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RE: [www-vrml] Tim BL Is Baffled, Too Looooooonnnngggggg




Hi Clayton,

>> every point you make neil seems to have the taint of fiscal responsibility all over it

Yes.  The Consortium is a non-profit - fiscal responsibility is required.  But more than that - if the Consortium is to complement the community it needs some funds to do so - I believe.

>> I have constantly said that the consortium need to watch dog the companies for proper usage, spec interpretation, deployment and interoperability.

Agreed - we are trying to put together a long-overdue conformance test suite - but it sure would go faster if we had some funds :)

>> more often these solutions are market and financially driven.. not driven by the force of vr itself, sad isnt it?

No - I don't believe it is sad - the way to make VR happen is through successful products and companies

>>  Neil, as the president of the web3d consortium it falls to you to provide some sort of leadership in this area

Yes - that's what I am engaged in here :)   But I am not a application developer - it is applications that will catalyze the market need.  I believe the leadership that the Consortium needs is to patiently prepare the background infrastructure for great apps to take root in.   Glamorous?  No.  Necessary?  I believe so - that's why I am still here.

Neil
 
"Clayton Cottingham" <drfrog@telus.net>
Sent by: owner-www-vrml@web3d.org

10/02/2004 07:21 PM

To
"'Neil TREVETT'" <Neil.Trevett@3dlabs.com>, "'VRML list'" <www-vrml@web3d.org>
cc
Subject
RE: [www-vrml] Tim BL Is Baffled, Too Looooooonnnngggggg





its times like this im glad i did just re-read neuromancer...that i can walk through the same city as william gibson and envision that 'possbile' direction...that i can calmly sit down and pick up the copy of marc pesce's vrml:browsing and building cyberspace (1995) ... coincedentally with Tim BL's foreward {OCR is wonderful see attached}
 
this is a very different tone in this foreward, talking about the same subject, as opposed to this threads article
 
I'm glad i can recall passionate discussions with all of you, nothing ever personal , although things do get heated {len are you on crack :P)...first and foremost in my mind was the vision of VR...my feeling then as it is now is that vrml/x3d is the conduit for this
 
i recall sending tony a thank you / congratulations on making his worldview vrml1 and vrml2 browsers....viewing the first world and of course building my first world
 
this stuff is important to me... it is with unbridled passion that i make my remarks
 
and as i said to my friend last night when thinking about it all:
'its easier to point to the problems than it is to find solutions'
 
im going to address the questions neil asks and then keep rambling
 
 
so the one question is
how do you engage the community
 
the other is
what does the consortium need to do to improve
 
engaging the community is as easy as allowing them to have access...
 
case in point is the browser work group
i dont know whom else to say championed the idea more than me that they were gonna sit down and talk ..gleeful you bet!
 
little did i realize it was going to be behind close doors, with no forum for us vermin to help/aid in that process
 
all that energy ended up accomplishing what? not even a percentile of interoperability , a let down? you bet!
 
engage the community? back in the day workgroups were fine to just join and help......
 
i was very interested in helping with the db workgroup until it started being controlled by oracles way of interfacing.. no clear consensus or forethought about how this was going to work with any other database...let alone operating system
 
 
engage the community indeed...we are still here, regardless of the consortium... who here would stop programming vrml/x3d if the consortium failed tomorrow? none of us! And thats something you should think hard about....the consortium exists amongst us... not above
 
 
what does the consortium need to do to improve......?
 
seriously i think its a dead end.. i really am begining to think VRML would have been better served by being a part of the w3c consortium
 
I dont understand the intimate financial details of the consortium, but every point you make neil seems to have the taint of fiscal responsibility all over it
 
i really dont see how there is this big need for money to make this work, we were fine before , what has changed?
 
other organizations seem to be doing fine, so look at what works ,there are tonnes of workable models to choose from, from open source to non-profits
 
I have constantly said that the consortium need to watch dog the companies for proper usage, spec interpretation, deployment and interoperabiity..they the consortium needs a reference browser/plugin for vrml or x3d, much like w3c has for html
 
i have constantly said that better marketing is needed, we have to educate the market, we need 3d on web3d.org
for a site dealing with 3d online... it seems pretty funny there isnt a lick of it on the site
 
thats considered bad marketing
:|
 
 
ok i dont want this to be taken hard ..its so far gone it spilt milk to me but i want you all to think about this and see what you think about this
 
when i made that perl script that used don brutzmans xslts and was able to generate vrml output from x3d when a x3d browser wasnt available yet i was asked by the consortium if they could put it on the site
 
cool stuff...right ?anybody would be overjoyed? sure as shootin i sure was
 
so yeah its up there in the membership area... no one can see or use it unless you have a membership
 
suddenly im cut off and obviously  a lil disgruntled
 
yes sometimes things seem a bit personal....
 
so over and over again i have seen example after example of bad treatment to the community at large by the consortium, and
 
these are just off the top of my head
 
 
 
 
Bafflement:
 
interoperability is inextricably linked to deployment issues
 
if people get fed up with setting something up they go away, and usually dont return
 
how many times have i missed out on a contract b/c i couldnt get a plugin to install and work?
anyone else????
 
the chasm you refer to is smaller than you think
i know lots of vermin are creating worlds for scientific and medical use...the gap isnt that big and its continually shrinking
 
 
regarding membership:
I dont see the need for me to make membership, what use will it give me?
 
i dont see it, I guess the only reason would be to put my money where my mouth is and run for a position on the BoD
:D:D:D
 
as purely a developer though, i dont see the need to do this..
as an html developer i dont see the need to join the w3c right?
 
sure, if i want to submit a proposal yeah i do.....but  i am here to find solutions to programming vrml/x3d
more and more often these solutions are market and financially driven.. not driven by the force of vr itself, sad isnt it?
 
 
Neil, you look forward with hope .. you hope someone somewhere will make this happen.
 
Neil, as the president of the web3d consortium it falls to you to provide some sort of leadership in this area
 
the point is that the consortium should be helping us get there, im fighting for it constantly, as should be obvious by now, and believe me its also with fasination and disappointment these thing cycle around to the same issues
 
why is that? do we need an organizational pschyologist?
 
why is it the visionaries and leader of vrml past have left?
 
a lot of bad blood was spilt on the specs and it has tainted them  
 
we all seem to know the fuzzy reasons why they left its got to do with vision verses money...and that is a sad legacy
 
but thats ancient history
 
 
 
 
ok gotta cacth up to thread
 
 
 
ok i gotta catch up on the thread now!
 [attachment "foreward.txt" deleted by Neil TREVETT/US/3DLabs/Creative]
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