Widgetification = Modularisation

An interesting piece by Om Malik (not on GigaOM) about the rise of the widget. But no surprise here really: the atomisation of programs is just another reflection of the tidal wave that is open source currently sweeping over programming in general. As I've written several times, modularity is key to free software's success: widgetification is simply the same idea applied to Web services.

...And That Leaves GNU/Linux

Om Malik has a nice (if brief) piece on the rise and rise of the domestic penguin. I particularly liked this:

The logic is simple – the other two players – Apple and Microsoft will have their own proprietary systems. Apple will not share them with anyone else, of course! Microsoft would as long as you play ball with their DRM system or some other lock-in. (And they are not to be taken lightly.)

This leaves CE makers, and start-ups with one option – Linux.

Time to put some herring in the 'fridge.

The Internet Goes...Open Source

There is a great irony at the heart of the Internet. Free software and its characteristic distributed development method were made possible by the Internet. Similarly, many of the earliest free software programs - Sendmail, BIND etc. - helped create the Internet. And yet today, the knots of the Net's interconnections - the routers - are generally proprietary (and usually from Cisco).

So here's an idea: how about creating an open source router? Enter Vyatta, which is doing precisely that. It's been working on the idea for a while, and, according to GigaOM, is close to launching its first product.

Assuming they get it right, I don't see any reason why this shouldn't steadily chip away at Cisco's dominant market share, just as every other open alternative to commoditised products has done. As they do, expect other open source solutions to enter this market soon.

The Open Source Mesh Begins to Mesh

I'm a big fan of open source meshes, with their potential to offer alternative ways of accessing the Internet. I'd not heard of the Champaign-Urbana Community Wireless Network before, but this story on GigaOM about serious NSF backing for work on an open source mesh network looks promising.

Webaroo - Yawnaroo

Convincing proof that Web 2.0 is a replay of Web 1.0 comes in the form of Webaroo. As this piece from Om Malik explains, this start-up aims to offer users a compressed "best of the Web" that they can carry around on their laptops and use even when they're offline.

Sorry, this idea was invented back in 1995, when Frontier Technologies released its SuperHighway Access CyberSearch, a CD-ROM that contained a "best of the Web" based on Lycos - at the time, one of the best search engines. As I wrote in September 1995:

Not all of the Lycos base has been included: contained in the 608 Mbytes on the disc is information on around 500,000 pages. The search engine is also simplified: whereas Lycos possesses a reasonably powerful search language, the CyberSearch tool allows you to enter just a word or phrase.

Only the scale has changed....