On webmentions (and decentralisation in general)

The internet was originally built to survive a nuclear attack on the US. By design it was a distributed network connecting many computers through different paths, making it resilient in the event of a disappearing connection or computer. In recent years, however, much of the web has become more and more centralised.

A centralised approach is easier to reason about. Everything is stored in the (conceptually) same database, accessible through a uniform query language. Think Google, think Facebook, think Disqus. All offer a single sign-on mechanism into their ecosystem which allows users to react on stories, both within their apps, as well as outside in places when other proprietors have included a bit of the Google/Facebook/Disqus/… code. But in the end all the data is stored in a central store, not owned by that user, not owned by the owner of that blog, but owned by a large company that stores information for million's of other sites. C…

Wednesday at The Next Web

Note: My ticket was sponsered by The Bean Machine I'm working for. Thank you!SoundCloudThe best talk of the day. Free is not important. Its about the bulb, not about the light. What happens around something is interesting. Any sufficiently interesting content is indistinguishable from cnotent. Kelly defines things that add value to something free. Context can 'make' (or the lack of context can probably break, ed.) the music. Relevance is defining the personal quality of music. The block buster approach doesn't work as well anymore. New schemes of music publishing arise. Use other people to help and promote your music, involve users in creation. Build relationships. Allow them, at a premium price, get additional material (e.g. multitrack version). SoundCloud makes it more accessible.3voor12Cool concept from 3voor12: FIY, film it yourself. Concert registrations done by combining video recordings from many.iMeemChaotic talk. API's, talk about the product, all mi…