Deys.ca | Bill Deys

So I was listening to Mitch Joel on the latest Six Pixels of Seperation this morning and Joseph Rogers had a comment that he spent a lot of time reading blogs but not commenting because he uses a feed reader and rarely goes to the site. I can say I do the same thing but I do have a habit of opening the feed item in a new window and commenting every once and a while. I would probably comment more if I didn’t have to do that so it got me thinking.

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Step One – Get the Comments to the Feed Reader

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So to start there is no way of reading comments from your reader and no way to publish them from it either. For the first part, getting the comments to the reader, what we need is a xml tag in the rss feeds with a link to that items comment rss feed. Most, I think, blogging platforms already have a feed for the comments, I know WordPress does (it’s ?feed=rss2&p=”Post ID #”). This would be fairly easy just a standard xml tag like “we” added enclosure for podcasting. Then the feed readers need to add the ability to pull in the comments when you “read” an item. This could be automatic when you open a new item or could be a link at the bottom of the article that will grab the comments.

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Step Two – Publish Comments from the Reader

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The second step is to set up a hook to allow for comments to be publish right there in the feed reader to the original blog thus allowing everyone to see them in other readers. Most platforms use an xmlrpc hook to publish posts from third party apps (like ecto) and other sites (like blip.tv, flickr and clipmarks). The same method could be adapted for publishing comments and still maintain all the spam protection and what not already in use.

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Final Notes

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I know other people, the guys from the TechCanuck podcast jump to mind, have a problem with sites like Shyftr taking the community away from their sites and this would eliminate the need to take the comments and community off site.

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clipped from www.techcrunch.com GroupTweet is a service that let’s users send private Twitter messages to a group of other users. It’s works great, unless you screw up and accidentally enter your normal Twitter credentials into the site instead of the credentials for a new Twitter account you create for the service. If you accidentally put in your normal Twitter credentials, the service took all of your private direct messages on Twitter and published them. Twitter user Orli Yakuel and others found this glitch the hard way, and suffered major embarrasement. First of all, he disabled all existing accounts. He updated instructions to be more clear. And he also set up the service so that only brand new Twitter accounts can be used – so if you still accidentally put in your normal account, it will detect it and show an error. Finally, the service now only retrieves message for one day.

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So the phrase “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle” has been around for a long time, I remember being introduced to it early in grade school, and back then it was a big thing but looking back it was only really Recycle that took off. That was about the time we got a blue box a put a composter in the backyard. When they were teaching us about it we never were told much about reducing or reusing. I guess at the time recycling, and minimizing the stuff that goes into the landfill, was the most important.

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Now with all the talk about switching to compact florescent light bulbs and hybrid cars it seams like we are adding emphasis to the Reduce part of the phrase. Is that the life cycle for this three part learning curve or is it so much more important now then it was then?

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With iTunes considering going to a subscription model for music, an idea I had way back near the beginning of podcasting before iTunes was even a podcast aggregator.

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My idea then was to publish some sort of XML that would contain links to the music to buy and the “host/DJ” created audio that would wrap the music and all the info on how to mix it together. Basically a listener would be able to download all the parts and legally purchased music and locally mash them together to make the podcast. It was a way around using licenced music as just the mashed up result would easily be fair use.

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The big problem would be cross border subscribers not being able to buy the music, mostly just in areas where there was not a system to purchase the tracks in digital form. Although with a bit of work I’d bet some one would be able to work around the issue in a non legal way.

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So now that iTunes offers subscriptions it’s even easier. Basically anyone who subscribes to the service, obviously has to use iTunes to use it, and the mash up part can easily be built into the application. Publishers just have to upload their audio and link up the tracks they need and any subscriber can add the show to their list and upon release of a new episode the host audio is downloaded as well as the music and the playback is as easy as playing any other podcast.

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My theory is also supported by a patent that apple applied for a while back for a way of mashing up audio, which at the time everyone thought, and rightly so as it could be used in this way too, that the system would be used to make custom news programs and such.

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So I’ve had these notes in my notebook for a while! They are from on afternoon when I was on the ski hill in Byron after the power at work cut out and I couldn’t do any work. Anyways I was lucky enough to be there, I don’t get out as often as I like after just starting to go for the first few times in years. By the way, thanks to my super wife for the awesome Christmas present!

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Anyways I’m by myself, iPod playing the latest podcasts, only one ear bud in because you have to be able to hear around you, and I’m chatting with the occasional person I riding up the lift with. I couldn’t believe it the first time when some stranger starts telling me that he’s on workers comp. and snowboarding is his “therapy.” The quotes on that are totally necessary because he said it in a tone that meant he was screwing the system! Then about a half hour later on the other chair lift, yes there is only two the hill is handy not amazing, a different stranger gets on a states “I love workers comp!” What the hell is with people?

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I know people abuse the system, it pisses me off to no end, but who the hell has the guts to advertise the face that they are? I know some people over at the workers compensation board and man would I love to be able to get these guys names and rat them out. I’m not a tattle tale but these people are taking advantage of a system designed to help people who are hurt on the job not help you go skiing! Come on people our social system is strained enough without you milking it more!

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