What a mess...

Writing with Writely is cool. Blogging with Writely even cooler !

But getting to the point ..Dion Hinchcliffe dreams about Ajax’s Disruptive Influences..

"The End of Software Upgrades, Fixes, and Security Patches" ...

"Since Ajax software delivers an application fresh to your browser each time you load the URL, you’re always getting the latest version, with all fixes and updates, automatically."

Provided that I really always want the latest version! Quite often I don't want to upgrade at all, or upgrade when I'm really ready. Sophisticated programs do have a learning curve to master. I would prefer deciding for myself when and how I want to upgrade. Minor upgrades for rather "simple" programs like Writely don't matter so much, but what about more complex programs?

In terms of complexity of features. I can't see Photoshop, Maya or similar as a web-based application, in a few years maybe, something the big guys should think about, which they probably do. If they don't others will.

" Software and Data Available Wherever You Go" ...

Hinchliffe: "How many of us are tired of synchronizing their personal, work, and family computers with the latest software and files?"

This is a bonus, no doubt. An important one too. This currently is the niche where I see Writely working for me. I can continue working from where I left off when shifting places. Crashes? Let the world crash, my Writely docs are safe...well backing up is never wrong of course ..

"Isolated Software Can’t Compete with Connected Software" ...

Hinchcliffe: "The best software is now highly integrated into the Web and leverages the rich landscape of services that can be found there."

I disagree. It's far away from highly integrated. In general, considering IT developments over the last 20 years complexity has continually increased. Using computers has become more difficult, no easier. (Remember the good old days of Windows 3.1?) Of course, it is also because we can do more with computers, but who is "we"?

The Microsoft aficiados are still working their way through XP and can't wait to wade through another 500 pop-up windows after installing Vista, while OS X addicts sweat in horror while waiting for the Apocalyptic Intel chip ... and the LINUX dudes are hailing every new Dr Mabuse Linux quick release as the final death knell for Windows.

The current desktop environments stink, and ye all know it.

Sun's Jonathan Schwartz was completely correct when he said while introducing "Project Looking Glass" that we need to look beyond reproducing paper office metaphors on computer screens. Not that he was the first. Ted Nelson once said

"Computer people don’t understand computers. Oh, they understand the technicalities all right, but they don’t understand the possibilities. Most of all, they don’t understand that the computer world is entirely built out of artificial, arbitrary constructs. Word processing, spreadsheet, database aren’t fundamental, they’re just different ideas that different guys have whomped up, ideas that could be totally different in their structure. But these ideas have a plausible air that has set like concrete into a seeming reality. Macintosh and Windows look alike, therefore that must be reality, right? Wrong. Apple and Windows are like Ford and Chevrolet (or perhaps Tweedledum and Tweedledee), who in their co-imitation create a stereo illusion that seems like reality."

And Linux desperately attempts to emulate, imitate and simulate both.
We need a re-metaphorization of the GUI. Maybe the 3D gamers can help us. Maybe we should start dancing on our desktops instead of staring at them. Maybe we can reach inside one day, walk through, open it from the top. X-Ray the HD, or CAT scan, or zoom in and out and left and right. Why do I need a boundary between my computer and the Internet?
I need conceptual boundaries, levels of intimacy and security, not Windows to simuated sheets of papers residing on a piece of hardware that is already junk by the time I unpack it.

We have no sense for information architecture and structure, only for nested folders and believe it or not, the majority of my customers don't even have that! They don't know where their stuff is on their hard drives. We can't see the threads that link...the clouds of metaphors that create meaning, history and reach out.

Nevertheless Web 2.0 is a promising first step in the right direction ..