I published a brief issue of my newsletter, JOHO, yesterday. It’s loosely based on some Matrixian themes. Well, that’s the gimmick anyway.

It’s available here.

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Tim “Co-Father of XML” Bray has written a clear, concise and understandable introduction to SOAP and the REST of the ways of talking to a Web server. The question is when it makes sense for a program to ask another program for information by sending it a URL or a more complex bundle of data. And this basic process is central to how we’re going to build Web services over the next few years.

<asbestos>
I make no pretense of knowing who’s right in the issues Tim raises.
</asbestos>

Note: Here’s Tim’s brief piece on why URI is right and URL is wrong.

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RageBoy’s got a brand new blog. It says it’s actually a blog for both RB and Ann Craig, but so far it’s all RageBoy all the time. But it’s RB in fine form, funny right from the tagline…

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Here’s something else W can add to his presidential resume: He is the first president to know how to roll a joint with one hand.

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That old memester, Nicholas “Mr. Bits” Negroponte, is at it again. In an interview in today’s Boston Globe (here today, gone the day after tomorrow), he says that at an FCC technical advisory committee meeting he responded to the charge that there’s no economic model for wifi as follows:

…I raised my hand and I said, “There’s not only a precedent, there’s a very strong economic model…flower boxes”

Think about it. If you put a flower box outside your house, you’re first of all using your own money to buy the flowers. You’re hanging it out there. You’re doing it for your self-esteem, for the beauty of looking out the window and seeing he flowers, of decorating your house and making it look well. But it also, if everyone on the street puts nice flower boxes out, makes the street look nicer. [Caution: Snobbery ahead] It happens a little bit on Beacon Hill, it happens a lot in European cities.

Now the theory of flower boxes…could be taken to wifi. I put in a wifi system in my home for my own use, but it radiates out into the street. There’s no incremental cost for me to let other people use it…If everybody does that, then the entire street has broadband.

Cool analogy.

He also predicts a rebirth of the tech sector in the field of “silicon biology.”

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At noon EDT today, Doc and I are going to be on The Computer Show, “New England’s longest-running technology talk show,” on WOTW 900 and WGAW 1240. Looking forward to it…

Well, that was fun. The hosts asked us about World of Ends and we spouted.

By the way, Doc’s written some mighty fine prose about why newspapers should put their archives online for free.

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Warren St. John has a good article in the NY Times today about what blogs are doing to privacy.

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Here and Now has posted the audio file of my 8-minute segment about what emerged at the O’Relly Emerging Tech conference. I talked about emergence, wikis, social software and the Internet Bookmobile, as I recall.

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NASA’s Deep Impact crashes into the Comet Tempel 1, in July of 2005. Now you can have your name inscribed on a disk that gets incinerated in the explosion. It’s a can’t-fail gift for both the complete egotist or terminally depressed loved on!

[Thanks for the link, Mary Lu.]

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Here is an amusing page. Note: Read it a little more closely before assuming that the link is broken.

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