Tag: Dave Winer

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Likes Exploring WordPress, Textcasting, and Open Web Standards.

In this episode of the Fediverse Flows series, host Matthias Pfefferle sits down with pioneer technologist Dave Winer. The inventor of blogging, podcasting, RSS, and text casting. Together, they unpack the evolution of the open web, discussing why true interoperability and openness matter more than ever in an age of restrictive social media platforms.

The shownotes and transcript on this podcast are wonderful. The Takeaways, provide a great summary and worth reading after you listen.

I’ve been reading Dave Winer’s blog since I discovered rss. I’ve tried many of his more recent tools, including WordLand & FeedLand which he discusses here1.

Matthias Pfefferle is an IndieWeb & WordPress developer. I use his sempress theme & several of his plug-ins2 on this site. Recently he has been developing the ActivityPub – WordPress plugin . This allow your WordPress site to function as a federated profile. I’ve not tried that as I currently posse posts from here to mastodon via micro.blog.

Anyway, I’m a big fan of both participants.

A few interesting things

of the many in the podcast.

I don’t believe in comment sections on blogs, though. I think we could live without that, actually

Dave Winer

Like Alan I do like comments. I’ve read about bloggers who do not and mostly they are the ones with huge audiences. Apart from valuing the conversation, comments & even likes, which I fetch back via brid.gy, it does let me know that sometimes I am not writing into the void. I’d still blog for the void but it is nice to get some contact.
I’d guess bloggers like Dave dislike comments because of the way they can go on big sites.

But over time, what I hope happens is that people find that Wordland’s editor isn’t what they want. They want a different editor because you know what? There’s no one kind of editor that would please everybody.

Dave Winer

I’ve found this one of the most compelling reasons for exploring WordLand. WordLand is quite an opinionated editor. It has led me to think about all the different ways I’ve posted in the past and try out a few other options.

I think most of the younger generations are not aware of what a link is, what a URL is. They simply use one social network, and if they search for other users, they have that little search box and they search for the username. They do not understand that in a decentralized world that they may have to copy and paste URLs to find a new.

Matthias Pfefferle

This really spoke to me as a teacher. I am saddened by the way that even browsers hide paths after domains, and pupils just grab whatever google tells them. I have been surprised twice in the last few years by young kids, 9-11, doing something smart with urls or parameters.

I really enjoyed listening to this episode, lots of food for though. The ideas discussed become complicated quite quickly. A bit like the IndieWeb in general. Dave has of course been aware of WordPress but only recently started using it in earnest. Matthias comes from a different direction, the IndieWeb and Activity pub.

I’ve also now listened to another WordPress podcast with Dave: #186 – Dave Winer on Decentralisation, WordPress and Open Publishing – WP Tavern.

In this one Dave’s optimism and enthusiasm really shines through. I don’t know who it was told me, or maybe I read it somewhere: if you wait long enough Dave Winer is always right, Not sure that is true of anyone, but Dave Winer is always interesting & though provoking to read or listen to.

  1. Other products of Dave Winer I’ve used recently include:
    BingeWorthy 3
    Drummer
    1999.io ❤️
    ↩︎
  2. indieweb/wordpress-indieweb
    wordpress-indieweb-press-this
    WebActions for WordPress
    A Webmention plugin for WordPress
    ↩︎
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Likes It’s really simple by Dave Winer.

The name Really Simple Syndication is supposed to make you smile, while most techie formats make you want to pull your hair out. RSS reads pretty well even if you know nothing about feeds and XML. I wish the browser people hadn’t insisted on masking it with ugly CSS style sheets. I like lifting the hood of a car to see what’s there even though I don’t know what many of the things in there do. I learn by doing it

RSS continues to make me smile, thanks Dave.

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WordLand 0.5.15 is out. New version of Dave Winer’s WordPress editor. Nicest feature for me is the

Choosing a site now remembers previous sites you’ve chosen

I seem to have 25 sites linked to my WordPress account.

I also listen to Dave’s podcast episode on WordLand earlier this week.

WordLand is a good editor. For some people who write in WordPress it will be a godsend, and for others, a revelation. There should be a lot of editors in this space, because there is no one editor that’s good for everyone.

A very interesting post & comments on Jeremy Herve‘s blog: WordPress, WordLand, and the Open Web. Where there a variery of takes.

Personally the idea of lots of editors really resonates with me, I used quite a few. WordLand for this post although I’ll probably nip into the editor to add some tags.

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A couple of new WordLand Links: First Drafting – Doc Searls Weblog & Joho the Blog » Trying out WordLand for blogging the second says:

It’s a web page that clears out all of WordPress’s cruft and gives you an interface  that’s so simple that it’s actually enjoyable.

….

 especially if  … Dave Winer, … lets us add tags. I am irrationally committed to tagging

I like tags too.

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I am still posting using WordLand from time to time. Dave Winer opened the service to everyone, on Friday. I’m reading round it as much as I can:

Aziz Poonawalla wrote a review to which Dave responded.

Andy Sylvester gave it a try, posting a video of his first use. Andy is thinking aloud, a process I always enjoy watching others do.

Manton noted:

its own RSS feeds outside of WordPress. The feeds have both HTML and Markdown. So you could build platforms (like Micro.blog!) that aggregate user feeds.

Manton Reece

Which points to the idea your blog could be, without the WordPress bit, an RSS feed that can be piped everywhere. For example: It could go to micro.blog and then be pushed on to lots of other places.

It has surprised me that WordPress does not have a bigger range of ways to post. I hope WordLand will start a trend. Personally I do not use one particular editor, depending on the type of post I am making.

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WordLand is where we start to boot up a simple social net using only RSS as the protocol connecting users. Rather than wait for ActivityPub and AT Proto to get their acts together. I think we can do it with feeds and start off with immediate interop without the complexity of federation. I call it the feediverse. It’s not a joke, although it may incite a smile and a giggle. And that’s ok

Scripting News: Saturday, February 22, 2025

Feediverse, what is not to like! WordLand, I’ve tested for a while. Something like that might be a good fit for Glow Blogs. A simple posting interface for busy teachers. See also pootlewriter.

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Listened to How I view WordPress

A podcast by Dave Winer tangentially discussing the WordPress drama. I’ve been testing his WordLand editor for posting to WordPress. It was especially interesting to hear Dave talking about the need of a range of different editors. He sees a need for a variety to suit different writers.

I’ve used a variety of Dave’s products and have always enjoyed using them. Dave’s products are opinionated in a thoughtful way that makes me think about what I want and need from software.

WordLand encourages me to think about the features I need and features I want. As I understand it, WordLand was based on an earlier blogging system, 1999 which I really enjoyed using.

I think my favourite way of blogging was when I used TextMate. Unfortunately TextMate & the blogging bundle has not been updated for years. Although TM supported quite a few WordPress features it lacks some I now use.

Like TextMate WordLand only support a subset of WP features. It certainly is nice to use for short status posts. Partially because it simplified all the boxes and features in the WordPress. I am continuing to use it to post to a WordPress.com site, for testing and nonsense and my local Raspberry Pi for short notes.

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Likes Pseudo code and kitchen-table conversations by Dave Winer.

I read a lot of negative stuff about chatGPT. Dave Winer seems upbeat. Even though he mentions that a lot of programmers will lose work, he is positive about chatGPT. There are a couple of laugh out loud moments and lots of ideas to chew on, even if you are not a programmer. An enjoyable listen.

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Likes The blogosphere is in full bloom. The rest of the internet has wilted by John Naughton.

How lovely to see Dave Winer’s 30 years blogging in the Observer on Sunday.

I either read or was told by a friend once that Dave Winer was always right if you waited long enough.

I certainly benefited from blogging, podcasting & RSS which Dave was pivotal in
Developing. I’ve also been lucky enough to play with some of Dave’s more recent tools which always makes you think.