Stephen Downes

I like the concept. As Dave Winer says, "We're bootstrapping a network of twitter-like systems built out of components of the web and nothing more. Every part replaceable." It's based on a 'source' namespace that "is a collection of add-ons to RSS 2.0 that provide information about where the content in the feed comes from, so it's possible that aggregators can provide a richer experience for readers." He explains more in this blog post. "There's no mystery to this. The fact that our text can't go everywhere is because the big networks don't want to be compatible with each other. Bad for business. The right way, the way the web would do social networking: Every part is replaceable. Interop everywhere." I'm on board with this philosophy. Anyhow, the demo server is open for public registration. It works well enough. You can run your own instance, and there's an API. You can find me there as Downes.