I don't grok Live Clipboard
I just read Ray Ozzie’s Live Clipboard post Wiring the Web, and some of the surrounding buzz, and I must say I don’t get it.
Sure, I’ve watched the screencasts, I think I’m clear on the types of things the ‘Live Clipboard’ enables, and I deify Ray Ozzie as much as the next guy; what I’m not clear on is why this idea is being greeted with such enthusiasm and adoration. Isn’t the hard part the establishment and maintenance of the structured formats themselves, not so much the plumbing that moves the data around?
Of course I know about Structured Blogging and microformats, but if this is truly a life-altering paradigm-shifting innovation as significant as the original clipboard UI idiom, doesn’t it need to go a bit further than copying and pasting event and contact info from one web site or application to another?
I must be careful, of course, because I am notoriously derisive of ideas I do not understand; usually this reflexive reaction is correct, as my inability to understand it belies its insignificance and absurdity, but more and more often it’s due to my lack of imagination and insight into the implications of the idea for the audience for whom it is intended.
I’ll wait and see what happens w/ this idea; perhaps its value will crystalize for me with further discussion, or perhaps enthusiasm for it will fade as its limitations become more fully understood…