W3C Report on Social finished - ActivityStreams Working Group?

[hha...@ibiblio.org]

Hey everyone,

Some of you (Monica W, Evan P, etc.) were at the workshop that W3C hosted in San Francisco last month on the "Social Standards". We had over 70 folks in attendance, and ActivityStreams,in particular various aspects of the new proposed ActivityStreams 2.0, drew lots of interest. We're writing up the final report for the workshop and would like to have input from the ActivityStreams community. Here's the draft in HTML:

https://www.w3.org/2013/socialweb/report.html

In particular, the parts that need your attention are:

1) "JSON-based ActivityStreams should be the common data-format for social activities should be, with the further pursuit in a Working Group of a new version that supports extensible data formats."

2) "ActivityStreams will focus on a new version, ActivityStreams 2.0, to increase extensibility and handle state. There was a large discussion over the role of JSON-LD as a syntax for ActivityStreams, but as ActivityStreams 2.0 does not depend on it, it was viewed as acceptable to the workshop participants."

In particular, W3C would be happy to start a Working Group around ActivityStreams 2.0 if folks in the community think it would help, in particular around test-suites, API and browser integration, Royalty-Free patent commitments, and deployment. Group, as well as continuing this open mailing list for public comments on the specs and the maintain test-suites in github. Folks from the ActivityStreams community that are independent or represent open-source projects can be invited experts, and the editors stay the same.

Both myself and Pete St. Andre (IETF) can discus the positives and negatives of continuing with a Working Group *if* the ActivityStreams community wants it, IETF and W3C will work jointly to help the ActivityStreams in anyway you all want. 

  thanks,
      harry

[Pat Cappelaere]

This is exciting news.

Is it possible to access the slides by any chance?

Thanks.

Pat.

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[James M Snell]

To be clear, for those who may be unfamiliar with the process, this would mean taking the current 2.0 Internet Draft and submitting it to a new W3C workgroup as a member submission. Which further implies that the draft's IPR would shift away from OWFa to the W3C's standard IPR policy.

Typically, W3C working groups are accessible only to w3c member organizations, but I have been ensured that this members of this open activity streams community would still be able to contribute and weigh in on AS 2.0 even if they are not currently employed by W3C members.

If the new workgroup is formed, I have volunteered to continue serving as the Activity Streams document editor.

While I personally feel that the AS 2.0 spec is essentially compete and does not really need to go through many more editorial iterations, a w3c work group could help elevate the data formats visibility, drive adoption, implementation, and interoperability. There is an opportunity here to make activity streams *the* data format standard for social applications.

Of course, it needs to be recognized that a w3c work group is definitely not a rubber stamp. The current 2.0 draft would be submitted to seed the effort, but what is ultimately produced could look quite a bit different. One of my personal goals participating in such an effort would be to minimize non backwards compatible changes, prevent change for the sake of change and ensure that this community retains a voice throughout the process.

That said... We should hear from members of the community on this. What do u think of submitting activity streams to a new w3c work group focusing on social standards? We don't have any formal voting process here but please do weigh in with your +1 or -1.

- James

[Monica Wilkinson]

Hi Guys

Here are my 2c

- A W3C member-only group will definitely add some friction for newcomers and developers who work at smaller companies like myself and do not plan on becoming a w3c member at this time but do have something useful to contribute. Will it remain as easy as writing on a mailing list ? Personally I love the Github process where anyone can open an issue or even submit a pull request and all changes are tracked as solving an issue.

I recommend we have a hangout to discuss how the new process would work and for us less familiar to ask questions. Also feel free to link us to any docs on the process for ASMS Harry.

- James thanks I know you would definitely help steer for openness. This is critical to produce something useful. Recently as the new ASMS 2.0 spec was being developed I recall asking why certain changes were made - It was not clear to me how each change related to a use case or problem. I advocated to James that he track his changes in the github repo to showcase but maybe that was too much work. James ?

Of course James did explain the source of the changes directly which is much appreciated.

I have a set of changes related to Activity States which I would like to see in an extension spec. This was also discussed at OWFa with some folks like Bill Christian who works at AT&T. Ill post them on this mailing list soon and I would love to hear feedback.

I think my bottom line is that I am pro a nimble and open process which is completely free and open to adopt. If the W3C can provide this I am definitely supportive given that they would also provide a good promotion channel and handle legal issues. 

Thanks

[James M Snell]

On Mon, Sep 16, 2013 at 7:39 AM, Monica Wilkinson <cib...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Hi Guys
>
> Here are my 2c
> - A W3C member-only group will definitely add some friction for newcomers
> and developers who work at smaller companies like myself and do not plan on
> becoming a w3c member at this time but do have something useful to
> contribute. Will it remain as easy as writing on a mailing list ? Personally
> I love the Github process where anyone can open an issue or even submit a
> pull request and all changes are tracked as solving an issue.
>

From what I understand the WG is intended to be as open as possible,
and likely will need to accommodate input from several open
communities that currently operate independently of the w3c.

> I recommend we have a hangout to discuss how the new process would work and
> for us less familiar to ask questions. Also feel free to link us to any docs
> on the process for ASMS Harry.
>
> - James thanks I know you would definitely help steer for openness. This is
> critical to produce something useful. Recently as the new ASMS 2.0 spec was
> being developed I recall asking why certain changes were made - It was not
> clear to me how each change related to a use case or problem. I advocated to
> James that he track his changes in the github repo to showcase but maybe
> that was too much work. James ?
> Of course James did explain the source of the changes directly which is much
> appreciated.
>

To be honest, writing it up in a blog post and adding a few paragraphs
to the draft was just easier and faster. We'll definitely need a
formal process for bringing issues to the table. I know the w3c has
their own established process around this that I'm not too familiar
with but I'll see what we can possibly do around github.

Also, to be absolutely clear, while I know that my employer (IBM) is
unconditionally supportive of this proposal, I personally will only
support this activity so long as it remains as open a process as
possible.

> I have a set of changes related to Activity States which I would like to see
> in an extension spec. This was also discussed at OWFa with some folks like
> Bill Christian who works at AT&T. Ill post them on this mailing list soon
> and I would love to hear feedback.
>

Would love to see it! Let me know how I can help.

- James