date:20060717

Title: Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback



Hi,
  Client 
Side 

  
Technologies used appropriately 


  e.g.. Flash elements on pages, not flash 
  pages 
  Flash content should be 
  sub-addressable?  
Also, tables 
for tabular data.
 
I'll try and come up 
with more suggestions later :-)
 
-dan

RE: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback

Title: Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback



Firstly, the list 
seems fairly comprehensive and easy to read.
Secondly, apologies 
if there are obvious answers to this email, i'm new...
 
How 
come REST API gets mentioned, but ajax doesn't? 
 
I know ajax is 
an overused buzzword at the moment, but it is unavoidably crucial to the web2.0 
push.   
Specifically in closing the gap with desktop applications in terms of application richness / responsiveness.
 
Also, although APIs and services are mentioned, perhaps this 
could be accented more? 
The move to a service-layer based world can be a 
substancial paradigm shift.
-dan 



From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] 
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Kim 
PlowrightSent: 14 July 2006 17:09To: 
backstage@lists.bbc.co.ukSubject: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, 
rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some 
feedback

Hi all 
As threatened, here it is…I'm part of a project 
internally that is looking at what the BBC does on the web, and how that should 
change over the next 3 years. As part of this, Tom Loosemore, grand 
paterfamilias of this list, has asked me to come up with some 'rules of the road 
for web2 sites'. Nice tight brief there, you'll appreciate.
So, I have a kind of a list of philosophical tennets 
- ways that code and design and data and content and whatnot should behave when 
playing nice on the internet. I'd be really interested to hear what everyone 
here thinks. Am I missing things? Obviously, I'm an editorial/management type, 
so some of this might be barmy. But.. What do you think? Have I missed anything 
vital about ways of making sites that play nicely on the web, and benefit the 
whole internet more than the organisation? That are, to nick a popular little 
motto, 'Not Evil'?
I'd really appreciate the thinking of you lot here. 
List follows the sig…. Let me know if any of the buzzwords are incomprehensible; 
I've stolen the categories from http://alistapart.com/topics/ 
because they seemed to make sense.
Kim Kim 
Plowright  |  Snr. Producer, New Product Development BBC Interactive Drama and Entertainment | MC1D6, BBC Media 
Village, 201 Wood Lane, London, W12 7TQ 
Rules of the Road for web2.0 sites: Data, 
Metadata, Interface Code 

  Client Side 
  
Semantic Mark-up 
Elegant, simple solutions 
Technologies used appropriately 

  e.g.. Flash elements on pages, not flash 
  pages 
  Flash content should be 
  sub-addressable? 
Pages Structured for Machine 
Friendliness 
Standardised naming for page objects that 
are reflected in CSS class names 
Shared libraries / widgets / functionality 
across all sites 
Degrades gracefully 
No popups, ever 
  Links and Linking 
·   Permalinks for all valuable content, at a 
first-order-object level ·   Not to an 
index ·   URIs to ideally be 
under 72 characters 

  1   
  URIs to be human meaningful - the user can 
  extract information from the link 
·   Hence 
Google can extract value from the link 

  

  
1   
Truncating a URL takes you to a valid 
destination 
·   Deep link 
externally. Encourage deep linking internally ·   Growth in incoming 
links as a measure of success / quality ·   Reflect linking 
activity on pages ·   But with sufficient 
spam filtering 

  Accessibility 
  
Build to degrade 
Build for accessibility 
  Common Engines 
·   APIs ·   REST for Quick, 
light and elegant 

  

  
1   
SOAP for the heavy corporate lifting 
2   
Any new system developed to have a useful API 
·   A 
componentised toolkit ·   Open Sourced 
wherever possible ·   technologies used 
appropriately 

  1   
  Standardised Naming Conventions 2   Test Early, Test 
  Often, Test Thoroughly 3   Use available 
  technology whenever possible - don't reinvent the wheel. 
·   Partner 
externally ·   All data available 
in machine readable format to other systems Content 

  UX 
  
Accessibility 
Aggregation 
Personalisation 
Richness 
Appropriateness for platform 
Appropriateness for mode of 
consumption 
Graceful degrading 
Annotatable 
Shareable 
Read/Write 
Consistent functions and Labelling 

  Appropriate to the medium 
  
Written for the web 
Produced for lean-forward 
consumption 
  Trust and Promise 
  
Value community contribution as much as 
your own 
value should flow equally in both 
directions 
Privacy respected 
“You own your data. Full 
transparency.” 
  Local, British 
  
BBC Content is localisable 
Reflecting the best of the web with a 
British perspective 
Design 

  
User centred design 
Appropriate to content 
Appropriate to audience 
Process 

  
Agile / Sprint / Responsive development

Re: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback

2006-07-17 Thread Luke Dicken

Daniel Morris wrote:
> Firstly, the list seems fairly comprehensive and easy to read.
> Secondly, apologies if there are obvious answers to this email, i'm new...
>  
> How come REST API gets mentioned, but ajax doesn't? 
>  
> I know ajax is an overused buzzword at the moment, but it is
> unavoidably crucial to the web2.0 push.   
> Specifically in closing the gap with desktop applications in terms of
> application richness / responsiveness.
>  
> Also, although APIs and services are mentioned, perhaps this could be
> accented more?
> The move to a service-layer based world can be a substancial paradigm
> shift.
>
> -dan
>
AJAX is a language/technology not an API - HTML doesn't get mentioned
either, its still a safe bet that it will be of relevance to web2.0.

-
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RE: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback


At 09:10 +0100 17/7/06, Daniel Morris wrote:

Hi,

  Client Side

Technologies used appropriately
e.g.. Flash elements on pages, not flash pages
Flash content should be sub-addressable?  
Also, tables for tabular data.


I'll try and come up with more suggestions later :-)

-dan



AJAX for AJAX pages?

Gordo


--
"Think Feynman"/
http://pobox.com/~gordo/
[EMAIL PROTECTED]///
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RE: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback

2006-07-17 Thread Phil Whelan

Title: Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback



Hi,
 
Web 2.0 for me is the movement of the web from something 
you read to something you participate in, and the new web-communities helping to 
build sites with which they have an interest. This is enabled by new 
technologies such as blogs, readers leaving comments, voting, mash-ups of 
web-services, video upload, wiki's, and tagging.
AJAX is a technology associated closely with Web 2.0, but 
is just a way to make the interaction more seamless by reloading parts 
of a web page instead of whole webpages. This way you get a feel you're 
interacting with the website, instead of manually submitting 
changes.
Anything that depends on a community for it's content and 
success, for me, is Web 2.0.
Examples, digg.com, wikipedia.com, youtube.com, 
myspace.com, flickr.com.
In Web 2.0 everyone is the author.
 
Cheers,
Phil


From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] 
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Daniel 
MorrisSent: 17 July 2006 10:31To: 
backstage@lists.bbc.co.ukSubject: RE: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, 
rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some 
feedback

Firstly, the list 
seems fairly comprehensive and easy to read.
Secondly, apologies 
if there are obvious answers to this email, i'm new...
 
How come REST API gets mentioned, but ajax doesn't? 
 
I know ajax is 
an overused buzzword at the moment, but it is unavoidably crucial to the web2.0 
push.   
Specifically in closing the gap with desktop applications in terms of application richness / responsiveness.
 
Also, although APIs and services are mentioned, perhaps this 
could be accented more? 
The move to a service-layer based world can be a 
substancial paradigm shift.
-dan 



From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] 
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Kim 
PlowrightSent: 14 July 2006 17:09To: 
backstage@lists.bbc.co.ukSubject: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, 
rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some 
feedback

Hi all 
As threatened, here it is…I'm part of a project 
internally that is looking at what the BBC does on the web, and how that should 
change over the next 3 years. As part of this, Tom Loosemore, grand 
paterfamilias of this list, has asked me to come up with some 'rules of the road 
for web2 sites'. Nice tight brief there, you'll appreciate.
So, I have a kind of a list of philosophical tennets 
- ways that code and design and data and content and whatnot should behave when 
playing nice on the internet. I'd be really interested to hear what everyone 
here thinks. Am I missing things? Obviously, I'm an editorial/management type, 
so some of this might be barmy. But.. What do you think? Have I missed anything 
vital about ways of making sites that play nicely on the web, and benefit the 
whole internet more than the organisation? That are, to nick a popular little 
motto, 'Not Evil'?
I'd really appreciate the thinking of you lot here. 
List follows the sig…. Let me know if any of the buzzwords are incomprehensible; 
I've stolen the categories from http://alistapart.com/topics/ 
because they seemed to make sense.
Kim Kim 
Plowright  |  Snr. Producer, New Product Development BBC Interactive Drama and Entertainment | MC1D6, BBC Media 
Village, 201 Wood Lane, London, W12 7TQ 
Rules of the Road for web2.0 sites: Data, 
Metadata, Interface Code 

  Client Side 
  
Semantic Mark-up 
Elegant, simple solutions 
Technologies used appropriately 

  e.g.. Flash elements on pages, not flash 
  pages 
  Flash content should be 
  sub-addressable? 
Pages Structured for Machine 
Friendliness 
Standardised naming for page objects that 
are reflected in CSS class names 
Shared libraries / widgets / functionality 
across all sites 
Degrades gracefully 
No popups, ever 
  Links and Linking 
·   Permalinks for all valuable content, at a 
first-order-object level ·   Not to an 
index ·   URIs to ideally be 
under 72 characters 

  1   
  URIs to be human meaningful - the user can 
  extract information from the link 
·   Hence 
Google can extract value from the link 

  

  
1   
Truncating a URL takes you to a valid 
destination 
·   Deep link 
externally. Encourage deep linking internally ·   Growth in incoming 
links as a measure of success / quality ·   Reflect linking 
activity on pages ·   But with sufficient 
spam filtering 

  Accessibility 
  
Build to degrade 
Build for accessibility 
  Common Engines 
·   APIs ·   REST for Quick, 
light and elegant 

  

  
1   
SOAP for the heavy corporate lifting 
2   
Any new system developed to have a useful API 
·   A 
componentised toolkit ·   Open Sourced 
wherever possible ·   technologies used 
appropriately 

  1   
  Standardised Naming Conventions 2   Test Early, Test 
  Often, Test

RE: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback

REST is a "collection of architectural principles" [1] rather than a
language itself,
however APIs still exist for it.

There are plenty of AJAX APIs out there. [2]

"One of the primary purposes of an API is to describe how computer
applications and software developers may access a  set of (usually third
party) functions (for example, within a library) without requiring
access to the source code of the functions or library, or requiring a
detailed understanding or the functions' internal workings." [3]

AJAX isn't a language, it's a technology as you've said, which can be
implemented in a number of different ways.
APIs can be for accessing internal libraries/functionality as well as
for third-party usage.

-dan

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Representational_State_Transfer
[2] http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=ajax+api
[3] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/API

-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Luke Dicken
Sent: 17 July 2006 10:57
To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Subject: Re: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development
philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback

AJAX is a language/technology not an API - HTML doesn't get mentioned
either, its still a safe bet that it will be of relevance to web2.0.

-
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Re: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback

2006-07-17 Thread Matthew Somerville


Phil Whelan wrote:
Web 2.0 for me is the movement of the web from something you read to 
something you participate in, and the new web-communities helping to 
build sites with which they have an interest. This is enabled by new 
technologies such as blogs, readers leaving comments, voting, mash-ups 
of web-services, video upload, wiki's, and tagging.


"new technologies"? Blogs (including online diaries) that you can leave 
comments on have been around since 1998; RSS 1999. Wikipedia launched in 
2001. XMLHTTP was invented by Microsoft for Outlook Web Access 2000. eBay 
launched its API in November 2000, Amazon launched their web services in 
2002, and I remember "mash-ups" being created back then - e.g. Amazon Light. 
So this second (perhaps more, who knows, my memory's not great either :) ) 
wave, or whatever you want to call it, isn't exactly new technology, it's 
just http://www.eod.com/devil/archive/web_20.html


AJAX is a technology associated closely with Web 2.0, but is just a way 
to make the interaction more seamless by reloading parts of a web page 
instead of whole webpages. This way you get a feel you're interacting 
with the website, instead of manually submitting changes.


Or you find that (not with all sites by any means, but a fair few) your back 
button stops working, or it just plain doesn't work...

http://www.eod.com/devil/archive/ajax.html

Anything that depends on a community for it's content and success, for 
me, is Web 2.0.


I'll let my local orchestra know. ;-)


Examples, digg.com,


So why that, and not slashdot? Slashdot has user submitted stories, 
sophisticated comments, and so on. It even has rounded corners!

--
ATB,
Matthew
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Re: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback

2006-07-17 Thread Richard Hyett

Listening to a podcast last week, Gillmor Daily, here the argument being advanced was that web 2.0 was a fairly misleading term and one to avoid. It was argued that the real change occured around 2001 with XML and more recently RSS.
The community argument doesn't ring true for me, though I wish it was true. AJAX=more interaction=community, don't think so.For me the breakthrough sites have been ebay and amazon, less community, more consumption and exchange, little person shall talk to little person.
To the friendship of the little people, rather than the english speaking people.Richard

Re: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback

2006-07-17 Thread Matthew Somerville


Kim Plowright wrote:

I'd be really interested to hear what everyone here thinks. Am I missing things?


It reads like a very good list, certainly... of what I'd expect *any* 
website to do! :-) Perhaps it's just me and the whole Web2.0 blah, but 
certainly anything in the Code section (apart from maybe Common Engines) and 
Content, Design, and Process sections, and much of User Science and Culture, 
should theoretically have applied to any website for quite some time now. If 
you just called it "Rules of the Road for BBC websites", I'd actually prefer 
it, but I understand that the BBC needs a brand. ;)


Couple of minor highlights:


* URIs to ideally be under 72 characters


This is *very* important; speaking as someone who's responsible for many 
thousands of emails to be sent out every day, it's very important that URLs 
try to be small enough so that some mail clients don't break them, and then 
you have to deal with the emails from people who don't understand what's 
happened.



Truncating a URL takes you to a valid destination


I do like this one, too. Nothing is more annoying when viewing a (iirc) 
Blogger blog entry, cutting off the end of the URL (very easy in Opera, with 
Mouse Gesture Up-Left) and getting a Not Found/Forbidden page, when from the 
URL it should obviously be giving me all the posts from that month. I always 
make sure when I write something that every "upwards index" does something 
useful.



  o Remember that you are not your audience; not everyone spends
all day in front of the internets


(!)
--
ATB,| http://www.theyworkforyou.com/  http://www.dracos.co.uk/
Matthew | http://www.writetothem.com/   http://www.pledgebank.com/
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RE: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback

Heh, well I'm very glad you picked up on the bit that was
cut and pasted from Tim O'Reilly. It's a useful condensed version, but it is
jargon heavy.
Yes, I so understand the buzzword thing; as far as I can
work out, inside the BBC, 'Let's make our site web2.0!' actually means 'Lets
make it better, and get more people to like it.'. I've been giving small
presentations hereabouts with definitions of web2.0 that I then ammend with a
nice zigzag-edge starburst rosette with 'Confusing Buzzword Alert!' on.
I'm not sure that anyone else finds it as amusing as I do.
However, because 'web2' now has such currency inside the organisation
with people who wouldn't know a standards compliant site if it bit them in the
blink tags, I've got to come up with a list of the blindingly obvious,
that we can use as a way to gently encourage people into doing the right
thing.
Various responses:
- I had a chat with Matthew Sommerville (who is 'too shy'
to post to the list... oh, hang on, now he's trolling... :-) who pointed out
that something like Google Maps only meets a certain percentage of the criteria,
so there's something to add about 'meets a given percentage of these
ideals'.
- Tables for Tabular data - yes, lovely, thanks! Completely
forgot that one.
- REST API but no AJAX - yep. I was trying to avoid using
TLAs etc, but those slipped in, mostly because I understood the difference
between REST and SOAP for the first time on Friday, yay me! I'll add
something about AJAX
- Participation - mentioned in the UX section (user
experience) - but will address this in seperate mail
- Richard H: yes. I see web2 as... well, just being the way
stuff is evolving, and will ususally use Amazon as one of the best examples
therein. However, see notes passim about wooly thinking and buzzwords. Once it's
stuck, it's stuck... I might try and preface the document with a bit of
context.
- Have I got enough in there about 'syndication' - RSS
feeds from everything, and content not necessarily staying within the confines
of the originating site.
-
blogs/ wikis/ newtech. Yes, absolutely. But how do I ensure that those
technologies get used appropriately internally? We don't want them just for the
sake of having them...

From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Richard
LockwoodSent: 14 July 2006 20:02To:
backstage@lists.bbc.co.ukSubject: Re: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets,
rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some
feedback

I think you've hit the nail on the head Kim. "Web 2.0" is
buzzwords, buzzwords, and more buzzwords, but ultimately, means nothing.
> Services, not packaged software, with
cost-effective scalability
> Control over unique, hard-to-recreate
data sources that get richer as more people use them
> Trusting users as co-developers

> Harnessing collective
intelligence
> Leveraging the long tail through
customer self-service
> Software above the level of a
single device
> Lightweight user interfaces,
development models, AND business models
See what I mean?
Cheers,
Rich.
On 7/14/06, Kim
Plowright <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
wrote:

Hi all
As threatened, here it is…I'm part of a project
internally that is looking at what the BBC does on the web, and how that
should change over the next 3 years. As part of this, Tom Loosemore, grand
paterfamilias of this list, has asked me to come up with some 'rules of the
road for web2 sites'. Nice tight brief there, you'll appreciate.
So, I have a kind of a list of philosophical
tennets - ways that code and design and data and content and whatnot should
behave when playing nice on the internet. I'd be really interested to hear
what everyone here thinks. Am I missing things? Obviously, I'm an
editorial/management type, so some of this might be barmy. But.. What do you
think? Have I missed anything vital about ways of making sites that play
nicely on the web, and benefit the whole internet more than the
organisation? That are, to nick a popular little motto, 'Not Evil'?

I'd really appreciate the thinking of you lot
here. List follows the sig…. Let me know if any of the buzzwords are
incomprehensible; I've stolen the categories from http://alistapart.com/topics/ because they seemed to make
sense.

Re: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback

2006-07-17 Thread Peter Ferne


Kim

Lots of good stuff in there.

On 14 Jul 2006, at 17:08, Kim Plowright wrote:


Common Engines
APIs
* REST for Quick, light and elegant
1 SOAP for the heavy corporate lifting


Maybe I'm reading more into this than you meant to imply but I think  
it's a mistake to assume that REST can't scale and that SOAP is  
required for 'serious' work. Arguably REST scales _better_ than SOAP.



User Science
IA
* Nimble Data and Information
* Open Standards
* Every list as RSS


OK so far.


1 Every page as RDF
2 Every relationship as FOAF


I'd have to disagree with the 'every' for these two.

I'm sure you've already read Tom Coates' presentation 'Native to a  
Web of Data' [1] (given at this year's ETech, Web 2.0 Summit and  
XTech inter alia), but it might be worth revisiting it, especially:  
'Architectural principles' [2], 'Three core types of page' [3] and  
'Parallel data representations' [4].


[1] http://www.plasticbag.org/archives/2006/02/ 
my_future_of_web_apps_slides.shtml
[2] http://www.plasticbag.org/files/native/native_files/native. 
058-001.png
[3] http://www.plasticbag.org/files/native/native_files/native. 
050-003.png
[4] http://www.plasticbag.org/files/native/native_files/native. 
054-002.png


--
petef
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[backstage] Web API down?

2006-07-17 Thread Mario Menti

The server hosting the BBC Web API (http://www0.rdthdo.bbc.co.uk/services/api/index.html) seems to be unreachable.. at least from where I am. Anyone else can get to it, or is it currently down?
Cheers,Mario.

RE: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback

2006-07-17 Thread Phil Whelan

Matthew Somerville wrote:
> "new technologies"? Blogs (including online diaries) that you can
> leave comments on have been around since 1998; RSS 1999. Wikipedia
> launched in 2001. XMLHTTP was invented by Microsoft for Outlook Web
> Access 2000. eBay launched its API in November 2000, Amazon launched
> their web services in 2002, and I remember "mash-ups" being created
> back then - e.g. Amazon Light. So this second (perhaps more, who
> knows, my memory's not great either :) ) wave, or whatever you want
> to call it, isn't exactly new technology, it's just
> http://www.eod.com/devil/archive/web_20.html   

Yes, "Web 2.0" is just a cheesey marketing phrase at the end of the day.
And as much as I hate it, I do think it does help to mark a milestone in
the way the web is being used now, how it has changed, and the direction
it's heading.
True, none of these's technologies are new. They did not appear on the
same morning "Web 2.0" was dreamt up. But I think they have definately
become more main stream in recent times, and understood by a wider
audience of non-techies.

> 
> Or you find that (not with all sites by any means, but a fair few)
> your back button stops working, or it just plain doesn't work... 
> http://www.eod.com/devil/archive/ajax.html
>

Use of AJAX should be like any other - if it's not supported by the
users browser it should fall back to a supported technology, and if it
breaks things, then it should not be used.

>> Examples, digg.com,
> 
> So why that, and not slashdot? Slashdot has user submitted stories,
> sophisticated comments, and so on. It even has rounded corners! 

Sorry, I just like digg. I think it's because of their heavy use of AJAX
;)

Phil

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RE: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback

2006-07-17 Thread Tom Armitage


So, I'm with Matthew, in that a lot of the technical nature of these
sites discussed really is stuff that ought to be hapenning on *any*
"modern" website.

I think the big challenge facing the BBC when it comes to implementing
any kind of Web 2.0 agenda - and I'm going to interpret that buzzword
along the Tim O'R lines of web-as-particiatory-platform - is going to be
making it relevant.

Most people on this list are computer- and tech-savvy individuals.
Many people aren't. Many people are intimidated. And a lot of Web 2.0
sites can be intimidating to people outside their target audience.

For instance: you might know what a tag cloud is, but to some, it's just
a list of words. Are they all the topics a site covers? No; probably
just a subset, but that's rarely clear from most clouds on the web. Why
are the words there? What does the size mean? Tag clouds are a confusing
visual element. To you or I, they're quite useful, but they don't
explain themselves well at all- Don Norman probably wouldn't like them,
if you get my drift - and that's a big problem.

And that's just one element of the vocabulary of this new approach to
the web. Participatory media is not about getting 100% of your audience
to participate - 10% would be a remarkable figure, and if 1% of your
audience are getting involved (however that is), that's better than an
old-web figure of 0%. What proportion of Radio 1's listeners text or
email the shows? That's an upper-bound for the participation you might
expect online, I'd warrant. The question is how to grow that percentage
out of early-adopters and inquisitive young people and into the broader
reaches of the core audience.

That means targetting more than geeks, hackers, and anyone with a  
MySpace profile. Sure, there will be some "power users" who will make  
use of every feed you give them, fill out every textbox with content,  
categorise every news article they want to save. But how do you add  
value for people perfectly happy with the services the BBC provides?  
How do you make someone *want* to add their own tags to a news story  
which they've just read - how do you convey the value that has for them?


It's not enough to bang on about communities and wisdoms of crowds -  
crowds are not very wise; most folksonomies are of more value to the  
individuals shaping them than they are to anyone doing a group search  
- everyone tags differently. No Web 2.0-ification of a mainstream  
content-providers products is going to succeed unless it conveys the  
*value to end users* of these new tools, new approaches.


Once your audience is suitably convinced of the value of what it's  
doing, you can make them do anything. Sometimes, this is easy: the  
value of texting a DJ is  having your comment read out on air. Minimal  
effort with a ubiquitous tool, and you get fifteen seconds of fame.  
Once that's established as a tool with your audience, you can do  
things like the Takeover days Radio 1 has been so successful with. The  
same process needs to happen with the web. Yes, it's going well,  
especially with the more youth-oriented products, but aiming for a  
wholesale reinvention is difficult.


The BBC is well-placed to take this participatory ideal and make it
relevant and accessible. For instance; how many people know about
Backstage beyond those who use it or are on this mailing list? My Mum
doesn't. Would she like some of the tools you lot are creating? Almost
certainly. Even if the techniques and technology are a mystery, the
ideals, goals, and outcomes shouldn't be. And so every advance needs to
be tempered with an explanation. The BBC has one of my favourite pages
explaining RSS out there, and I love the fact it runs XSLT on RSS
requested as text/html so that it doesn't look "broken" in most
browsers. Any implementation of user-generated "stuff", personalisation,
etc., is going to need similarly clear explanations.

Kim's outline and the discussion on the list have been really positive
and (for the most part) accurate. I'd be interested to know how it
survives a translation to reality, and to hear how that process is
going.

t.

Quoting Kim Plowright <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:


Heh, well I'm very glad you picked up on the bit that was cut and pasted
from Tim O'Reilly. It's a useful condensed version, but it is jargon
heavy.

Yes, I so understand the buzzword thing; as far as I can work out,
inside the BBC, 'Let's make our site web2.0!' actually means 'Lets make
it better, and get more people to like it.'. I've been giving small
presentations hereabouts with definitions of web2.0 that I then ammend
with a nice zigzag-edge starburst rosette with 'Confusing Buzzword
Alert!' on. I'm not sure that anyone else finds it as amusing as I do.
However, because 'web2' now has such currency inside the organisation
with people who wouldn't know a standards compliant site if it bit them
in the blink tags,  I've got to come up with a list of the blindingly
obvious, that we can use as a way to gentl

Re: [backstage] Web API down?

2006-07-17 Thread Ian Moss


ahh another key requirement of web 2.0 ;)

(a cynical comment.  But I do actually think there's been some interested  
debate going on here, about what

exactly it is)


The server hosting the BBC Web API (
http://www0.rdthdo.bbc.co.uk/services/api/index.html) seems to be
unreachable.. at least from where I am. Anyone else can get to it, or is  
it currently down?



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RE: [backstage] Web API down?




I'm seeing it internally - can anyone confirm it's dead 
outside the firewall?

  
  
  From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] 
  [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Mario 
  MentiSent: 17 July 2006 14:00To: 
  backstage@lists.bbc.co.ukSubject: [backstage] Web API 
  down?
  The server hosting the BBC Web API (http://www0.rdthdo.bbc.co.uk/services/api/index.html) 
  seems to be unreachable.. at least from where I am. Anyone else can get to it, 
  or is it currently down? 
Cheers,Mario.

Re: [backstage] Web API down?






http://www0.rdthdo.bbc.co.uk/services/api/

Down.

g5:~ gordo$ traceroute www0.rdthdo.bbc.co.uk
traceroute to www0.rdthdo.bbc.co.uk (132.185.224.30), 64 hops max, 40 
byte packets

 1  adsl (192.168.116.1)  10.314 ms  5.778 ms  5.572 ms
 2  anchor-hg-3-l100.router.demon.net (194.159.161.34)  21.202 ms 
12.494 ms  15.361 ms
 3  anchor-access-3-v154.router.demon.net (194.159.161.129)  28.036 
ms  12.972 ms  13.758 ms
 4  anchor-inside-4-g5-0-1.router.demon.net (194.159.161.74)  13.498 
ms  26.118 ms  15.438 ms
 5  tele-border-2-g1-0-2.router.demon.net (194.70.98.198)  14.232 ms 
14.456 ms  27.816 ms
 6  demon-te4-3-607.prt0.rbsov.bbc.co.uk (195.11.50.66)  15.452 ms 
25.252 ms  13.752 ms

 7  212.58.238.149 (212.58.238.149)  14.987 ms  26.898 ms  27.568 ms
 8  212.58.238.34 (212.58.238.34)  14.454 ms  18.623 ms  12.746 ms
 9  212.58.238.173 (212.58.238.173)  16.904 ms  18.734 ms  15.471 ms
10  132.185.239.14 (132.185.239.14)  27.530 ms  28.245 ms  15.154 ms
11  132.185.224.30 (132.185.224.30)  27.334 ms  23.949 ms  29.030 ms
g5:~ gordo$ telnet !$ 80
telnet www0.rdthdo.bbc.co.uk 80
Trying 132.185.224.30...
GET index.html



Gordohind-grove.demon.co.uk

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Re: [backstage] Web API down?

2006-07-17 Thread Eric Vey





It times out here, as well.

Kim Plowright wrote:

  
  
  I'm seeing it internally - can
anyone confirm it's dead outside the firewall?
  
  

 From:
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] On Behalf Of Mario
Menti
Sent: 17 July 2006 14:00
To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Subject: [backstage] Web API down?


The server hosting the BBC Web API (http://www0.rdthdo.bbc.co.uk/services/api/index.html)
seems to be unreachable.. at least from where I am. Anyone else can get
to it, or is it currently down? 

Cheers,
Mario.

RE: [backstage] Web API down?

2006-07-17 Thread David Burden










I can’t see it either.

 

 



David Burden

www.chatbots.co.uk

 

 



 

-Original
Message-
From:
[EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Kim Plowright
Sent: 17 July 2006 14:08
To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Subject: RE: [backstage] Web API
down?

 

I'm
seeing it internally - can anyone confirm it's dead outside the firewall?



 







From:
[EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Mario Menti
Sent: 17 July 2006 14:00
To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Subject: [backstage] Web API down?

The server hosting the
BBC Web API (http://www0.rdthdo.bbc.co.uk/services/api/index.html)
seems to be unreachable.. at least from where I am. Anyone else can get to it,
or is it currently down? 

Cheers,
Mario.

Re: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback


At 11:49 +0100 17/7/06, Richard Hyett wrote:
Listening to a podcast last week, Gillmor Daily, here the argument 
being advanced was that web 2.0 was a fairly misleading term and one 
to avoid. It was argued that the real change occured around 2001 
with XML and more recently RSS.


The community argument doesn't ring true for me, though I wish it 
was true. AJAX=more interaction=community, don't think so.


For me the breakthrough sites have been ebay and amazon, less 
community, more consumption and exchange, little person shall talk 
to little person.
To the friendship of the little people, rather than the english 
speaking people.


Richard



Wikipedia (to mention one project) is very multilingual, both in the 
interface and the content. You can read the French Wikipedia with 
Japanese navigation and headings, and the Greek Wikipedia with 
Flemish navigation.


I guess "we are all content providers" is very Web 2.0 (in 2006) but 
if like me you started in 1993 writing pages for the departmental 
webpages (in my case UCL CS), then the difference is rather vacuous.


Ten years before that I writing for "Google Groups", for example net.ai

http://www.ntk.net/index.cgi?b=02002-01-11&l=54#l

More useful posts to gnu.gcc and comp.emacs followed..

"Nation shall blog peace unto nation" perhaps?

Gordo

--
"Think Feynman"/
http://pobox.com/~gordo/
[EMAIL PROTECTED]///
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Re: [backstage] Web API down?

2006-07-17 Thread Tom Scott


It's dead outside the firewall.

-- Tom

Kim Plowright wrote:

I'm seeing it internally - can anyone confirm it's dead outside the
firewall?

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RE: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback

OK - so, the summary API/Ajax thoughts...

APIs 
- are good. We love APIs.
- They give as much benefit within an organisation - (linking up
internal systems) as they do when publically exposed (mashups)
- There are different flavours of API, and the right API should be used
for the job; always use the appropriate technology, (whilst ensuring you
can migrate to a newer more appropriate technology further down the
line??)
- APIs are the foundations of the shift to a 'service layer based world'
(anyone want to expand on that concept? It's a nice one...)

AJAX
- Is currently the best way to build responsive, in-browser application
like experiences for performing actions on data*
- AJAX is more than just a scripting language; it too can be the
'appropriate technology' for an API
- AJAX should be used when a site needs a responsive interface whilst
being mindful of graceful experience decay
- It's not magic web pixie dust - you need to design your interface for
your intended audience. Our current design patterns serve a niche.
- Is - generally speaking - operating at a layer above the API,
providing the tools for the user to manipulate the data the API offers
up (this one will get me shouted at, I think?)

HTML
- At the root of everything, standards compliant, with presentation
separate from content.


*I'm thinking, something along the lines of Ajax for what ajax does
well... Namely thing X, and flash for what flash does well, namely thing
Y. For values of Y approaching 'nice animation, games, interactive
entertainment', and X approaching 'operations on XML, dynamic sites and
databasey stuff...' But I kind of hit my technical limit in describing
X. Anyone?

-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Luke Dicken
Sent: 17 July 2006 10:57
To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Subject: Re: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development
philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback

Daniel Morris wrote:
> Firstly, the list seems fairly comprehensive and easy to read.
> Secondly, apologies if there are obvious answers to this email, i'm
new...
>  
> How come REST API gets mentioned, but ajax doesn't? 
>  
> I know ajax is an overused buzzword at the moment, but it is
> unavoidably crucial to the web2.0 push.   
> Specifically in closing the gap with desktop applications in terms of 
> application richness / responsiveness.
>  
> Also, although APIs and services are mentioned, perhaps this could be 
> accented more?
> The move to a service-layer based world can be a substancial paradigm 
> shift.
>
> -dan
>
AJAX is a language/technology not an API - HTML doesn't get mentioned
either, its still a safe bet that it will be of relevance to web2.0.

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RE: [backstage] Web API down?

2006-07-17 Thread Josh at GoUK.com










I can reach it

-Original
Message-
From:
[EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]On Behalf Of Kim Plowright
Sent: Monday, July 17, 2006 2:08
PM
To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Subject: RE: [backstage] Web API
down?

 

I'm
seeing it internally - can anyone confirm it's dead outside the firewall?

 









From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On
Behalf Of Mario Menti
Sent: 17 July 2006 14:00
To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Subject: [backstage] Web API down?

The server hosting the BBC Web API (http://www0.rdthdo.bbc.co.uk/services/api/index.html)
seems to be unreachable.. at least from where I am. Anyone else can get to it,
or is it currently down? 

Cheers,
Mario.

RE: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback


> Maybe I'm reading more into this than you meant to imply but 
> I think it's a mistake to assume that REST can't scale and 
> that SOAP is required for 'serious' work. Arguably REST 
> scales _better_ than SOAP.

Apparently; "querying Amazon using REST is 6 times faster than with
SOAP" [1] 

There are pros and cons against both [2]. Generally speaking however,
the lighter weight REST does seems to chew less resources and have more
standardized _built-in_ security [3].

-dan

[1] http://www.onlamp.com/pub/a/php/2003/10/30/amazon_rest.html
[2][a] http://webservices.sys-con.com/read/79282_2.htm
   [b] http://res.sys-con.com/story/apr05/79282/table1.jpg
[3] http://www.devx.com/DevX/Article/8155

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Re: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback

2006-07-17 Thread Peter Ferne



On 17 Jul 2006, at 14:40, Kim Plowright wrote:


- AJAX is more than just a scripting language; it too can be the
'appropriate technology' for an API


Umm, to a techie that's a bit confused:
* Ajax isn't a scripting language, Javascript is (the 'j' in Ajax).
* An 'Ajax' API doesn't really make sense, what you can and do have  
is a 'JSON API' - Javascript Object Notation is the format for  
exchanging messages via such an API.


Your Ajax front end could be talking to an XML API (the 'x' in Ajax),  
a JSON API, an XMPP (Jabber) API or even a raw text custom API if you  
like.



- AJAX should be used when a site needs a responsive interface whilst
being mindful of graceful experience decay


Yes, althopugh the more common phrase is 'graceful degradation' (or  
'progressive enhancement', subtly different).



- Is - generally speaking - operating at a layer above the API,
providing the tools for the user to manipulate the data the API offers
up (this one will get me shouted at, I think?)


No, that's fair comment.
--
petef
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Re: [backstage] Web API down?

2006-07-17 Thread Andrew McParland

On Mon, Jul 17, 2006 at 02:43:16PM +0100, Josh at GoUK.com wrote:
> I can reach it

Can anyone else see http://www0.rdthdo.bbc.co.uk/services/index.html ?

Looks fine from the inside, but we're still looking...

Andrew

Andrew McParland
Lead Technologist, Technology Group

BBC New Media & Technology
Kingswood Warren, Tadworth, KT20 6NP, UK

> -Original Message-
> From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Kim Plowright
> Sent: Monday, July 17, 2006 2:08 PM
> To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
> Subject: RE: [backstage] Web API down?
> 
> I'm seeing it internally - can anyone confirm it's dead outside the
> firewall?
> 
>   _
> 
> From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Mario Menti
> Sent: 17 July 2006 14:00
> To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
> Subject: [backstage] Web API down?
> The server hosting the BBC Web API (
> http://www0.rdthdo.bbc.co.uk/services/api/index.html) seems to be
> unreachable.. at least from where I am. Anyone else can get to it, or is it
> currently down?
> 
> Cheers,
> Mario.
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Re: [backstage] Web API down?

2006-07-17 Thread Richard Lockwood

Not here - it appears to be Fubar 2.0
 
Cheers,
 
R. 
On 7/17/06, Josh at GoUK.com <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:




I can reach it

-Original Message-From: 
[EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
]On Behalf Of Kim PlowrightSent: Monday, July 17, 2006 2:08 PMTo: 
backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Subject: RE: [backstage] Web API down?



 
I'm seeing it internally - can anyone confirm it's dead outside the firewall?

 



From:
 
[EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]
] On Behalf Of Mario MentiSent: 17 July 2006 14:00To: 
backstage@lists.bbc.co.ukSubject: [backstage] Web API down?
The server hosting the BBC Web API (
http://www0.rdthdo.bbc.co.uk/services/api/index.html) seems to be unreachable.. at least from where I am. Anyone else can get to it, or is it currently down? Cheers,Mario.

RE: [backstage] Web API down?




OK, by the magic of telnet and white text on a black 
screen, I've found out that the people that need to know about this do, and are 
looking in to it. Can't give you anything approaching a time it might work 
again, sorry.

  
  
  From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] 
  [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of David 
  BurdenSent: 17 July 2006 14:28To: 
  backstage@lists.bbc.co.ukSubject: RE: [backstage] Web API 
  down?
  
  
  I can’t see it 
  either.
   
   
  
  David 
  Burden
  www.chatbots.co.uk
   
   
   
  -Original 
  Message-From: 
  [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] 
  On Behalf Of Kim 
  PlowrightSent: 17 July 2006 
  14:08To: 
  backstage@lists.bbc.co.ukSubject: RE: [backstage] Web API 
  down?
   
  I'm 
  seeing it internally - can anyone confirm it's dead outside the 
  firewall?
  
 



From: 
[EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] 
On Behalf Of Mario 
MentiSent: 17 July 2006 
14:00To: 
backstage@lists.bbc.co.ukSubject: [backstage] Web API 
down?
The server hosting the BBC Web API (http://www0.rdthdo.bbc.co.uk/services/api/index.html) 
seems to be unreachable.. at least from where I am. Anyone else can get to 
it, or is it currently down? 
  Cheers,Mario.

RE: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback

2006-07-17 Thread Pete Cole

Way back in the mists of the late 20th century I attended a meeting with
someone from Factual and Learning about the Digital Curriculum - at a time
when it was still a thought. We suggested that it would be really useful if
teachers could take the "content" that the BBC produced and "re-arrange" it
to their requirements in their classroom. I suppose this would now be called
creating a mash-up. Such ideas lead to difficult conversations about what is
"content", how can teachers "mash-up" that content, in what circumstances
etc etc. As far as I can see Jam has not followed up on this.
 
IMHO, the BBC should not try to conform to some definition of Web 2.0 (and
what is a lightweight business model - one that is short?), the BBC should
be creative and innovative with what it has got and the delivery mechanisms
at its disposal.
 
The list as presented here seems to be a list of technical things that can
be done but without reference to what those technical things are being done
to (content) and to what end (what/why/how is being viewed/used and by whom
(the audience)). It seems to me the BBC have an aweful lot of content in an
aweful lot of categories and also have an incredibly diverse audience using
a variety of reception devices.
 
What have the BBC got?
Who can use BBC content?
What do the BBC want to enable people to do with it?
What can the BBC allow people to do with it?
 
and from that:
 
How do the BBC want them to do those things?
 
For example, you might decide that you want to enable anyone to do what ever
they like. You recently ran a competition for people to design a bbc home
page, but only a mock up. A theoretical route you could go would be for
bbc.co.uk to disappear and be replaced completely by 'services'. All those
competition entries wouldn't have to be mock-ups, they could be real. Then
www.bbc.co.uk might just be the BBCs own hack at putting a face on those
services. iPlayer (or whatever it is called these days) could be just one of
many apps putting a face on downloads/streams. Back to Jam, the BBC would
become a provider of "content components" to all the VLEs out there (perhaps
it already is).
 
On the other hand, given all the rights issues etc etc etc the BBC may be
forced to be a 'closed shop', no body can do much with much of your content
other than look at it and write comments on it. Your list will produce an
excellent, modern web site that elegantly degrades to the capabilities of
the users device and that is developed in a well managed environment. This
doesn't strike me as Web2.0, just web or in fact just "TV", the box is a
browser and that is all you can use to look at it and you can only look at
it in the way it was 'broadcast'.
 
If it seems I have missed the point, I was trying to address "So, I have a
kind of a list of philosophical tennets - ways that code and design and data
and content and whatnot should behave when playing nice on the internet."
The ways that code etc should behave will depend upon what you are going to
allow; what content can be used to what end and by whom?
 
 
Pete Cole

---
On 7/14/06, Kim Plowright <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: 
Hi all 

As threatened, here it is.I'm part of a project internally that is looking
at what the BBC does on the web, and how that should change over the next 3
years. As part of this, Tom Loosemore, grand paterfamilias of this list, has
asked me to come up with some 'rules of the road for web2 sites'. Nice tight
brief there, you'll appreciate. 

So, I have a kind of a list of philosophical tennets - ways that code and
design and data and content and whatnot should behave when playing nice on
the internet. I'd be really interested to hear what everyone here thinks. Am
I missing things? Obviously, I'm an editorial/management type, so some of
this might be barmy. But.. What do you think? Have I missed anything vital
about ways of making sites that play nicely on the web, and benefit the
whole internet more than the organisation? That are, to nick a popular
little motto, 'Not Evil'? 

I'd really appreciate the thinking of you lot here. List follows the sig..
Let me know if any of the buzzwords are incomprehensible; I've stolen the
categories from http://alistapart.com/topics/ because they seemed to make
sense.

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Re: [backstage] Web API down?

2006-07-17 Thread Andrew McParland

The only news I have is that the issue is still being looked into.  It seems
that some people have access and some don't.

Sorry for the inconvenience.  We'll let you know what's happening as soon as
we have something definite to report.

Andrew

On Mon, Jul 17, 2006 at 02:56:08PM +0100, Andrew McParland wrote:
> On Mon, Jul 17, 2006 at 02:43:16PM +0100, Josh at GoUK.com wrote:
> > I can reach it
> 
> Can anyone else see http://www0.rdthdo.bbc.co.uk/services/index.html ?
> 
> Looks fine from the inside, but we're still looking...
> 
> Andrew
> 
> Andrew McParland
> Lead Technologist, Technology Group
> 
> BBC New Media & Technology
> Kingswood Warren, Tadworth, KT20 6NP, UK
> 
> > -Original Message-
> > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Kim Plowright
> > Sent: Monday, July 17, 2006 2:08 PM
> > To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
> > Subject: RE: [backstage] Web API down?
> > 
> > I'm seeing it internally - can anyone confirm it's dead outside the
> > firewall?
> > 
> >   _
> > 
> > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Mario Menti
> > Sent: 17 July 2006 14:00
> > To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
> > Subject: [backstage] Web API down?
> > The server hosting the BBC Web API (
> > http://www0.rdthdo.bbc.co.uk/services/api/index.html) seems to be
> > unreachable.. at least from where I am. Anyone else can get to it, or is it
> > currently down?
> > 
> > Cheers,
> > Mario.
> -
> Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group.  To unsubscribe, please 
> visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html.  
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RE: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback

This is a fantastic post, Pete, thankyou.

I can't even begin to pick a lot of it appart right now (it's gone six,
and I've had an afternoon of meetings). I think some of what you're
reacting to - and quite rightly - is that you're only seeing one tiny
part of a much bigger project, that is indeed adressing 'what we've got,
and what we can allow people to do with it'. Yes, a lot of this is
obfuscated by saying it's 'web2' - when in fact its just.. Stuff.
Content. The internet. People. I've fallen into my own trap of using a
catch all term to disguise a lot of gnarly underlying issues.

In the way of gnarly issues, they're a way from being sorted yet. But
we're working on it - and kind of from both ends. Hence the odd 'what
makes a good website?' approach.

k



-Original Message-
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Pete Cole
Sent: 17 July 2006 15:44
To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
Subject: RE: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development
philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback

Way back in the mists of the late 20th century I attended a meeting with
someone from Factual and Learning about the Digital Curriculum - at a
time when it was still a thought. We suggested that it would be really
useful if teachers could take the "content" that the BBC produced and
"re-arrange" it to their requirements in their classroom. I suppose this
would now be called creating a mash-up. Such ideas lead to difficult
conversations about what is "content", how can teachers "mash-up" that
content, in what circumstances etc etc. As far as I can see Jam has not
followed up on this.
 
IMHO, the BBC should not try to conform to some definition of Web 2.0
(and what is a lightweight business model - one that is short?), the BBC
should be creative and innovative with what it has got and the delivery
mechanisms at its disposal.
 
The list as presented here seems to be a list of technical things that
can be done but without reference to what those technical things are
being done to (content) and to what end (what/why/how is being
viewed/used and by whom (the audience)). It seems to me the BBC have an
aweful lot of content in an aweful lot of categories and also have an
incredibly diverse audience using a variety of reception devices.
 
What have the BBC got?
Who can use BBC content?
What do the BBC want to enable people to do with it?
What can the BBC allow people to do with it?
 
and from that:
 
How do the BBC want them to do those things?
 
For example, you might decide that you want to enable anyone to do what
ever they like. You recently ran a competition for people to design a
bbc home page, but only a mock up. A theoretical route you could go
would be for bbc.co.uk to disappear and be replaced completely by
'services'. All those competition entries wouldn't have to be mock-ups,
they could be real. Then www.bbc.co.uk might just be the BBCs own hack
at putting a face on those services. iPlayer (or whatever it is called
these days) could be just one of many apps putting a face on
downloads/streams. Back to Jam, the BBC would become a provider of
"content components" to all the VLEs out there (perhaps it already is).
 
On the other hand, given all the rights issues etc etc etc the BBC may
be forced to be a 'closed shop', no body can do much with much of your
content other than look at it and write comments on it. Your list will
produce an excellent, modern web site that elegantly degrades to the
capabilities of the users device and that is developed in a well managed
environment. This doesn't strike me as Web2.0, just web or in fact just
"TV", the box is a browser and that is all you can use to look at it and
you can only look at it in the way it was 'broadcast'.
 
If it seems I have missed the point, I was trying to address "So, I have
a kind of a list of philosophical tennets - ways that code and design
and data and content and whatnot should behave when playing nice on the
internet."
The ways that code etc should behave will depend upon what you are going
to allow; what content can be used to what end and by whom?
 
 
Pete Cole


---
On 7/14/06, Kim Plowright <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: 
Hi all 

As threatened, here it is.I'm part of a project internally that is
looking at what the BBC does on the web, and how that should change over
the next 3 years. As part of this, Tom Loosemore, grand paterfamilias of
this list, has asked me to come up with some 'rules of the road for web2
sites'. Nice tight brief there, you'll appreciate. 

So, I have a kind of a list of philosophical tennets - ways that code
and design and data and content and whatnot should behave when playing
nice on the internet. I'd be really interested to hear what everyone
here thinks. Am I missing things? Obviously, I'm an editorial/management
type, so some of this might be barmy. But.. What do you think? Have I
missed anything vital about ways of maki

Re: [backstage] Web API down?

2006-07-17 Thread Peter Goodhall, M3PHP


On 17/07/06, Andrew McParland <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:


Can anyone else see http://www0.rdthdo.bbc.co.uk/services/index.html ?


Loads fine for me.
--
Peter Goodhall, M3PHP
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Re: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback

2006-07-17 Thread Richard Edwards

Hi Kim,

I have read all the replies, and I must say, as an outsider to the BBC and the 
Web2 concept... that the technical jargon in the list is overwhelming and 
therefore confusing to me. I respect the fact that my point of view is 
therefore pretty unenlightening, but it would seem that the principle is to 
look at web2 as some kind of organisation or club, great if you have the idea 
for membership, 
but as has been mentioned the "tenet" of all this technology is to further the 
interaction of myself, ie. Joe Public, within the internet.
I think that it is very positive for the BBC to have a three year strategy ... 
but I would also hope that history would exclude the possibility of such a 
tight "club like" response to the increasingly complex set of technologies 
which allow content to be delivered via web pages to the user.
The past is littered with examples of conceptual frameworks that have held the 
originators back, mostly corporate structures, whilst allowing other free 
thinkers to push ahead in various beneficial directions. 

I hope you appreciate, as I do, that this is my own opinion, but it may give 
you some balance from the outside world when you come to clarify the management 
of this "new" structure for those within the Beeb.
Please remember that the users as well as the providers have a choice that is 
exercised whenever they use the web, and therefore all these structures have to 
be liquid in conception.

Have fun:)
Richard Edwards

On Friday, July 14, 2006, at 06:20PM, Kim Plowright <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

>
><>
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RE: [backstage] Web2.0 - tennets, rules, development philosophy... I'd love you to give us some feedback




HTML
- At the root of everything, standards compliant, with presentation
separate from content.




HTML? You mean I to switch back from XHTML? Since when?!??!

:-)


Gordo

--
"Think Feynman"/
http://pobox.com/~gordo/
[EMAIL PROTECTED]///
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RE: [backstage] Web API down?

2006-07-17 Thread Pete Cole

Hi,

I've been able to see it (and use the API) since the first report it was
down. I foolishly thought 

a) must be a one off and/or

b) its been fixed since the time those people said they couldn't see it

Hence, I didn't say anything :-(  

Regards

Pete Cole
via Zen ADSL

> -Original Message-
> From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] 
> [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Andrew McParland
> Sent: 17 July 2006 14:56
> To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
> Subject: Re: [backstage] Web API down?
> 
> On Mon, Jul 17, 2006 at 02:43:16PM +0100, Josh at GoUK.com wrote:
> > I can reach it
> 
> Can anyone else see http://www0.rdthdo.bbc.co.uk/services/index.html ?
> 
> Looks fine from the inside, but we're still looking...
> 
> Andrew
> 
> Andrew McParland
> Lead Technologist, Technology Group
> 
> BBC New Media & Technology
> Kingswood Warren, Tadworth, KT20 6NP, UK
> 
> > -Original Message-
> > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Behalf Of Kim Plowright
> > Sent: Monday, July 17, 2006 2:08 PM
> > To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
> > Subject: RE: [backstage] Web API down?
> > 
> > I'm seeing it internally - can anyone confirm it's dead outside the 
> > firewall?
> > 
> >   _
> > 
> > From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> > [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Mario Menti
> > Sent: 17 July 2006 14:00
> > To: backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk
> > Subject: [backstage] Web API down?
> > The server hosting the BBC Web API (
> > http://www0.rdthdo.bbc.co.uk/services/api/index.html) seems to be 
> > unreachable.. at least from where I am. Anyone else can get 
> to it, or 
> > is it currently down?
> > 
> > Cheers,
> > Mario.
> -
> Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group.  To 
> unsubscribe, please visit 
> http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html.
>   Unofficial list archive: 
> http://www.mail-archive.com/backstage@lists.bbc.co.uk/
> 

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Re: [backstage] Web API down?