Thanks Dave!

You'll find a new addition to my site today - this simple, little badge:

The badge is a link to Scripting News, the weblog home of Dave Winer. If you hover over the image on the site, you should see the following text:

My thanks to Dave Winer for his visionary role in the development of weblogs, RSS, podcasting, SOAP, XML-RPC, OPML, and outliners.

Why?

As a loyal reader of Dave's site over the past five years, I've grown to share his frustration with the way his contributions to the Internet are recorded and viewed. Time after time, he has played a substantial role in the development and evangelizing of new technology (particularly weblogs, RSS, and podcasting), only to have his effort and contribution ignored or substantially diminished over time.

I decided it was time for those of us who owe so much to Dave to do something about it. I can't change what other reporters and bloggers write, but I can place a simple image on my site that reminds me, and everyone who visits my site, of the role he has played in making all of this possible.  Simply put, without Dave, I certainly wouldn't be blogging and much of the blog revolution that has swept across the country and the world would not exist.

So, grab one of these badges or make your own, link it to Scripting News, and join with me in saying...

Thanks Dave!

If you add one of these to your site, send me an email or comment on this post and I'll post a follow-up in the near future. Ask not what the Internet can do for you, ask what you can do for the Internet.

Comments

[Russ Lipton]

Dave Winer is a national treasure. Of course, things are always worse than they appear, including treasures ;-).

Even when I disagree with Dave, I learn something. Is there higher praise?

[pj]

I agree with you. I started blogging this month because of dave. http://gatorcast.com

[Mike]

We are honored to honor Dave.

This would be a sad world without all that we can now do.

Added to http://tmfcoutofbounds.blogspot.com/

What a great idea !

[Tom Kimmerer]

Thanks for doing this. Dave Winer deserves all this and more. I have been reading Scripting News from the start and using Radio for quite a while. Great stuff. I posted the badge at http://www.dlarborist.com/treetrends.

[Sylvia Paull]

Thanks to Dave, I also took up blogging. But now I'm not sure if that was a good thing. The medium does not always the message make. In other words, Dave has something interesting to say whether he's blogging, speaking live, or writing in longhand a la Benjamin Franklin. Lots of people who blog boggle my mind, or what's left of it.

[kathleen]

Thanks!

Posted to http://thingseen.typepad.com

Maybe I'll even move it to the sidebar later! :-)

[Bill Berry]

This is cool! I just started blogging and one of my first posts (about Instant Outlining) was titled, "Dave is at it again...". I remember using More and a Mac to develop presentations back in the '80s, using Frontier in the '90's to publish websites via templates. Dave keeps creating new things that I thrive on. Pretty incredible. Thanks Dave, for everything, and Brian for this idea!

Link added to: http://stratblog.com

[Peter Breuls]

Added it to http://blog.breuls.org. Thanks, Dave. :)

[Koan Bremner]

I'm a Radio addict, podcaster, blogger, technologist who's just blown away by he potential of OPML... so yes, I agree entirely with the sentiments vouchsafed by this initiative... posted about this at http://www.multidimensional.me.uk/2005/06/15.html#a162 and linked in my sidebars (and even if Dave doesn't have a blogroll, I do; "Scripting News" *and* "Leave It Behind" have both been in there for yonks). Respect to both of you! :-)

[Gwenael Le Drean]

Merci Dave
the link is here: http://radio.weblogs.com/0100306/

[Graeme Nobes]

I'm not worthy to display this button. No seriously, not worthy or able to add it to my blog in the way intended so I included it in a post. Forget Dave's many past contributions (that didn't quite come out the way I intended) a day without Morning Coffee Notes is not quite complete. Can't wait to see the new outliner either. Is this going to turn into one of those war of the coloured ribbons things?

[Andrew]

Maybe we need some LiveSTRONG-style wristbands???

What colour???

[Fred Zelders]

I like your initiative.
frEdSCAPEs: Done! :-)

[bob]

Great idea! Thanks! Without Dave, I wouldn't be a podcaster, blogger, or know what OPML is..

http://www.bobandaj.info

[Firgger]

It's too bad Dave Winer is such a huge asshole to so many people. Maybe more would recognize his contributions if he didn't publically flame so many innocents.

The most recent is the guy who runs Political Wire, one of the best weblogs around. He's publically stated that Dave's vision of the aggregator is the best, yet when he chose to use Feedburner, Dave chose to publically blast him.

Dave needs to learn how to interact with people like a human.

[Joe]

Dave is an asshat.

[Paul Chaney]

Dave may be a god, but he is not a benevolent one. My impression of him at Blog Nashville is that he could use some psychotherapy. I realize he is in fact, yes, one of the gods of the blogosphere, but his sense of self-importance is not ingratiating in the least. A little humility goes a long, long way.

[Russ Lipton]

Brian,

I'm embarrassed that you called out my comment on your main post, only because it didn't provide enough real content.

Though he swerves tactically as need be, Winer's vision of 'writing the Web' has been a logical, strategic follow-on to ThinkTank (and parallel to Frontier/Manila/Radio).

The protocol work has proven amazingly serendipitous by connecting up (outlining) 'nodes' on the Internet itself. Cf weblogs. Podcasts.

While I have become a fan of Google's flat search (who isn't), outlining remains a seminal human tool for structuring knowledge that long predated Dave ;-). If the choice is binary (it isn't, probably) between the semantic Web and an outlined Web, I'll go with outlining.

Granted, early Web outlines (Yahoo, anyone?) ran into limitations. So did instant outlining. Tactics. Tactics.

I have a gut feeling that even this iteration of instant outlining is a beta bootstrap viewed against the history of the Internet. I'd put my money on 2008 for a true version one. But who knows?

As for Dave's faults, oy. They are inseparable from his genius. Anyone with brains leaves him be. This guy is a major piece of work.

Now, as a fellow New Yorker, Mets fan and Jew by culture (even goys who live in the NYC metro area are 'jewish'), Dave knows I just paid him still another compliment.

It's nice to live a life with enough impact that one can be a major piece of work. Great work.

[Peter Scott]

Gladly added to http://allrss.com on the main page

[J. Leslie Booth]

Brian ... TOUCHE! A very good act. Let's hope others will take up your challenge and spread the word.

les

[Mike O'Connor]

Ah. Very nice idea Brian. I've added the "thanks Dave" button to my personal home page too. I was inspired to do a little short podcast comparing Dave to Reginald Fessenden a few weeks ago, for exactly the same reason.

Most people don't know that Fessenden is the person who really invented radio as we know it today. Here's a link to the blurb in front of the podcast for those who are interested - http://www.sexandpodcasting.com/modules/news/article.php?storyid=17

For those of you who ding Dave because he's sometimes cranky, I would offer the following. He's sharing a lot more of his life, personality and feelings on the 'net than I ever would. But if I did, you'd see that I'm cranky too sometimes. Let he who is without crankiness cast the first stone.

[Andre]

Bravo Brian!

I gladly join in the collective thanks to Dave.

Thanks to your initiative.

[David Golding]

I've added a button to my sidebar and also written a post:

http://pah2.buzzword.com/2005/06/18#a1610

[Bill Soistmann]

Dave's was one of the first blogs I discovered. I respect his opinion very much. I believe we all owe him a great deal.