Yesterday at the annual Demo show we saw lots and lots of server-side Internet applications, as I note in my Tuesday column.
Today is Internet Appliance day. Lots of cool stuff on tap, some of which I talked about in a special Monday column.
Trellix Web Express
Readers of this journal know I’m a big fan of Manila, the software I’m using to feed this site. Manila is designed so people can write on the Web for the Web — creating content inside a Web browser and then posting it directly (or slightly indirectly in this case, as I have an editor) to the Net. It’s a liberating concept.
But Manila isn’t the only thing around that does this, which is a good thing given competition’s manifest value. And this morning at Demo, Dan Bricklin’s company, Trellix, announced a product called Trellix Web Express, also aimed at writing on the Web.
The products are quite different in key areas. But both validate the growing need for such tools.
Amazon Sued for Privacy Violations
The infamous DoubleClick Web-surveillance company has gotten most of the (deserved) bad press lately when it comes to taking away privacy on the Net. Now it’s Amazon’s turn.
The Amazon case is a little less blatant, but no less worrisome. What is certain is that the online marketeers are heading for a showdown with the public on this issue. The federal government has utterly failed to protect our rights, unfortunately, but a host of state laws may address some of the gross imbalance between our right to keep our personal data private and the greed of corporations that see our data as a commodity to be sliced, diced and sold at will.