Anyone ever heard of Flock?

Wow, I love their website... NOT!

Yeah, what's up with the design? That's a bit of a turn-off, obviously.

Well, it's not even ready for distrbution yet. I agree that the website sucks but that's hasn't got much to do with the product at this point or why it's interesting.

Is the site down? It wont load for me

Yeah, same here. Could be too much traffic on the server. The Wired article has better info anyway.

That is BIG text, five lines per screen

Hmmm, quirky site. I like it, also interesting to see exactly what it's trying to accomplish. I don't have an issue with the site at all, it looks different but it's eye-catching and at least easy to read. Also they don't have much content to show at the moment so I guess you'll have to wait for the nice corporate site to appear when the software does.

They'll probably use some genius to design it: Dave Shea, Cameron Moll, Zeldman, Megan etc.

Although I have to wonder how many of these damn open source apps are required to do things on the Internet. I already have Firefox, Sunbird and Thunderbird! Another Moz application?! And they say it wont replace Firefox? I can't see many people other than pioneers/early-adopters using both at the same time without getting confused!

Me - genius... Ha!

What I thought was interesting here is the whole bit about web 2.0 and how people will use the internet more for applications and communications. It's a big change from the more information-based web we have now.

I think the world needs less browsers. I also think html needs to go in a more advanced direction. But that's just my openion, no one cares

Maybe it wont be so much a browser as a communcation tool, advanced ICQ or something

Or maybe we'll see all kinds of permutations of Mozilla for specific niche users. Like, I don't know, there could be one specifically for the financial sector or health sector or anything like that with specific tools for their work. Flock is for people who use the web as a communication tool. A lot of the experts have been talking more and more (again) about the internet on alternate devices as well; moving away from the traditional desktop applications.

What web 2.0 is all about, as far as I can tell, is moving away from information feeding and more into functionality. So you have services like flikr, for example, or gmail is another example of how the developers have just taken it to another level so it's more like a software application than a website. That's a pretty big shift.

Megan wrote: Like, I don't know, there could be one specifically for the financial sector or health sector or anything like that with specific tools for their work.

Well, I don't pretend to know much about Web 2.0 but I can't imagine there would be a purpose for diversity being built into desktop applications, the diversity would be within the Web application itself. The different permutations would manifest themselves in the useage of XML, DOM and CSS by the website (or should I say: Web Application) developer.

Basically what I'm trying to say is that the desktop applications we currently call browsers should become more generic, not more specific to a particular sector/task.

As Wired pointed out this is what MS have been trying to stop, if NS had won the browser wars we'd probably all be using similar applications to the AJAX stuff we're seeing now, although it would be under NS' terms not those of the W3C, so perhaps everything has turned out better for the Web

Oh yeah, there's been a lot of stuff floating around about Gates and MS and how software should remain on the desktop etc. etc. Here's a better article on that:

http://news.com.com/Gates+on+Google+What%2C+me+worry/2008-1082_3-5863514.html?tag=nl
(had to go look it up because I couldn't remember what he was talking about exactly)

About browsers being generic - that sort of comes back to what Opera is doing too in making their product available to alternative devices as well. I don't know - we'll see what Flock is really like I guess and whether there's value in customizing a browser to that extent.

Megan wrote: whether there's value in customizing a browser to that extent.

Ahhh, but are they customizing or genericizing?

And agreed on the Opera thing, they're cleverly providing the best method to use Web Applications instead of concentrating on superfluous functionality like extensions (and when you consider the potential of Web 2.0, having a weather feed in your toolbar and other such tricks pale in comparison). I like where Opera is going

Flock is available of public download:

http://news.com.com/New+browser+gives+taste+of+Web+2.0/2100-1046_3-5905922.html?part=rss&tag=5905922&subj=news

(another thread full of Megan and Jeeves arguing amongst ourselves )

Consider your self lucky... you don't find it natural to start a argument when things get boring...
Thats just what I need another browser I need to install on my computer to make sure I'm compatable.

first time i run this thing i got an error

but it looks great! more for the 'simple' user who doesn't want a load of buttons and that.

isnt that the purpose of firefox though?