Syndication is Still Simple

Every time RSS comes up for discussion, someone links to Mark Pilgrim's misleading article about the version history of RSS, making a comment like this:

RSS with its 9 [diveintomark.org] +1 [rss3.org] incompatible versions is hardly a standard for anything. It is a huge pain for a implementer to decide which versions to support.

There are only two significant versions of RSS: RSS 1.0 and RSS 2.0. These formats have one major technical difference that prevents their merger: RSS 1.0 makes use of RDF, a standard for data exchange, and RSS 2.0 does not, favoring a slightly simpler approach.

There's only one significant version of Atom: Atom 1.0, which recently became a proposed standard of the IETF.

The other seven versions of RSS identified by Pilgrim are older versions of either 1.0 or 2.0.

An implementor of syndication publishing software can support RSS 1.0, RSS 2.0, and Atom 1.0 and ignore their older versions. All three formats are stable, and code that produces RSS can easily be adapted to produce Atom 1.0. I added Atom support to an RSS-feed PHP script in a half-hour.

Rss · 2005/08/22 · 7 COMMENTS · Link

Casting a Dark Horse as the Sixth 007

James Bond producers are searching for a new actor to play the role after dumping Pierce Brosnan this week.

Media favorites for the next 007 include Hugh Jackman, Heath Ledger, Jude Law, and Clive Owen. I imagine they'll pick someone from this demographic: Top-of-the-marquee actors under 40 from the U.K. or Australia who can handle a black-tie dress code.

British bookmakers have Owen as a 4/5 favorite, but some of their other choices are so odd you have to wonder at the collective intelligence of the gamblers placing the bets. Goren Visjnic?

As someone who became bored with the Bond movies around the time Timothy Dalton took over, I'd love to see them do something bold with the franchise, casting a black actor in the role.

A color-blind casting call opens up some interesting possibilities. Black actors can lead blockbuster action movies, as proven repeatedly by Will Smith, but he was born in the wrong country to be considered for the role. An American Bond would go over as well as an American Robin Hood.

Brosnan's choice for successor is reportedly Colin Salmon, the actor who played MI6 operative Charles Robinson in the last three Bond films.

My pick: Idris Elba, the 32-year-old actor who played Stringer Bell on The Wire. Born in London to parents from Ghana and Sierre Leone, Elba was incredible in an odd role -- an erudite Baltimore drug dealer trying to turn dirty money into clean businesses -- and he wears a suit like he was born in one.

Television · Movies · 2005/08/21 · 13 COMMENTS · Link

RSS 3.0: Please Pass the Fork

Jonathan Avidan has announced RSS 3.0, a one-man attempt to fork RSS 2.0.

As far as I can tell, this is Avidan's first involvement in syndication. He's passing over three groups -- the developers of RSS 1.0, RSS 2.0, and Atom -- without making an attempt to work with any of us.

RSS 3.0 is pitched as a better-specified version of RSS 2.0, but it drops a bunch of elements and makes changes to several others, so it's more than a spec rewrite.

Avidan also claims it will make Atom better, which would be a neat trick, since that format just became a proposed Internet standard after an arduous, two-year development process. I'm guessing that its creators would burst into tears at the slightest mention of a second version.

I don't know why RSS offers more forks than a picnic, but I wish I could use the RSS Advisory Board to simplify the situation. A new person trying to figure out syndication shouldn't have to learn three formats just to make an educated decision about which one to support. Correction: Four formats.

Slashdot founder Rob Malda thought RSS 3.0 was front-page news yesterday, which gives me hope. I've been working on an incredible new format I call HTML 5.0.

Rss · 2005/08/19 · 4 COMMENTS · Link

Never Wrestle with a Pig

One of my friends is looking for archived versions of Rush Limbaugh's show from the years he was abusing Oxycontin. He figures there has to be comedy gold in the shows where Limbaugh was pontificating under the influence.

Earlier this week, Limbaugh made a statement about Cindy Sheehan that's so bizarre we should be talking relapse:

Cindy Sheehan is just Bill Burkett. Her story is nothing more than forged documents. There's nothing about it that's real, including the mainstream media's glomming onto it. It's not real.

He subsequently denied calling her a liar, in audio that Rachel Maddow gleefully broadcast on her Air America show this morning (two-minute clip attached). Jerry Springer broadcast it also, Media Matters is doing the same, and Al Franken will undoubtedly air the same clip at noon.

Liberals spend a lot of time debunking false statements by over-the-top conservatives like Limbaugh and Ann Coulter, and I sometimes worry that we're just making them stronger. Anyone who cares already knows that they have an estranged relationship with the truth.

Whenever someone on television angrily denounces Coulter, she visibly brightens. Check out her reaction to Alan Colmes on Crooks & Liars. It's the Seinfeld dirty-talking episode all over again, prior to the point where Jerry kills the mood by asking, "you mean the panties your mother laid out for you?"

The laboriously detailed corrections that Franken devotes to Limbaugh remind me of the days when I would get into flamewars on Usenet. I can recall spending hours drafting a point-by-point rebuttal to someone's post, believing that the information I had gathered, coupled with the strength of my reasoning, would prove to everyone that my antagonist was a total stupidhead who sucks big rocks.

Podcasts · Politics · Radio · 2005/08/19 · 35 COMMENTS · Link

Katherine Harris Sways Florida Voters

U.S. Rep. Katherine Harris announced her Florida Senate bid on Hannity & Colmes last week in one of the most bizarre interviews I've ever seen a politician give on television. She's sitting awkwardly in three-quarters profile, sways back and forth, and keeps moving her facial muscles around as if she's forgotten how to keep them still.

Harris spokesman Adam Goodman has attempted to explain her conduct as fatigue from a long first day of campaigning. "She was just a little tired," he told a reporter.

I think we're in for an entertaining Senate race.

Florida · Politics · Television · 2005/08/17 · 9 COMMENTS · Link

USA Today is running a cover story on Patrick Cobbs and Jamario Thomas of the University of North Texas Mean Green, the NCAA-leading rushers in 2003 and 2004.

They'll become the first season leaders to ever share the same backfield when my alma mater loses by several touchdowns to LSU on Sept. 3.

Sports · North Texas · 2005/08/15 · 2 COMMENTS · Link

Buzzword.Com Runs Manila 9.5

I've upgraded to Manila 9.5 on Buzzword.Com, the free weblog service I'm running for Manila and Radio UserLand users.

The server's having problems staying online lately, to the chagrin of Craig Jensen of BookNotes and other bloggers trying to publish there.

I think the problems are caused by the huge number of weblogs on the server -- somewhere around 5,000 at the moment. I'm going to move every weblog that hasn't been updated in 2005 out of Manila, which should leave fewer than 500 sites on Frontier.

Manila · 2005/08/15 · 1 COMMENT · Link

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