Library of Congress's $3M Deal With Microsoft

Cory Doctorow sounds the alarm over a Library of Congress deal with Microsoft that will have collections locked up in Silverlight. I'll double the Microsoft deal and offer them $6M in perl scripts and an infinite value of free OS software if they let me (or Google or any other honest company) publish their collections in free formats. "This deal involves the donation of 'technology, services and funding' (e.g., mostly not money) with a purported value of $3M from Microsoft to the Library of Congress. The Library, in turn, agrees to put kiosks running Vista in the library and to use Microsoft Silverlight to 'help power the library's new Web site, www.myloc.gov.'"

where's the advantage?

[ILuvRamen]

Okay so they traded off having to use use silverlight in order to use Vista kiosks? That seems like a bit of a lose-lose deal to me. They must have some pretty stupid negotiators. Plus, how could anyone be so stupid that they put something that important into a super proprietary format?!

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, we are running a deficit. I guess the government needed the $3 million dollars.

Readers of Slashdot could be powerful.

[Futurepower(R)]

"Well, we are running a deficit. I guess the government needed the $3 million dollars."

That's the kind of low energy, uncaring way of thinking that makes a mess of things. Readers of Slashdot, if they decide to work together, can be very powerful.

Let's end the dominance of the depressed people among us, who constantly imply that nothing is worth much effort. (Notice that one of the tags given by K. Dawson to this story is "googleisevil". That doesn't even make any sense in the context.)

Let's do something more than just complain about Microsoft's abusive behavior. Slashdot, or some other site we start, could grow up and be adult and take responsibility for something other than just our own lives.

Re:Readers of Slashdot could be powerful.

[wizbit]

Notice that one of the tags given by K. Dawson to this story is "googleisevil".

Since when do the editors tag stories? I was under the impression they only filtered tags from users (and even then, only subscribers got to tag publicly).

Re:where's the advantage?

[HappySmileMan]

Yes they are stupid about it, it IS a lose lose situation, anyone want to email the Library of Congress? Time for some registered voters to get involved instead of arguing on slashdot. http://www.loc.gov/help/contact-general.html [loc.gov] That;s the contaxct info, I'm not sure which of those categories it falls under, but someone should write out an email and have a load of people send it in. Congress don't listen to common sense, they DO listen to voters.

Re:where's the advantage?

[Anonymous Coward]

To Whom It May Concern:

In my opinion, it is a bad idea to restrict access to some of this nation's most prized possessions by requiring a non-standardized, non-open software package in order to access valuable information both in an online format and to visitors at the Library in Washington D.C.

Microsoft's Silverlight is an unproven and immature new technology. While Microsoft believes that the software will become very valuable, it does so by restricting access to operating systems and web browsers that only Microsoft deems worthy of using this new technology. With respect to Microsoft's anti-trust history, it would behoove the Library of Congress to steer clear of this technology. Especially considering several states fear Silverlight may be a source of future anti-trust violations.

I would strongly urge you to reconsider implementing Microsoft's Silverlight in favor of an open and freely available technology such as AJAX, SVG, and H.264. By using open and free standards and technology, you will be: 1. Allowing open access to all citizens, not just those deemed worthy by Microsoft. 2. Guaranteeing open access to all citizens for the foreseeable future, without restrictions imposed by Microsoft as upgrading becomes a necessity. 3. Guaranteeing open access to all citizens for the foreseeable future, should Microsoft demand a fee for access to its technology. 4. Allowing open access to all citizens without requiring them to bow to Microsoft's restrictive licensing agreement.

Thank you,
(your name here)

Re:

[HappySmileMan]

I sent it using form on a href='http://www.loc.gov/aba/contact/general_form.php'>this page

Re:where's the advantage?

[nametaken]

Cataloging and Acquisitions I would think...
http://www.loc.gov/aba/contact/ [loc.gov]

All the way at the bottom.

I'm using this one, someone please post if there's a more appropriate place.

Web Site Comments. Let them know what you think.

[twitter]

Web Site Comments [loc.gov] looks like the appropriate place to tell them what you think of non free information and non free formats.

The LOC should not host works that can't be exactly reproduced for non commercial purposes. Rights holders who disagree with that can host content on their own dime and pay for their own advertising. At the very least, the copyright status of works on the LOC site should be unambiguous. Serving them that content with restrictions is a waste of everyone's time and money. Sooner or later, all of the work will have to be redone because non free formats are always flash in the pan. Non free content will violate everyone's rights and pocketbook in the mean time. There's no amount of equipment, software or money that M$ can come up with overcome the cost of giving them control of our national library. Our heritage and freedom is worth more than the $20 billion in cash they have.

Re:where's the advantage?

[Anonymous Coward]

Unfortunately, M$ is already well on the way to locking down content in libraries...check out this mysterious new machine that recently appeared in our local library...'free' audiobooks for download. Which aren't free in any way, shape or form, of course. Microsoft windows DRM encumbered/infected/infested audio files, which librairies have been brainwashed into purchasing, for literally tens of thousands of dollars, and ignoring/publicizing truly free(dom) sites such as libravox.org

Check out this site for all the horrifying details of how librairies are selling out:
http://www.stratford.library.on.ca/downloadlibrary.html [library.on.ca]

It is not an issue of mac or linux users,

[an.echte.trilingue]

No, Mac users can use silverlight [wikipedia.org], and have been able to for quite some time. Linux users will be able to use it soon [wikipedia.org], although I don't know about licensing and patents.

So, from a user's perspective, this is irrelevant. The concern in this new technology is on the server side of things, and in Microsoft's market position. Silverlight's purpose in life is to dynamically load xml within the DOM tree, which should sound familiar since that is essentially what Ajax does. Ajax, however, has some short comings, for which the w3c developed the E4X [ecma-international.org] standard.

However, given the high quality of web applications written in Ajax, Microsoft rightly assessed that E4X threatened their office and email monopolies, and therefore their OS monopoly, because such applications are platform-agnostic. It is no coincidence that MS really started to push Silverlight development shortly after Google started testing high quality Ajax-based office, email and collaboration software.

Therefore, IE, which is already pretty non-standards compliant in its javascript syntax, still does not support it at all [w3schools.com], although all other major browsers have for years. By creating and promoting silverlight, MS is essentially embracing and extending to get control of dynamic web page standards away from the w3c. They will try to promote silverlight in as many places as possible, and hobble Ajax in IE. They will develop a series of neat free tools that make it easy to develop in silverlight. Once there is a critical mass of pages that use silverlight, they will start to make "improvements" to the standard but only integrate those changes into their Windows plugin. When that happens, all web users will once again be locked into Microsoft. It will MS will also have the bonus of also being able to integrate features that depend on asp, forcing their way into the server market.

If you don't believe MS would use a strategy like this, just ask yourself why there was an IE5.5 for Macs and no IE6 for Macs.

Thus, improvements in technology that should be happening around an open standards making body, indeed would happen faster and more effeciently in this standards making body, are going to go into the hands of one company at proceed at a much slower rate. It's a classic embrace/extend/extinguish. It is just sad that the US government is supporting this.

Re:where's the advantage?

[Jerry Smith]

Paid medical benefits would cause a tax increase to the general population, increase the number of freely available jobs at the same time (especially medically trained), leaving a great deal of people in better health and ready for the job market.

There, fixed that for you.

Why do public institutes like the LoC get influenced by companies? I don't mind getting influenced by a major company, especially when large sums are shoved my way. Yet if I'm a representative for the public, or something public, or have people expecting me to do the right things instead of only the monetary attractive and interesting: hell, how many ways to describe 'bribe'?

Re:

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:where's the advantage?

[Z00L00K]

The important thing is not the kiosks, but if they also are going to run Silverlight on the publicly accessible parts of their services. In that case they are limiting the access to their records to those that are able to run Silverlight.

Re:where's the disadvantage?

[burner]

Not every network-connected computing device is a desktop PC. Citizens with handhelds, rich-interface cell phones, and internet tables all should be able to access the information at the library of congress. Indeed, even users without access to install specialized plugins should have access.

There's really no need for silverlight here.

Re:where's the disadvantage?

[stavros-59]

It's just another piece of software that will need to be installed to access information. They haven't excluded anyone that I am aware of, unless you're still using a Commodore VIC-20.

Access in 20 years is not guaranteed. Silverlight is proprietary. Micorosoft have made it accessible to other operating systems but ongoing accessibility is absolutely dependent on the whim of Microsoft maintaining the availability and leaving the format untouched.

In addition to libraries, many Records Management Systems in many Universities and public services are equally tied to proprietary formats.

What happens in 20 or 30 years. I can still read documents that are hundreds of years old that are on paper.

Microsoft's record in the past 20 years doesn't give me much confidence in their ongoing behaviours.

It also assumes that current storage media will stay the same or similar. In only the last 20 years, my 8" floppy disks have become redundant, cassette tapes are almost unusable now, some old computer tapes no longer have drives that can read them and on it goes.

This approach to important documents is so myopic, I find it difficult to believe that librarians and records management experts can't see that far ahead.

Re:where's the disadvantage?

[filbranden]

And Flash is?

Flash would be as inadequate as Silverlight for publishing information.

Silverlight is worse than Flash for several reasons. 1) It's from Microsoft, a company that has been known for introducing proprietary technologies to lock in people to their products. 2) It's a new, unstable and unproven technology; Flash at least has been around for many years now. 3) Silverlight seems to be patent encumbered, and it seems Microsoft will try to use it against free software and the GPL.

However, ultimately I believe that Silverlight will fail for the same reasons Flash failed. 10 years ago I remember that every single company was converting their websites to Flash. Every webdesigner at that time was versed at that technology and it was being pushed very strongly. At that time, the incompatibilities and bugs in implementations of HTML (introduced by... can you guess it? Of course! Microsoft's IE!) made a big case for starting to use Flash and have consistent look and feel among different browsers and platforms.

But now most companies are back to having HTML based websites, and using Flash sparingly, and not for publishing content. They realised that using Flash had many shortcomings, and that they would have to use HTML if they wanted to:

• Have search engines index their sites. In a world where most company websites are reached through Google, no company would want a Flash website that will never be reached because it's not properly indexed.
• Allow people to bookmark or link specific pages. In the blogging era this is very important, as bloggers want to point readers exactly to the page and snippet where the relevant information is. If a blogger starts to have to write instructions ("follow this link then click on 'Products' and then search for 'Name' and click on the tab for 'Data Sheet'"), they'll not link to you at all, and maybe even try to find the information from your competitors.
• Mashups. Same as before. Your content will only be usable if it's accessible.

The need for plugins is not longer the reason why people don't use Flash (and won't use Silverlight). When content is king, it has to be served in an open standardized format, that allows it to be accessed, indexed, linked and ultimately used. That's what the Web 1.0 was about, and the Web 2.0 kind of tried to bring these core ideas back, after technologies such as Flash were being misused for content publishing.

We've already been mistaken once. Are we going to do it again? I really hope not.

Silverlight and Accessibility

[xswl0931]

Silverlight, unlike Flash, is designed with full accessibility support including screen readers.

Re:where's the advantage?

[civilizedINTENSITY]

Its not a trade off, TFA states that the plan is to use both: silverlight (for their website) and vista locally for their kiosks.

Re:where's the advantage?

[Anonymous Coward]

The benefit is wizzy 3d effects!

I hope all the linux users here like using Novell's distro, here's some evidence that Silverlight is entirely patent encumbered

"to avoid patent problems over Silverlight, when using or developing Mono's implementation (known as Moonlight), it's best to get/download Moonlight from Novell which will include patent coverage."

Moonlight will be able to run on any distro supported by Mono, which is most of the major distros. Under the terms of the agreements we have with Microsoft, Novell customers are covered by Microsoft's covenant not to sue over patents. In terms of Moonlight, that means that, if you download Moonlight from Novell (which is free of charge), you are considered a Novell customer of Moonlight, whether you run it on SUSE Linux Enterprise or on another distribution. If you get the Moonlight code from elsewhere, you are not considered a Novell customer, and so don't fall within the covenant.

That's Miguel and Novell speaking.

Re:

[jlarocco]

Wow, I bet that's flying off the servers.

At the very least they seem to be missing the point of free software. IF you're going to restrict it that much, why fucking bother?

How much is $3m?

[mcrbids]

What's that in LOCs?

Uh, wait...

Is the US government this poor?

[l2718]

Greanted, $3M is not petty cash, but surely that's the "sticker price" of the software to be installed (e.g. on the Vista kiosks), not the cost to Microsoft or the true cost after negotiations. So is LOC so cash-strapped that they can't afford to create their website without this ``donation'' ?

Re:Is the US government this poor?

[TubeSteak]

So is LOC so cash-strapped that they can't afford to create their website without this ``donation'' ?

The LoC has to pick and choose their battles when it comes to funding requests. They do a lot of stuff off budget by collaborating with Centers, Foundations, Institutes, etc.

The LoC also gives away a lot of money, in the form of grants, for fellowships & university programs. So they could cut some of that, but someone else will feel the pain.

Re:

[STrinity]

There's a difference between being poor and having to meet a budget.

Re:

[l2718]

Look at it this way, if someone offers to buy a house for you, does accepting the offer mean that you don't have the money yourself?

If someone offered to buy a house for me, on condition that all my friends will have to pay him rent to visit, I would be quite concerned, and might decline the offer.

Don't forget that LoC is not a private company -- it is actually charged with providing a public service. Once this spiffy public service becomes accessible only to those members of the public who first purch

Unproven Technology

[nurb432]

Aside from vendor lock-in, this product is far too new to be relying on like this.

Re:

[Maxmin]

Particularly when you realize just how fickle Microsoft is with its own "yup invented here" technology.

If Silverlight don't shine, Microsoft may drop it, like they have so many other technologies they've created from a "yeah we can beat XX with our own incompatible version" business strategy (substitute "Flash" for "XX" in this case.)

Re:

[Maxmin]

Ooh, and if anyone took a look at www.myloc.gov [myloc.gov], you'd notice it is, indeed, a Flash site. Hmm.

Re:

[Maxmin]

So what's better, tying yourself to a brand-spankin'-new, unproven technology, one that's still under development, and still released as "beta" -despite being labeled "version 2.0"- and requires downloads even for users of the latest MS o/s?

Or, stick with Flash, a technology that's been around for a decade, whose download size is still around one meg after all these years? Has tons of open-source projects around it, even open-source releases of the player technology? Think MS's OSP is gonna allow anythi

Locked up?

[Bryan Ischo]

Can someone explain to me where the term "locked up" applies to this news article? I read the (very brief) article linked to - and didn't see how anything in the library would become 'locked up', which I assume to mean, available only to people using Windows software. Yeah, they're going to accept some 'donations' of OS's and stuff (so Microsoft spends $10 burning a bunch of CDs and calls it a multi-million-dollar donation, with all the relevent tax perks as well - why does the government let them get away with this?) for their new kiosks (which if my experience with Windows kiosks is anything to go by, will be sitting at a blue screen or an empty Windows desktop 50% of the time), but how does this equal anything being 'locked up'?

Re:Locked up?

[LiENUS]

The concern is over the use of Silverlight for the website. Silverlight as of yet does not have a end-user ready version for several operating systems, including free ones such as Linux. There is however a Moonlight project by the Mono guys to bring Silverlight to those operating systems.

Re:

[Bryan Ischo]

Thank you very much, that answers my question. I didn't know what 'Silverlight' was but now that you've explained it to me I can see what the problem is.

Re:Locked up?

[linumax]

Firstly, I happily use Silverlight on Leopard, no problems at all, but don't know the status of Moonlight on GNU/Linux.

Secondly, I'm just wondering, is there a clause in the deal with MS that prohibits LoC from presenting same information in any other format or

Google or any other honest company

can also join in and provide the similar service in an open format? Like say, when you go to www.myloc.gov and wanna see a book/item, you get to choose:

• Silverlight
• Flash
• JPEG

In case MS gets any sort of ruling power on how myloc.gov is run then that's something to worry about.


PS: "honest company"? What does that even mean?!!

Re:Locked up?

[Vexorian]

Firstly, I happily use Silverlight on Leopard, no problems at all,

Until MS disposes otherwise.

Re:

[Eddy Luten]

Because the government also knows, that the cost and value of a product doesn't lie in its carrier. E.g.: The value of the United States' Constitution isn't $1.00 simply because it's written on a sheet of parchment with cheap ink.

It's the website, not the kiosks

[l2718]

how does this equal anything being 'locked up'?

The donations of the kiosks don't lock up anything. But making the website depend on a media format that is not a common web standard and is furthermore specific to Microsoft risks a situation where the only way to get the full functionality of the LoC website would be to install Internet Explorer.

Re:

[LiENUS]

But making the website depend on a media format that is not a common web standard and is furthermore specific to Microsoft risks a situation where the only way to get the full functionality of the LoC website would be to install Internet Explorer.

I know its a bit pedantic but is "risks" really an appropriate term to use? I think that "hopes to achieve" would be a better description of whats going on.

Re:

[cmacb]

That term may in fact be hyperbolic, depending on what they actually use it for. On the other hand I've worked with government IT people who didn't know their ass from a hole in the ground, and with government IT consultants who did know their ass from a hole in the ground (but still didn't know anything about IT).

They (the two groups above) do dumb-ass things like store archival documents in Word format, and then when they discover that new versions of Word won't read them, load old versions of Word, prin

Honest?

[Anonymous Coward]

So Google is deemed "honest" by virtue of simply NOT being Microsoft?

Re:Honest?

[Anonymous Coward]

I think that's an honest question. Google has not been "evil" to the extent that Microsoft has, but it seems like people here give them a free pass. Google benefits from and actively encourages domain parking, which I think most of us agree is one of the sleaziest "businesses" on the web. Again, that's nothing compared to what Microsoft has done, but that doesn't mean it's nothing.

LOC website = horrible

[Raul654]

As I noted on Slashdot recently [slashdot.org], the library of congress website is possibly the most dysfunctional site on the internet. If you ever browse their collections, it's literally impossible to get a permanent URL (which makes it incredibly difficult to copy their public domain stuff to Wikipedia - all the URLs to confirm the copyright status break after an hour) What's even worse, it feels like somebody spent a lot of my taxpayer money to put together something that is functionally useless.

Silverlight on Linux

[jdh28]

Silverlight is planned for Linux: http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070507-mono-developers-to-bring-silverlight-to-linux.html [arstechnica.com]

Re:Silverlight on Linux

[Pichu0102]

That's not the point. The point is that it's a Microsoft controlled format, and Microsoft has a track record of continually updating their software, which in turns, often ends up breaking compatibility with free implementations of said software, making it a game a perpetual catch-up to be able to read their formats. Not to mention, this is a government website, which shouldn't be forcing people to use a certain operating system just to view their website.

Re:Silverlight on Linux

[Anonymous Coward]

Microsoft has a track record of continually updating their software, which in turns, often ends up breaking compatibility with free implementations of said software, making it a game a perpetual catch-up to be able to read their formats.

Hell, it breaks compatibility with Microsoft software, too! Ask anyone who has spent long, boring hours reformatting .doc files for the latest version of Office.

Which kinda explains how they will get their $3M back. "Gee, it doesn't work with our new Silverlight? Yeah, we'll be glad to come in and fix it, but we gotta charge now." Lather, rinse, repeat.

Like any drug dealer on the street: the first one's free!

Re:

[TheNetAvenger]

Actually that is NOT the point either.

What is the most horrible thing that could be? Gasp, the UI is built by Microsoft technology? Would you be more happy with Flash Instead? You simply can't do as light or rich UI without a technology like Silverlight unless you buy into Adobe and Flash, which still has many parts undocumented, in contrast to Silverlight.

Silverlight also implies two things.
1) The images will all be part of the new JPEG standard(See Microsoft HD Photo approved as Next JPEG Standard)
2) The

Re:

[webmaster404]

The first step of MS's strategy is always embrace....

Re:

[node 3]

Well, to be fair, one is *supposed* to "embrace and extend" their own formats. The problem is when MS embraces some open standard, then extends it in a way that breaks the actual *open* version of the standard.

This is still a bad idea, but not because of "embrace and extend".

Re:Silverlight on Linux

[JoeCommodore]

Obviously you are new to using MS products in a mixed environment:

- Microsoft provides a version of X for Mac and/or other platform (case in point MS made for Macs: MS Project, Outlook, FoxPRO, Windows Media Player, Office VBA, Internet Explorer, Virtual PC, Frontpage, Fight Simulator, etc).

- Updates usually go to windows versions first, but due to "technical problems" (or something similar) X version does not always receive all of the updates.

- Second generation of product comes out employing some more Windows-only exclusive technology - the version for platform X is kind of crappier and not compatible (no explanation just some short "use Applescript instead" for the missing features).

- MS announces that the X version of the software will be discontinued due to lack of 'customer interest' (more so on MSs part)

- MS touts how great they are at supporting multiple platforms on their next product... (repeat)

Re:Silverlight on Linux

[JoeCommodore]

Except the Linux version isn't maintained by Microsoft.

Understood. So it has no MS support then, and under the IP/FUD shadow of MS as well, so Linux/Silverlight doesn't make a great platform to rely on eh?

AND even if it was, the web technologies development team at Microsoft is quite different from most of their other teams...

Heard the same about the FoxPro guys, also the Mac Office Team both of which had ther day for a while but are no more. It may be that way now for Mac Silverlight, but those guys are the proverbial 'nails sticking out' at Windows-first Microsoft, they'll be hammered back into the woodwork eventually.

(Many of them rave about Firefox and MAC OSX on their blogs for one...)

Blogs don't make executive decisions. Balmer does.

Re:

[harlows_monkeys]

No Moonlight is planned for Linux, which will always be behind Silverlight, because Microsoft won't give them the specs until AFTER each new release of Silverlight, which could mean months of cathup after every Silverlight release

So? You think sites using Silverlight are going to immediately upgrade to each new version, and immediately start using features that aren't in the old version? That's not what happens in the real world. What happens is that it takes sites months or years to decide to go to t

Re:Silverlight on Linux

[Raul654]

Yea, it's funny how Microsoft is cooperative with third party developers when they are losing, trying to catch up to a dominant format (Flash). Let's say they succeed in overtaking Flash, and Silverlight becomes the dominant format for interactive applets. How long do you think Microsoft will continue to aid the linux developers? I give 'em 5 minutes, tops.

Re:

[HappySmileMan]

I won't disagree with this statement but I would like to add that the Microsoft developers I have spoken with that are communicating with Mono developers seem genuinely interested in assisting the Mono guys. I just hope they are able to continue the relationship after Microsoft has what it wants. But I don't expect them to be able to.

That's the problem, most of Microsofts developers probably don't have a problem helping other developers. But the developers don't make the desicions, the businessmen do, adn the businessmen don't give a shit about anything except how much money they can make by screwing people over.

Re:

[Gideon Fubar]

Or when they helped SEGA develop the Dreamcast, including it's oh-so-unbreakable copy protection system.

Another 50 Years

[buravirgil]

This country's hypocrisies are a persistent, petty and subtle agenda of a few, tired dying people. The LoC was never the people's library in practice so much as a promise...folk recordings represented that promise crying out from a stubborn reality that not everbody can afford to make a trip to D.C., stay at a hotel, and view the library's contents.

And the internet was going to change that...and dying, dying dying Micro$oft steps in to handle the bottleneck.

Not for another 50 years now will the promise of the LoC be realized because somebody's daddy is somebody's daddy in America

Re:Another 50 Years

[Moonpie Madness]

SO TRUE!

I remember actually going to the library of congress, and they refused to allow me in. Why? Because I didn't actually have anything specific to research... I just wanted to check out what the library had to offer, browse around, read a book or two. Of course I waited five minutes and invented a research topic, but nonetheless it's absurd not to allow me, a taxpayer access to my library.

Bureaucracy.

News story from January

[93 Escort Wagon]

I hate to pick on Slashdot (okay, no I don't) - but this was "news" back in mid-January [gcn.com].

I'll be curious to see how this plays out. Currently the LOC uses a lot of Flash. After reading the article (the one I linked above, not the non-informative blog post in this /. "story") it sounds like the LOC will be using Silverlight in a specific, probably limited, fashion. It'd be nice to get more information, though. From what little information is available, it's possible that MS proposed this as a new project - adding content, not replacing current LOC web materials.

In any case it seems like a silly thing to do unless there's something Silverlight does that Flash doesn't do (given that the LOC site already uses Flash). Plus Silverlight currently doesn't include accessibility support, which to my mind would make it a non-starter for a government website.

Accesibility Standards?

[Sweetwater]

I'm not sure about Silverlight's ability to conform to accessibility standards. Are not all American Government websites required to be accessible? I mean, I know a site can have different entry points for different browsers and accessibility levels, but doesn't this seem very counter productive?

Re:

[Shados]

Its probably EASIER to make a site accessible for the disabled using Flash, Silverlight, fucking ActiveX, whatever, than with straight XHTML/CSS. The former technologies have the features built in, and can more reliably interact with screen readers and whatsnot. Of course, the little 5 minutes 2 cent demos you see if you google for Silverlight don't use it, but its fairly simple. And definately easier to learn than the very simple, but incredibly numerous details you need to think about in XHTML for the dis

Re:

[Shados]

xhtml/css can only be handled if the proper properties are set and the markup is semantic. Else you get the text, yes, but it wont make any sense. The idea is with other technologies, making the application semanticaly correct is easier. They also provide more tools to give more info for the reader to parse.

Also keep in mind that Silverlight 1.0 is still just markup, and can be parsed the same way, at the worse.

Money, bribery & Free software

[Yvanhoe]

If you're tired of seeing these things happening, support Lawrence Lessig's movement "Change Congress" and if you happen to vote in California 12th in the Congress elections, take a look. http://lessig08.org/ [lessig08.org]

Bad decisions like this one are either caused by incompetence or economy of influence. Time to change congress!

Re:

[xant]

You bet. The minute he makes up his damn mind to run, I'm on the phone with my debit card out for a donation.

Post a message to the LOC!

[EMR]

I just sent them a message explaining the issues with choosing a proprietary technology to hold the LOC content on their website via their Contact US form on the mylog.gov website. Explaining the track record and history of Microsoft is to change the technology midstream, or abandon it, (ie. Play for Sure and the new Zune) also it does not allow FULL and OPEN access by ALL people. And that locking that content in Silverlight would require me having to purchase a new computer, new OS, PLUS several companion products (anti-virus, anti-spyware etc..) Just to view content semi-securely and safely.

Re:

[TrancePhreak]

Then they should laugh at you, and point out that Silverlight is already on OSX and is being developed for GNU/Linux.

Silverlight and Firefox

[donatzsky]

Am I the only one that can't get Silverlight to work with Firefox on Windows? I have now tried on two different machines, several times, with the same result.

Re:Silverlight and Firefox

[Zarf]

Am I the only one that can't get Silverlight to work with Firefox on Windows? I have now tried on two different machines, several times, with the same result.

I can't get it to work in Internet Explorer... on Windows or Linux... let alone my Mac.

Vista

[Nom du Keyboard]

The Library, in turn, agrees to put kiosks running Vista

And then the Vista built-in DRM will then prevent anyone from actually accessing any of the possibly copyrighted information. Better to err on the side of caution and block everything.

Congratulations to all the Geinuses involved...

[Zarf]

everyone involved in this project should have their names recorded on a large bronze plaque in front of the library as a matter of American pride.

By the way, I'm being completely sarcastic right now.

Actual wording of the letter from Microsoft

[Dystopian Rebel]

Dear Library Of Congress,

We are interested in donating $3m USD in technology, services, and funding if you will use kiosks powered by Windows Vista and Silverlight.

If you choose not to accept our offer, we reserve the right to pursue all necessary steps to ensure that the Library Of Congress's patrons are provided with the opportunity to realize the value inherent in our proposal.

We will fuck with you if we have to.

Sincerely,

General Presidente Señor Lanzero de Sillónes Ballmero
La Republica de Bananas de Redmondia

In god we trust, all others pay cash

[westlake]

I'll double the Microsoft deal and offer them $6M in perl scripts and an infinite value of free OS software if they let me (or Google or any other honest company) publish their collections in free formats.

The LOC collections:

30 million books in 470 languages, including the largest rare book collection in the states.
58 million manuscripts
1 million government publications
1 million issues of the world's newspapers dating back 300 years. 30,000 bound volumes of newspapers
500,000 reels of microfilm
4.8 mi

Re:Related

[l2718]

Imagine that in order to drink these Pepsi bottles from your school, one needs a special bottle-opener which is only sold by Pepsi for $100, and that it's illegal (for good reasons) to share your bottle opener with your friends, so each of you needs to buy your own. Assume also that Coca-Cola bottles can be opened by any old bottle-opener, including bottle-openers you make yourself, and that it's perfectly legal to share bottle openers for Coca-Cola bottles. Would you still be OK with Pepsi buying off the retailer to only stock Pepsi?

Re:Related

[node 3]

Yeah, I'd be fine with that so long as I can still readily buy Cokes elsewhere, or even if I preferred Pepsi in the first place. What I *wouldn't* be fine with is having to buy a Pepsi-opener in order to view publicly-funded archives of my nation's history (er, to drink the free soda my government is entrusted with preserving for the benefit of all humankind--hey, it was *your* analogy!).

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok, lets take this a step further:

Lets say Apple purchases Coke. And then they change the bottle so that any nonofficial iBottle opener will ruin the taste of the product.

How would you feel about that?

Re:

[milsoRgen]

Remaking myloc.gov in silverlight doesn't bother me as long as they don't lock out non-silverlight enabled browsers.

I agree, and I must say the summary starts off somewhat misleading. The website will use MS-Flash, the collections aren't going to be locked into any proprietary MS format.

Microsoft Silverlight, a graphical browser plug-in, will help power the library's new Web site, www.myloc.gov, where users will be able to access and personalize interactive materials.

Really what's one proprietary format over another, granted Silverlight seems to be Windows only. Still the meat and potatoes of what the library does is the same old same old.

Re:

[civilizedINTENSITY]

Seems like you asked and answered the crucial question: Really what's one proprietary format over another, granted Silverlight seems to be Windows only.

Re:

[milsoRgen]

So, some enterprising group of users will write a linux binary...
But when the choice comes down to Microsoft or Adobe... Hmmmm, neither one thank you. But Flash at least is a necessary evil at times. Nothing to get worked up about.

But this irrational hatred of Silverlight is a bit beyond me. Big fucking deal, at least it's attempting to become a competitor of Adobe Flash. Competition spurs innovation and all that jazz.

Personally I could care less what format the library is using for their interactive m

Re:

[TrancePhreak]

Silverlight is NOT Windows only.
http://www.microsoft.com/silverlight/downloads.aspx
http://www.mono-project.com/Moonlight

Re:Silverlight

[quanticle]

The issue with Moonlight is that its patent encumbered, and the only vendor that Microsoft has a licensing agreement with is Novell. While they've indicated that they don't intend to sue users of Moonlight even if they don't use Novell Linux, they haven't entered into any soft of legally binding covenant and could go back on that decision at any time. Therefore, unless you use Novell Linux, you have nothing other than Microsoft's word protecting you from a patent infringement lawsuit if you use Moonlight.

Re:

[milsoRgen]

Whats the other proprietary format?

Adobe Flash [wikipedia.org]
Such as found on the front page, http://www.loc.gov/ [loc.gov] (homepage/swf/main.swf)

Re:

[cheater512]

What on earth is so wrong about HTML? :(

Re:

[Stormwatch]

It's not as flashy as Flash. Frankly, I'd count that as a positive trait...

Re:

[garett_spencley]

Sounds like a good enough reason to write your representatives and let them know how you feel about where your tax dollars are going.

Re:

[timmarhy]

ms is doing it for free you dumbass. its a DONATION of 3 million in software.

Re:Silverlight - it's actually illegal!

[Anonymous Coward]

It's actually illegal to remove Section 508 compliance from a government website (hence why many of them suck so much)... and Silverlight, true to typical usages of it, will break that compliance in a big way. So Microsoft (and LOC's move) may actually be illegal depending on how it's implemented. I would hope that Cory, or anybody who has some sway, will realize this and call them on it.

I actually make an effort (have since 1996) to design every one of my sites I run to be complaint (as much as possible) with section 508 Handicap Web Accessibility rules. I used to use Bobby at CAST to do some preliminary checks. I'm actually appalled how many of the sites out there are broken on those simple accounts (table nesting, bad CSS and not ALT tags), and now even thinking about compliance on mobile browsers (iPhone, Palm, Windows Mobile, Symbian, etc.) that these sites also suffer from in accessibility.

Re:

[LiENUS]

So Microsoft (and LOC's move) may actually be illegal depending on how it's implemented.

Fortunately We know Microsoft has an excellent policy for when their product is not compatible with the law. Lobby, bribe and cheat until the law is twisted into allowing their product to resemble compliance.

Re:

[rjkimble]

It's actually illegal to remove Section 508 compliance from a government website

The trouble with that argument is that the Library of Congress is in the Legislative Branch, not the Executive Branch, and the way that such laws are written almost always don't apply to the Legislative Branch. GPO (Government Printing Office) and GAO (Government Accountability Office) fall into the same category.

Re:

[littlerubberfeet]

Some years ago, there was an effort by the LOC to implement an online registration system for copyrights. They tried then to do a windows-only implementation in a way that violated section 508. It didn't fly, and they are using a PDF system with generated barcodes. I have done some work for multi million dollar production houses with not a single networked Windows box. Nobody would risk connecting their dedicated Gigastudio machine to the internet either.

Anyway, the point is:

They have been exceedingly short

Re:

[l2718]

Remaking myloc.gov in silverlight doesn't bother me as long as they don't lock out non-silverlight enabled browsers. If I suddenly can't browse a government website

that is at least partially funded with my tax dollars then I'm taking my money elsewhere! err wait... nevermind...

Well, if LoC had a website, and then MS paid them to reproduce all the functionality in Silverlight, that would be mostly fine (though it would complicate managing the website for no good reason). But the idea here seems to be to ad

Re:

[canuck57]

Remaking myloc.gov in silverlight doesn't bother me as long as they don't lock out non-silverlight enabled browsers. If I suddenly can't browse a government website that is at least partially funded with my tax dollars then I'm taking my money elsewhere! err wait... nevermind...

I think this is the intent. Get users to downlaod and install Silverlight into Firefox. Many har having issues too. Can't beat them, destabilize them. Plus MS gets code into the browser once again. But not me, I see that Silve

Re:

[weicco]

And very bad summary from Slashdot. Silverlight and Perl is like JavaScript and PHP, apples and oranges.

Re:

[IBBoard]

Or they could do it with (amongst others and just as big names I know): Google, Redhat, Novell, Canonical and dozens of other companies who are FOSS and provide paying customers with support.

It isn't just proprietary, closed-source companies who offer support.

Re:So?

[ScrewMaster]

Or they could do it with (amongst others and just as big names I know): Google, Redhat, Novell, Canonical and dozens of other companies who are FOSS and provide paying customers with support.

Yes, and more to the point, this is the Federal Government we're talking about here, with the resources to hire the right people and provide in-house support if it really needed to do so. The need for support is simply not a deciding factor in this case ... the GP doesn't have the bigger picture. Honestly, the Feds would be far better off coming up with their own solution to the problem: hire somebody really good to lay out the system and then build a staff to maintain and improve it. In the long run, they'll end up with a system that will do what they want, not what Microsoft tells them they want, and serves the needs of We the People.

It isn't just proprietary, closed-source companies who offer support.

Not only offer it, but in Red Hat's case it's their bread-and-butter.

Re:

[Anpheus]

Eh? You're accusing the Federal Government of being competent in its hiring and deployment practices with regard to information technology?

Sheesh, Bush is going to be in international war crimes court before they get convicted of that.

Re:

[timmarhy]

so why didn't google or redhat offer to do it? OSS crowd hypocrite much?

Re:So?

[civilizedINTENSITY]

Bad publicity? Like when MS bought HotMail? Replaced the Free Software with their own stuff, and the site failed under the load? Not like this would be the first time, for sure...

Re:

[hxnwix]

I'm not saying that MS and Silverlight are the answer, but having accountable support (for what it may be worth) is a nice ace to have in your pocket. It sure beats the atypical RTFM

Fortunately, your complaints do not apply as (1) IBM, Red Hat and a multitude of other respected, competent companies support open source software (2) many of Silverlight's viable competitors, although they have some support in the open source world, are generally closed solutions supported by the companies that develop them.

Ever heard of Flash?

Why did they make Silverlight?

[Neuticle]

Considering how omnipresent Flash is today, in good and bad implementations*, why did MS decide to make Silverlight and push it so hard? I've read a bit about it, but I missed the boat on the big publicity when it was first announced. To me it just seems like a Flash-clone, not something new and innovative.

Is this just classical MS jealousy over seeing someone else dominate a market and wanting that market, even if they don't already compete there? Embrace, Extend, Extinguish etc

Are there any web developers

Re:

[rucs_hack]

You make the mistake of assuming that they care about these issues.

No knowledge of open source?

No caring, possibly. You'd likely be amazed how many people don't even know Linux exists. Computers run Windows, or they are Macs. Then there are people who know, but see the Linux crowd as a bunch of techie extremists who are adverse to easy interfaces. (Emacs, I'm looking at you, yes I am).

No knowledge of the LONG TERM issues of proprietary data formats?

It's more likely that they don't see it as important. This

Re:

[TrancePhreak]

Your comment makes it seem like you have no knowledge of open source.
http://www.mono-project.com/Moonlight

Re:

[pipatron]

If we nerds and geeks codes it, it'll run on any old P2 they have around in the basement awaiting destruction.