from servers to mobile proxies to virtual homes

[TahoeBlue]

An expanded use of the XMPP protocol could point to some potentially
large tectonic shifts in the modalities of usage of the internet for
collaboration, multiple-party interaction, and even with regards to
management and control of personal content assets and intellectual
property.

That a "conversation", as interpreted and implemented by Google,
appears to involve the persistence in a data archive of all activity
associated with the conversation certainly appears to be right up
Google's alley - not much different from how the integration of IM
and mail (and *ads* ) in Gmail. It also raises the paradox of a
theoretically virtual peer-to-peer XMPP end-point symmetry being
implemented and deployed on Google's massive, central-esque server
platform with its voracious appetite for saving web behavior and
transmissions of all kinds.

I suspect that XMPP enables some truly expanded horizons for internet
interactions. Just where in the internet cosmos will the data reside,
be accessed, be controlled ? Given that data can physically reside in
a number of places ( central server, personal proxies like MobileMe,
or home media "set top" servers ), what kind of controls will users be
given as to what kinds of content can be accessed by XMPP conversation
participants ? It would appear that the "conversation", in its
broadest sense, could have a life of its own as an environment where
different participants have different levels of access to the data
making up the archive of the conversation. It would appear that
Google will still be the 800-pound gorilla in the room, however.

[Jason Kolb]

I dig this post, I'm going to turn it into a Wave for the group. I'm
still working on a mechanism to auto-follow everyone in the group to a
Wave, should be done shortly. (Yes, it's dumb that you can't do this
by default)

Jason