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Microsoft Debuts MySpace-Like IT Site
snib writes "Microsoft has launched Aggreg8, a 'social networking and collaboration space for the IT community.' Apparently, the owner of the popular open-source RSS reader of the same name sold the domains to Microsoft for $5000 in August in order to host what was then called 'Microcosm.' Microsoft hopes their new service, which utilizes Windows Live ID (formerly .NET Passport) authentication, will become a 'MySpace-like forum for developers to share scripts, tools, or best practices, or even to just connect with others within the profession.'"
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Or; post code for your pet project on this site and we will use it and sell it as our own.
If man has no tea in him, he is incapable of understanding truth and beauty
You cant even browse around without logging in. Sites which require logins for visiting should be boycotted and not promoted on Slashdot.
May I be the first to point out that it is god-awfully ugly?
Mod me down if you so please, I hope to never see the light of day after seeing what I just witnessed.
I have a bunch of zer0-day sploitz I would like to share with my friends. Also, I would like to be able to stream teh l8test industrial rock on my Aggreg8 page. Will this be possible?
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
What the hell did you expect?
It is as ugly as hell indeed. I think it's a good idea for Microsoft to offer such a service. Objectively though it is a bit silly that you have to login to view the page. Does anyone know of any good sites for IT networking? Please advise!!
Open Office- try it http://www.openofice.org
With THAT license, how many people do they expect to share the code?
First it was your Hotmail ID. Then your Passport ID. Now it's your Windows Live ID.
Stop renaming stuff! It's hard enough keeping track of all of these marginally useful services already.
The ______ Agenda
this will be great! I'm gonna have bill gates, steve jobs, linus and woz as ms-friends! this will be sweet! hell, i might even let balmer friend me
This comment is guaranteed*
*not guaranteed
I just logged in, and tried to find a PHP/MySQL group to join. There is no group "search" feature under the "search for a group" link. You can only browse in a very obfuscated fashion. Honestly, they'd better change the interface soon, or you won't be able to find things. Plus, requiring a Live ID means that search engines can't index...and suddenly your site is a thousand times less useful. But I bet that sweet MSN Search is going to index it! Like anyone uses that willingly.
Yay!! Steve Ballmer is in your extended network!!
It looks like you're trying to post something. ...
Would you like me to
Establish a community, get people accustomed to it, then twist them and use them to your will.
Well-known procedure. Id especially suspect that when it comes from a company that doggedly fought freedom and open source and lost.
Read radical news here
Or, as works with EVERY public forum. "Things you post in a public space are public knowledge and use.
There are actually quite a few companies that post source code and other information on the web with licenses that impose obligations on you if you as much as look at it.
For example, go to the Sun web site and look at the licenses under which they make Java documentation and source code available; read them carefully and then roll your eyes.
How???? That site is unusable. There doesn't seem to be a way to search for groups, so if there is a unix group, I can't find it (or any other group)
At some point, somewhere, the entire internet will be found to be illegal.
is community server, the same software powering thedailywtf where users agree that the forum software is the real WTF. Every page is served as text/html with a XHTML 1.0 Frameset DTD, without any frames* and many users call it "unusable". So it's a perfect match for Microsoft. Microsoft probably just threw their hands up knowing that even if they wrote a system from scratch, it could never outdo community server. Thinking about it some more, I take it back. Community server is written in ASP.NET using Viewstate, nobody can ever beat Viewstate for sheer WTF-tasticness. Pffft!
* Possibly to allow for users adding iframes because MSIE doesn't support xhtml object embedding? Still, WTF?
They will have to indicate that they will not sue any individual software developers, period, before I would venture within a thousand miles of that site.
While looking through the help to see whether Microsoft can spell RDF[1] or FOAF[2] (they don't appear to), I came across this[3]:
a tion_passport
"Why do I need to use Passport?"
"We chose Passport in order to help you consolidate the number of logins you have to manage."
*sigh* here was me thinking passport was dead.
[1] http://www.w3.org/RDF/
[2] http://xmlns.com/foaf/0.1/
[3] http://aggreg8.net/Aggreg8_Help_Pages.htm#registr
It will be full of sage advice and code samples from MSCEs.
We have a tester at work who is an MCSE. I've been teaching him shell scripting using bash in Linux, for which he is immensely grateful, embarrassingly so, as he bows and scrapes and calls me "Mr Unix Genius." His productivity has improved 10-fold, and now he has a new job at another company with better pay.
One Monday morning he proudly informed me that he'd spent a lot of time over the weekend reading the Advanced Bash Scripting Guide and that he'd, "copied and pasted it," so that he could, "read it on Windows." He'd spent hours copying and pasting all 800 pages from the web browser into Microsoft Word.
I asked him why he didn't just download the file. "But I want to read it on Windows."
Stick Men
Isn't the appropriate response to immediately upload the NT source code that was released a few years ago? Now that I type that it doesn't seem as funny...
Boring home page. At least on myspace they try to invite you into the site with some content and "new profile" pics.
Kind Regards, Phillip
"Localhost for IT pros"? "Loopback for IT pros?" Huh? I would guess they were going for "Home for IT pros", but that's just not what 127.0.0.1 means.
LOAD "SIG",8,1
..or does MS seem to be doing a lot of desperate things lately?
Buying hotels (the Four Seasons hotel group).
Developing an iPod-clone (Zune).
Launching what's essentially a copy of MySpace.
Removing the one-reinstall restriction from Vista.
The Vista voucher scheme (promising XP->Vista upgrades for PCs bought now).
The MS-Novell deal (which has a dozen different perspectives, but at least promoting Linux).
To me, it seems like MS is genuinely scared of becoming largely irrelevant in the not-so-distant future.
Privacy begins with
It took me twenty minutes to figure out how to drill down into the working groups and find one about User Interface. It's very, very poorly laid out. Without the search everyone wants, it's functionally useless. Maybe this kind of thing works for social networking where it's just as valuable to "run into" someone as it is to be able to find them with some precision, but to also put this forth as a useful resource for IT pros is silly.
:)
This is not to say that if they can add a search I won't try it out in earnest -- I think MS is doing a lot to embrace the Linux and Mac communities, and I for one want to encourage that. MS has a lot of very intelligent people working for them -- they just need a bit more exposure to how the other 20% lives.
It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
Microsoft launches a new developer community website every few months. I'm confused as to which one is the real one. Someone please inform?