4 ms·

No, Your Service isn't "Open"

13 points by michaelchisari 16y ago

michaelchisari 16y ago
Maybe we should all start stressing the difference between "Open" and simply "Available"
- jdp23 16y ago
  Michael, do you also see Appleseed, Diaspora, OneSocialWeb and Buddycloud as part of a "federated social network" movement? Are there any concrete steps the different projects are taking to work together?
  - michaelchisari 16y ago
    Most definitely, I think we all see ourselves that way. There was a Federated Social Web conference in July that was pretty well attended by the different projects, and I believe a follow-up event is in the early planning stages. We also have a federated social web mailing list, with w3c representation. We're all interested in inter-operability. It's still too early to tell what shape that will take, we're all experimenting in different directions, but from my take on it, the future looks bright for interoperability. We may find ourselves with 3+ protocols early on, but they'll all be open, documented and available to anyone, and the different projects hopefully will try and support more than one protocol. But eventually, something will rise to the top, it's just too early to tell what that will be at this point. But that's not hindering anybody's progress, in fact, in a lot of ways, the platform can be a lot more difficult to build than the protocol.
  - imaginator 16y ago
    We're also all participating in the http://www.w3.org/2005/Incubator/socialweb/ http://www.w3.org/2005/Incubator/socialweb/
ZeroMinx 16y ago
I give my deepest respect for anyone who fights for open software. I wish I would do more.. I've never met RMS, and as far as I call tell he might be a bit weird, but I still owe him the greatest degree of respect. Thanks to him, and to people like him, I was able to grow up with software I could hack on my own. I started learning proper programming in the early 90's, and I could do that using free (I'm not going to qualify what type of free we're talking about. If you don't know, you're not on HN) software and the reason is for people like him who lead the way (ok, this post might be more about protocols rather than software, but the main gist of my point still remains)
- Semiapies 16y ago
  Not really. RMS has harshly rejected terms like "open source" for free software. "Openness" is a relative and meaninglessly vague term in this context. Anything short of a open-sourced program and completely public data is less "open" than some alternative. The complaints that 99.99% of people make about APIs have less to do with "openness" than poor communication by the provider in the forms of bad documentation and unwarned changes. TFA: "Facebook Connect is not open. It's controlled by one company." Yes, because if it was another company, you wouldn't care about this API. The API only matters to anyone because it's Facebook. I adore free software, but "openness" is a lousy justification for trying to work up umbrage about the difficulties of working in a parasitic developer ecosystem.
  - ZeroMinx 16y ago
    There are plenty of words in this particular universe that are thrown around a lot. You mention "openness". Another big one is "freedom". You can discuss to great length what these words mean, but I'm not going down that route tonight. I don't know specifically what RMS has said and has not said. For the most of it I'm not interested. What I am interested in are the actions. Like him or not, but RMS has clearly done good things for anyone who believes computers should be devices that you and I are free to hack on on your own. (I'm carefully avoiding your TFA quote because I have nothing useful to comment on that. Yes, I agree that the API only has value because it's coming from this one company. I don't really think this has much to do with openness).
lurkinggrue 16y ago
Am I the only one who found the like button and the disquis on that page ironic?
DanLar75 16y ago
Well in all fairness, I would assume that most API's and Services have some form of disclaimer. What TOTALLY 100% open service have you ever seen?
- blantonl 16y ago
  This. Frankly, there has to be TOS around any API released, because there are always nefarious uses just waiting to be exploited by non-"legit" consumers. I realize that "legit" is a subjective term, so well, that is why TOS for API's are needed.
  - michaelchisari 16y ago
    This. Frankly, there has to be TOS around any API released, because there are always nefarious uses just waiting to be exploited by non-"legit" consumers. Actually, you can (and should) build protections against spam and improper use into the protocol instead of relying on a centralized gatekeeper. All truly open systems do this.
teilo 16y ago
I really don't think there is anything to complain about here. When I hear that an API is "open", I have always assumed that means that it is published, and open to the public to use, both of which are true of the Twitter API. However, I have never assumed that "open" means that I have a right to abuse a publicly available API without getting banned for doing so.

Maybe we should all start stressing the difference between "Open" and simply "Available"

jdp23 16y ago
Michael, do you also see Appleseed, Diaspora, OneSocialWeb and Buddycloud as part of a "federated social network" movement? Are there any concrete steps the different projects are taking to work together?
- michaelchisari 16y ago
  Most definitely, I think we all see ourselves that way. There was a Federated Social Web conference in July that was pretty well attended by the different projects, and I believe a follow-up event is in the early planning stages. We also have a federated social web mailing list, with w3c representation. We're all interested in inter-operability. It's still too early to tell what shape that will take, we're all experimenting in different directions, but from my take on it, the future looks bright for interoperability. We may find ourselves with 3+ protocols early on, but they'll all be open, documented and available to anyone, and the different projects hopefully will try and support more than one protocol. But eventually, something will rise to the top, it's just too early to tell what that will be at this point. But that's not hindering anybody's progress, in fact, in a lot of ways, the platform can be a lot more difficult to build than the protocol.
- imaginator 16y ago
  We're also all participating in the http://www.w3.org/2005/Incubator/socialweb/ http://www.w3.org/2005/Incubator/socialweb/

I give my deepest respect for anyone who fights for open software. I wish I would do more.. I've never met RMS, and as far as I call tell he might be a bit weird, but I still owe him the greatest degree of respect. Thanks to him, and to people like him, I was able to grow up with software I could hack on my own. I started learning proper programming in the early 90's, and I could do that using free (I'm not going to qualify what type of free we're talking about. If you don't know, you're not on HN) software and the reason is for people like him who lead the way (ok, this post might be more about protocols rather than software, but the main gist of my point still remains)

Semiapies 16y ago
Not really. RMS has harshly rejected terms like "open source" for free software. "Openness" is a relative and meaninglessly vague term in this context. Anything short of a open-sourced program and completely public data is less "open" than some alternative. The complaints that 99.99% of people make about APIs have less to do with "openness" than poor communication by the provider in the forms of bad documentation and unwarned changes. TFA: "Facebook Connect is not open. It's controlled by one company." Yes, because if it was another company, you wouldn't care about this API. The API only matters to anyone because it's Facebook. I adore free software, but "openness" is a lousy justification for trying to work up umbrage about the difficulties of working in a parasitic developer ecosystem.
- ZeroMinx 16y ago
  There are plenty of words in this particular universe that are thrown around a lot. You mention "openness". Another big one is "freedom". You can discuss to great length what these words mean, but I'm not going down that route tonight. I don't know specifically what RMS has said and has not said. For the most of it I'm not interested. What I am interested in are the actions. Like him or not, but RMS has clearly done good things for anyone who believes computers should be devices that you and I are free to hack on on your own. (I'm carefully avoiding your TFA quote because I have nothing useful to comment on that. Yes, I agree that the API only has value because it's coming from this one company. I don't really think this has much to do with openness).

lurkinggrue 16y ago

Am I the only one who found the like button and the disquis on that page ironic?

DanLar75 16y ago

Well in all fairness, I would assume that most API's and Services have some form of disclaimer. What TOTALLY 100% open service have you ever seen?

blantonl 16y ago
This. Frankly, there has to be TOS around any API released, because there are always nefarious uses just waiting to be exploited by non-"legit" consumers. I realize that "legit" is a subjective term, so well, that is why TOS for API's are needed.
- michaelchisari 16y ago
  This. Frankly, there has to be TOS around any API released, because there are always nefarious uses just waiting to be exploited by non-"legit" consumers. Actually, you can (and should) build protections against spam and improper use into the protocol instead of relying on a centralized gatekeeper. All truly open systems do this.

teilo 16y ago

I really don't think there is anything to complain about here. When I hear that an API is "open", I have always assumed that means that it is published, and open to the public to use, both of which are true of the Twitter API. However, I have never assumed that "open" means that I have a right to abuse a publicly available API without getting banned for doing so.