Dan Bricklin: Democratizing the Web

securitas writes "This NY Times story featuring Dan Bricklin discusses the social impact of the Web on small businesses (Mom and Pop shops) and how the Web is leaving some behind. Bricklin wants to change that and make creating Web sites as easy (*cough*) as using a PC."

Comments

Small shops?

[numbski]

The small shops are usually the places the high school and college students get their first HTML gigs in. Granted, the sites come out looking less-than-beautiful, but there's no reason to get left entirely behind. With the advent of PayPal just about anyone can set up shop online with minimal barrier to entry.

*shrug*

Re:Oh dear God, no.

[akadruid]

I disagree. What makes the web so good is that people can create websites about anything, with minimal skill. This is how some people get started on greater things, and makes it a universal resource.
In addition to this, some people out there may think that your cute pet is really interesting.
There may be a time when you need some information on say, goldfish juggling, and the guy who knows loads about this was only able to put up his site because of these easy to use tools. Could be great content behind that naf design, but you'd never know if he couldn't publish it.

On the same note...

[adamofgreyskull]

I propose that installing central heating be as easy as turning my heating on, making my own car be as easy as driving.

Poor analogies perhaps...anyway...my main point is this, you *can* do it yourself, but it'll never be as good as having a specialist do it.
I know I'd rather pay a plumber to install my heating than end up with a leaky botch job that I put in myself.

800 pound gorilla

[L. VeGas]

There is no excuse for any business to not have a web presence. Minimally, every business, no matter how small, should have appropriate contact information and business description.

As added features, they should also have free samples. And attractive customer representatives. Plus, snacks.

But at least a website.

Making web pages

[rf0]

I would have to disagree slightly. In a mom+pop shop in the high street it is possible for them to see how customers shop and rearrange stock accordingly. Making web pages however is a not as easy. They say beauty is in the eye of the beholder and sometimes less than intuative. This is good example of how not to do things

Rus

Its Always Been Easy

[Anonymous Coward]

Creating a website has always been easy. Although, creating a scalable ecommerce website with all the wiz bang features is not. I know of a software package called Weblisket created by AllBinary that will allow anyone to create an ecommerce site with seven easy steps. Although, if you don't like the visual styles it provides through the Weblisket Store Wizard you still need to know JSP, XSLT, and the client ML you wish to modify like DHTML or WML. Plus, whenever a new client ML is needed you must change the XSLT to include the new client agent. To sum things up if you need a professional website you will always need professionals.

One approach: TownPortal

[bergie]

We're building the Open Source TownPortal application for just this.

The idea with TownPortal is that a local community (say, town or county) can easily build and maintain their web site.

In addition, the TownPortal will also enable local small businesses, clubs and schools to run their web sites with simple but efficient CMS tools.

By default the sites of these organizations are hosted under the main TownPortal site, but they can also be easily shown under their own domains with their own layout. In this case the operator of the portal would probably provide this as an additional service.

/Bergie