So my big question is? Where is Windows Live Calendar, and when will it be out?

Evidence is mounting it will arrive with WLM, but was there an open beta?

http://jeftek.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!F2042DC08607EF2!646.entry

Have you seen or tried Zimbra?

http://www.zimbra.com/

I'm looking at it to replace our FirstClass system. Pretty cool email/calendaring integration, and there is an open-source as well as commercial version. I'm not completely sold on it but looks interesting. It's also AJAX based.

> Kiko was a feature, not a full-fledged
> online destination let alone a viable business

Now I see why you are a Microsoft employee. I take it that you don't believe in composite applications, mashups, or SOA. All of the pieces of a distributed architecture need to be built by the same organization or they can't possibly add up to a useful solution?? You should really let all your gadget developers know that they are wasting their time.

I actually hope that this is the prevailing attitude at MS. It tells me that I won't have to worry about MS being a viable competitor in a couple years time.

"All of the pieces of a distributed architecture need to be built by the same organization or they can't possibly add up to a useful solution??"

The article Dare is commenting on is an article about pieces built by a single organization killing a mashup Web 2.0 thing, so empirical evidence seems to be against you here.

Mike -

I was more impressed with Justin's analysis who indicated that the reasons for Kiko demise "don’t have a lot to do with getting stepped on by a giant".

I see why Dare would agree with Paul. Paul is basically saying don't try to compete with Google even though their applications suck.

It's way too early to be thinking in terms of empirical evidence...it's all just FUD at this point.

Dare -

You are definitely entitled to your opinion that I have a narrow worldview. However, I fail to see how you came to this conclusion as I am arguing that a feature +can+ be a business, while you appear to be dismissing this possibility. Maybe this is where my conclusions about your post were in error. Google seems to be doing fine with their search feature.

I agreed with what I scanned in your post up until the last paragraph, which is why I quoted that part of your post. Perhaps you can explain what a full fledged destination is. Are you sure that Kiko even wanted to be a full fledged destination? I see that they provide support for RSS, iCal, vCard and have a restful API. There obviously was more going on at Kiko than the sprinkling of AJAX on old ideas.

I do believe that people want something that integrates into +their+ usage patterns. After the "Web 2.0" hype cycle runs its course and user generated content is commonplace, I look forward to the next cycle (Web 3.0?) when user generated applications will become the norm. I would rather assemble my own destinations from the features that I (or other users like me) choose rather than have a giant monolith tell me how I am supposed to use software.

Describing the future as "user generated applications" is at least an entertaining way to lose a debate. Consumers (as a whole) are good at generating three things: demand, enthusiasm, and words.

You can build some things out of this, like consumer generated encyclopedias, news filters, review sites, fan sites, etc. However, it's not enough to build a software product, let alone cars, phones, computers, cartoons, museums, zoos, or any other consumer product or destination. When none of these older things are consumer-generated, why should software (which requires so much special expertise) be any different?

I wonder what kind of nonsense arguments were popular back in the times of Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, Alexander Graham Bell, Walt Disney, etc. When Disneyland was built, did everyone predict a future of consumer-generated amusement parks? Or did it just herald imminent doom for our precious culture?

It seems anytime there's lots of interesting new stuff happening, it stimulates everyone -- even the layperson who doesn't know what he's talking about -- to attempt to analyze and synthesize the changes and predict the future. And yet, despite all the practice, we haven't gotten much better at it.

Michael -

It's too bad that someone with your experience and accomplishments takes such a narrow view of what consumers are capable of. I look at the success of applications like HyperCard, Wikis, MySpace and SecondLife and have to conclude that consumers are interested in and capable of building their own software if they are provided the right set of tools to do so.

I suspect that my worldview was shaped back in '92 when I saw what consumers, mostly children, were able to do with a crappy tool I built called MovieWorks. That experience was invaluable to me. If the Xbox team were to provide a simple set of tools that even a layperson could use to build and share their own titles then I firmly believe the results would speak for themselves and you would see this debate in a very different light.

Hi there,

guess a calendar is always a good function...

> What's surprising to me is how surprised people are that an
> idea that failed in 1990s will turn out any differently now
> because you sprinkle the AJAX magic pixie dust on it.

Usually it's people who think the idea is new, or worse yet, that they were the first in humanity that thought of it. There's no substitute for having a few old heads around for perspective. I can't tell you how many incarnations of "diskless workstations" I've seen come and go for the same reasons... and that's just the tip of the iceberg.