Reflections on DataPortability

[Eran Hammer-Lahav]

I noticed the mission statement last night: "Designing, Implementing
and Evangelizing the Personal Data Portability Stack in Concrete
Terms". Seems like a bit of a paradox to me. Nothing in that statement
fits my expectation of 'concrete terms', and the scope of this effort
is just not possible. This is not a 'mission', It's a 'mission:
impossible'.

I am not sure subscribing to this list makes me an official member of
Data Portability (in the same way Google, Plaxo, and Facebook are now
members), but that was not my intention when I subscribed. I am not
saying that I will not be a member, but I can't be a member of
something I don't understand. At all. It is possible it's just me - I
am open to that conclusion.

After a couple of week of following the discussions in this group, I
still have little idea of what this group it about. Not because it is
not posted, or hard to find. The Data Portability Workgroup is trying
to be everything to everyone. This is not meant as a dig against
anyone in particular. This group has been created with nothing but
good intentions, and has an impressive roster of talented individuals.
I have a lot of respect to the work Chris Saad and others put into
this. But I can't see how it can possibly be successful.

If you want to know my general philosophy on how to fix this effort,
you can read my recent post Reflections on the Open Web Community
(http://www.hueniverse.com/hueniverse/2007/12/reflections-of.html). So
far, this effort does not score high on my top 10 rules for successful
projects. In fact, it flat-out fails.

It is not practical to expect the same group of people to write specs,
implementations, do public relations, and negotiate political deals.
Just from a legal standpoint, this is not going to work out. Take a
look at each one of the components on the front page of
dataportablility.org. Each took years of design and implementation
cycles. And some of those groups will not talk to one another.

Personally, I am working on technologies that I hope will make some of
what people here have been talking about a reality. I am proud to be
part of the OAuth Core group, and am having lots of fun working on
OAuth Discovery and the new XRDS-Simple initiative. I am also working
on getting OpenID email identifiers. Each one of these efforts have
very narrow and specific objective. I know what I am doing, what
resources I need, and a good idea of how to go about it.

Using my 10 rules (really 9), can we perhaps start with a discussion
on what we are all here for and how we are going to accomplish it?

1. What are we trying to solve in a single sentence? And it has to be
simple enough for regular social network users to understand. What is
the elevator pitch? Can we list some real-world use cases? Stuff we
can get users interested in? What is the most important task? What's
first?
2. Do we have the right people? We got a mix of developers,
philosophers, evangelists, press, and corporate reps. I'll take the
position that it's not possible we can all be productive here. So what
is the profile of a valuable member? So far, it seems like name
recognition is key.
3. Is it easy for the right people to join? Seems like we have a
website, a public group, a private group, and some documents, but I
for one can't figure out what it is I am expected to do. Where do
people join? Do you have to be invited? It is perfectly fine (and
actually preferred) to have strict rules about participation but they
must be in the open.
4. Who are the core members? Who gets to decide when there isn't an
obvious consensus? Who decided what technologies are already listed?
5. Are there any deadlines? If I decide to be part of this, how long
should I expect this to go on?

The rest of my rules: don't branch out too soon, grow organically,
start with an accomplishment, and don't be afraid to end a project,
are more of a guideline than a question (and it's a little late for
them anyway). I would just say that starting with an accomplishment is
desperately needed. And no, getting people to join an online group
isn't much. Not until they start talking. Of the 4 big announced
members, Google, Plaxo, Facebook, and Scoble, only Joseph from Plaxo
wrote an introduction. And he is the one we need to learn the least
about. If you don't know what Plaxo and Joseph Smarr believe in, you
are in the wrong group. It is not a good sign when there is more PR
activity in blogs about this group than actual activity in the group.

There is a great opportunity here, but there is also a price to pay if
it is missed. The damage from failing getting something out of this
effort will make it much harder for others to start new initiatives in
this space. Now is the time to get it right.

EHL

[ripanti]

thanks eran for your great comment,

i think in some points you are right. a lot of facts of dp are a black
hole, but the important thing is, that someone starts.
during the next weeks (or month) i'm sure that everybody knows what
dataportability means. maybe it's a good idea to start step by step.

e.g. we start to make your own personal network portable. this is easy
to understand for all the users and they will surely accept it.

marco

[Josh Patterson]

Eran,
I think this is pretty dead on, and after talking to some people, I
realized as well that some structure was needed, which is why I pushed
to move WRFS into its own group. It's a technology, just like openID,
OAuth, XRDS, FOAF, APML, etc --- and it needs to be a good citizen and
be a solid work of engineering no matter what happens. In 10 years, if
someone asks me "well, what happened to WRFS?", no matter how well it
gets recieved, I better damn well be able to say "ya know what? we did
the best engineering work the best way we could. We made the right
design tradeoffs. We bridged as many relationships the right way. And
in the end, I'm proud of the work that was done. "

In that regard, let's make tech be tech, and initiatives be
initiatives. Where they meet and work together is one thing, but there
have to be very clear boundaries there. Now is definitely the time to
get it "right".

Josh

[Eran Hammer-Lahav]

> e.g. we start to make your own personal network portable. this is easy
> to understand for all the users and they will surely accept it.

Nope. That can still mean anything. What is your personal top use
case? And it needs to be a testable use case, as in, a QA person can
take what we do and your use case, and confirm it works right.

EHL

[Chris Saad]

Eran - some answers below and also I have started a page sub to
document the outcomes of this discussion:

http://groups.google.com/group/dataportability/web/work-to-be-done

On Jan 11, 6:33 am, Eran Hammer-Lahav <e...@hueniverse.com> wrote:
> I noticed the mission statement last night: "Designing, Implementing
> and Evangelizing the Personal Data Portability Stack in Concrete
> Terms". Seems like a bit of a paradox to me. Nothing in that statement
> fits my expectation of 'concrete terms', and the scope of this effort
> is just not possible. This is not a 'mission', It's a 'mission:
> impossible'.

Eran if you don't believe in the mission - then suggest improving it
however, I don't see any reason why we can't achieve what the mission
says - it's really not all that complicated and nothing other
standards groups have done before. Also I don't think we are a normal
standards group - read the page I created for more.

>
> I am not sure subscribing to this list makes me an official member of
> Data Portability (in the same way Google, Plaxo, and Facebook are now
> members), but that was not my intention when I subscribed. I am not
> saying that I will not be a member, but I can't be a member of
> something I don't understand. At all. It is possible it's just me - I
> am open to that conclusion.

The mission has not changed since day one. You are an official member
- but if you don't think the mission is possible then you need to help
refine it or continue to focus on the sub-set technology pieces you
believe in (such as OAuth etc)

>
> After a couple of week of following the discussions in this group, I
> still have little idea of what this group it about. Not because it is
> not posted, or hard to find. The Data Portability Workgroup is trying
> to be everything to everyone. This is not meant as a dig against
> anyone in particular. This group has been created with nothing but
> good intentions, and has an impressive roster of talented individuals.
> I have a lot of respect to the work Chris Saad and others put into
> this. But I can't see how it can possibly be successful.

Eran again if you can't see it then you need to help clear up the
image or focus on smaller pieces that you do believe in.

>
> If you want to know my general philosophy on how to fix this effort,
> you can read my recent post Reflections on the Open Web Community
> (http://www.hueniverse.com/hueniverse/2007/12/reflections-of.html). So
> far, this effort does not score high on my top 10 rules for successful
> projects. In fact, it flat-out fails.
>
> It is not practical to expect the same group of people to write specs,
> implementations, do public relations, and negotiate political deals.
> Just from a legal standpoint, this is not going to work out. Take a
> look at each one of the components on the front page of
> dataportablility.org. Each took years of design and implementation
> cycles. And some of those groups will not talk to one another.

I don't agree. Each standard group before us has done it. But also
again, there is a difference here - I don't think we a typical
standards group. Again, please read and contribute here for more:
http://groups.google.com/group/dataportability/web/work-to-be-done

[Eran Hammer-Lahav]

I guess I will go work on those sub-set smaller pieces...

http://www.hueniverse.com/hueniverse/2008/01/something-borro.html

EHL