1936 Berlin Olympic Marathon Winner Son, Gi-Jung

Mr. Son is well known to all Koreans for winning the 1936 Berlin Olympic Marathon, the one where Joe Louis bombed Max Schmeling.  Mr. Son ran wearing the Japanese flag because Korea was occupied by Japan at that time.  For Koreans, the event was a great sign of hope that is still cherished.  Interestingly enough, Korean newspapers ran his photo with Japanese flag removed from his uniform.  I am sure that took some balls.  Mr. Son died Friday at 90 years old.

Scott on SAML

"Scott" thinks out loud about SAML and its relevance to Google Federation and Weblog World.  He even throws in a pretty diagram.  My thoughts on SAML is still baking.  I doubt I'll have anything really brilliant to say until I am either stuck inside it at least knee deep high.  I am hoping it happens before 2002 is over.

Best Part of Radio

What I like the most about Radio is that Radio is dynamically updateble and extensible.  As "Dave" and UserLand staff evolve Radio day by day, my version walks in step.  Radio third party software developers have also started to do the same.  For example, Marc Barrot's activeRender tool, used here, is updated each time I fire up Radio.  Both Microsoft and Sun has a lot to learn from Radio.  Only if Java and .NET had similar capabilities…

Zero-Install Extensible Client Platforms

The Net needs zero-install extensible client platforms.  Java WebStart and .NET meets some of the needs, but both require the user to install 6 to 20 megabytes of mostly unused code and lacks the ability to incrementally update and extend the platform.  The same applies to Flash.  Unless the platform itself can be updated and extended incrementally, its not zero-install in my opinion.

Money in Motion

Korean word for money is same as my first name, Don.  It means turning or circulation.  If money doesn't circulate, you end up with what has been going around in Japan for the past ten years and the US for the past two years.  Current trend toward free software and open source encourages circulation of goods and discourages circulation of money.

Open Letter to Jeremy Allaire

Dear Jeremy,

I would like to ask you to put following two features into Flash that will impact both Macromedia and the Web tremendously.  Here are the features:

1. User Control over Flash Content Feed (aka Slap Button)

It's simple, give web surfers a button somewhere on the browser toolbar that will disable flash content from the particular site currently  being viewed. If more than one site is involved, disable them all.  If flash content is being blocked already, the button should provide some feedback showing there is flash content available, so those who enjoy being annoyed can do so.

2. Cryptography Support

Add crypto support to Flash that can be used for encryption/decription, digital signature, strong authentication, and other cryptographic applications.  The business world needs zero-install clients with cryptographic features: online payment companies, banks, financial institutions, law firms, hospitals, acounting firms, B2B companies, auctions.  The list goes on an on.

Need a document signed?  Just convert the PDF to Flash and embed digital signature code that uses Flash's built-in crypto functions.  Encrypted web-based mail (see Identity-based Encryption) and secure web-storage also become possible using Strong Flash.  New online payment technologies like Verified-by-Visa, MasterCard SecureCode, PayPal, and Bill Me Later as well as B2B e-commerce technologies can also take advantage of Strong Flash to strongly authenticate transactions without requiring the users to install software.  PassPort and Project Liberty can benefit as well.

Best,

Don Park
Docuverse

Weapons of Ass Destruction

Apparently, Reverse Cowgirl has similar sense of humor or taste as I do.  She featured box cover image of adult movie Weapons of Ass Destruction as a demonstration of her image blogging.  [Via Marc and Adam Curry]

I doubt North Korea is developing Weapons of Ass Destruction, but that's the kind of arms race I like.  Given South Korea's fast advancing plastic surgery technology, Koreans have a good chance of kicking ass in a pleasant way.  <g>

UserLand Radio improvement suggestions

Here are some suggestions for improving UserLand Radio.

Category post to e-mail – I subscribe to many mailing lists.  Discussion topics of those mailing lists frequently overlap with my blog categories.  For example, my Online Payment category and the 3d-secure mailing list.  When I post a message on either one, I usually post on the other as I have done with my Extending 3D-Secure post.  So, an optional Radio feature that automatically does this would be convenient.

Category post to Usenet – same as above except post is made to Usenet.

Private Category to Public Categories – while most news aggregation is happening at the client end, there is room for intermediate news aggregation that aggregates posts from multiple blogs. User can set this up by specifying one or more post destinations, each corresponding to a Public Category.  This feature leads naturally to introduction of editorialized news and invited columnists.

Syndicated News Filters/Prioritizer – I subscribe a good set of RSS feeds, but I am usually interested only in certain topics.  It would be nice to be able to filter or sort news by requiring presence or absence of certain words and phrases for each subscribed RSS feed.  Also, it would be great if I received regular reports of words and phrases my RSS feed subscribers are interested in.