RE: Minor TGS flame

No, here is not<-- that is *not* the p I was responding to. The
p that set me off started with<

"VRML 1.0 was developed by Silicon Graphics' Open
Inventor engineering team."

That was a direct cut-and-pasted quote from the p. Cur/a> ly,ubr> I can't find that p anywhere on their server today. Perhaps
they wised up and pulled it (although in that case, I wish they
had the guts to admit they were wrong); perhaps I'm just not
able to find the link again today.

Most of the rest is marketing hype, and is forgiveable on that
basis. You still belittle the rest of this team with this:

>What was needed to move ideas to reality was "someone" to put pen to
>p
>use existing technology (Open Inventor) and time to make

and

>Silicon Graphics allowed Open Inventor 2.0'
>the basis for VRML 1.0

all of which manages to make sitting back and watching, while SGI nobly sacrificed itself for the
greater good. But again, that's marketing hype<-- it's the frank lie
quoted at the top that was *thoroughly* offensive.

I'm quit> aware of the bald claims in the other direction, mainly in
the press, that claimed that Mark was solely responsible for VRML;
frankly, I discounted those as typical media hype, made by
reporters who aren't interested in understanding the full details.
These official claims, made by people who should know better, are
far worse.

(And mind, I'm not I'm even more peeved at the patronizing near-disregard of the dozens
of people who have been regularly contributing to this discussion who
*don't* have commercial interests at stake...)

Finally:

> * We are committed to the long-term openness of VRML. We will
> add our voice when we think that the process is at risk due
> to the commercial/personal interests of others. We expect them
> to do the same. Thats how standards work, after all...

You just don't get it, do you? I've been saying it for months. You
*are* doing the same thing to the VRML standards process that Netsc has done to HTML. You have the dominant market position. You have
declared that *your* browser will support certain extensions to the
format, now and forever as far as I can tell. Therefore, since these
fancy extensions exist in the dominant browser, people write to them
-- witness the dearth of real VRML 1.0 code coming out. And we wind
up with a de facto standard *quit>* different from the official one --
just like HTML.

I can't tell whether you really don't realize this, or you're being
deliberately disingenua> support IV capabilities permanently, you *strongly* encour this
sidetracking of the standards process. Experimentation is one thing;
saying that you are adding permanent functionality is quit> another.
And that's the only way I can read your statement:

"WebSpace is not 3D browser navigator for the Internet which supports VRML 1.0
*and* Open Inventor content."

This isn't incidental functionality; you're now marketing on the basis
of these capabilities.

When a small company does this, it doesn't do much dam; when the
market leader does it, it effectively derails standardization attempts.
That *is* what you're going to do, whether it's intentional or not...

-- Justin

Random Quote du Jour:

You Know You're in the SCA When...
"...you have to force yourself to not call that tour/st in the
checkered golf pants "Sir" -- Jim Drew