It seems to me though that the best Companies (and Eras) focus the Internet
through a vector set. Were you working on Infrastructure or Retail in 1997?
Search or Marketing in 2001? Cloud or Advertising in 2008?

We may work _for_ the Internet. But it only becomes what we choose to work on.

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jgilliam
I'm not completely sure that Evan Williams is trying to exert control in the
same way Microsoft has. Much of the great stuff that happens online is due to
a "benevolent dictator" approach. Someone (or a team) needs to shepherd the
"big new idea" through many phases, in an environment where a lot of people
are trying to muck it up (trolls, spammers, you name it).

Giving anyone the firehose could cause all sorts of problems in the short-
term. It seems reasonable for Twitter execs to think carefully about the right
way to do that.

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rythie
The firehose is pretty revolutionary really. Being able to get every public
feed in one feed is pretty easy compared to having to index the whole web like
Google do with blogs and news.

I can see one of the reasons they shut it down is that bandwidth cost is going
to be very high. I expect if they could charge for it they could open it up -
but I expect many of the companies who would like it don't have business
models or can't afford it.

