Google has some XUL developers on their payroll.
So does Amazon.com and there are several still at AOL/Netscape.
There are over 600 Firefox and Thunderbird extensions.

And, I've seen several internal XUL based applications...in production environments except I can't tell you where.

There's SimoHealth as a XUL based health management software.
There's the Amazon XUL browser built by an individual.

And let's not forget that Mozilla Suite (Netscape 7.x), n|Vu, Sunbird, Firefox, and Thunderbird are all XUL based applications.

What XUL apps would I like to see:
- an AIM/Yhoo/MSN/Jabber chat client
- a simple n|VU like editor for blog posting and maybe simpler documents
- XUL based media player
- a few more things...

The best "sidebar" are the AIM/Yahoo/MSN clients. A buddy list is something you want persistent and maybe some content but not lots of mini blocks of content.

I'm wondering if the "sidebar" or Google Desktop expands into Skyline. I'll just stop there. Those who know Skyline know what I'm talking about. It also could morph into Marlon/Joe's task and contact oriented sidebar/messaging app. That was a pretty good idea too.

Anyhow, I have a cool finish planned for this year. It's a cross between an NBA three point shot and a little product placement. But first I have to finish.

We're actually defining all these as we go. I'm not aware of too many open source/community marketing projects out there. Trust and marketing don't often go hand in hand. So I think we're defining trust marketing too.

There's only been two places I've seen talk of trust marketing, this one article trying rename permission marketing to trust marketing and Steve Rubel.

"Permission marketing" apparently is all about opt-outs and opt-ins. Steve's brief mention of trust marketing is around citizen journalism and bloggers, and trusting your social circle which is a limited definition.

Well, trust marketing is all about telling the truth (easy enough) and being very open. It's not overpromising, it's not saying something is the best thing in the world, it's not saying we've solved the problem when we haven't, it's about being matter-of-fact, it's about being up front with problems, it's about going above and beyond when you mess up (over communicating). No one wants to be tricked into things.

Anyone notice that the prices at the Mozilla Store aren't $5.99, $14.99, or $19.99. The prices are like $6.00, $14.00, $17.00. So random and so refreshing. BTW, Windows XP SP2 is $189.99. So not only are you getting price gouged, you're getting tricked while you're at it. It's $200 for Win XP SP2, and what's the $50 difference between Home and Pro again.

The other piece of trust marketing is the word of mouth recommendation. It's much better to hear about something from your family, friend or co-worker then some spokesperson, analyst, etc. Trust marketing is also about helping that along, making sure folks are able to say great things about your product but also that people are equipped to know what to say when they do make that recommendation. So it's tell your friends and co-workers about Firefox, here's a blog space where you can do it, add this button to your site, get it installed on your family's computer, etc, and also some of the things you should point out are the tabbed browsing, popup block features, the security benefits, your favorite features, etc.

So that's trust marketing. Telling the truth about your products (no lipstick), being good to people, giving people an opportunity to recommend your product, and helping people come up with what to say when they do want to recommend your product.

I wasn't around then but I think it was Mike Homer who started the "Best Viewed in Netscape" campaign. It was a defensive marketing tactic and when you're on the defensive, you're not in a good position.

We don't recommend that folks do "best viewed in Firefox". However, we do recommend specifying system requirements, and it's ok to say you've tested/certified your web site or application to work in Firefox.

So when you see Gateway|Dell|HP "recommending" MSFT, give it some time because that recommendation is only there because of some silly marketing line item in some long contract.

So, already looking forward to next year. This one is going to be rough.

Some observations:
- Splitting "profile" information from identity. Identity 2.0 can't have "profile" information nonsense, so establishing identity has to have the most minimal information possible just to establish identity none of this country of origin, male/female, age stuff. "Sharing" of profile information among identity partners is also a big hairy ball of a mess, so need to stay away from that.
- Central gateway, e.g. passport model doesn't work.
- Identity 2.0 can't be a password manager/wallet.
- There is a trust relationship that needs to be established e.g. iChat's @mac.com and @aol.com among those playing the game.
- A reset/migration of identity, is there something other than email that we can use.
- Political bs. The big players yhoo, msft, aol already have a namespace based on email. Google is building up a namespace. Small fry sites really have no chance if they're requiring people to sign-up yet again for some service. Wonder why AOL, MSFT, YHOO have not opened up instant messaging? It's not because they can't, they don't want to make a competitor's identity more powerful than their own (especially when identity is a billing relationship).
- "Trusted client" is going to sneak it's way back in to the mix (as if identity 2.0 wasn't bad enough).

So what's the identity problem again?
- Too many usernames and passwords and the security of it all.
- Single sign-on (the holy grail of authentication, if only we could all just get along).
- Spoofing/scams go away.

The net of this is, we can be in a much better place than where we are today with identity. Right now, it's just a complete mess. Maybe everyone should just install the bugmenot extension and call it a day.

- Chain suck, sucks. I broke my bike and had to get it replaced with a new bike. Yup. I'll be able to ride it maybe once before Ironman Canada. Nice!

- My new catch phrase that I've lifted from a friend, "not so much". Example, Internet Explorer 7 is going to be a great browser. This is where I would respond, "not so much".

- Looks like it's back to school season. Zach Lipton is a stud and is not going to be the next Blake Ross (whatever that means). He's going to be the next Zach Lipton. Great job this summer.

- This graphics back end stuff is dangerous. Vlad and Pav are kicking some serious ass.

- I've added this new feed to my live bookmarks: http://rss.cnn.com/rss/cnn_mostpopular.rss CNN's most popular.

- Stumbled on Keen Footwear. I do need some outdoor shoes for hiking and such. I guess this is the new/latest outdoor footwear?

- A blog about garbage cans. Noto so much. I actually do want one of these simple human garbage cans that sell for way too much over at Hold Everything. This blogging stuff is getting a little bit out of hand. C'mon Steve. I wonder if Steve sends us one for Mozilla, if he can hook me up with a free one, and then I'll see if we can get the garbage can in a photo shoot, okay, I'm stretching it.

- Already planning for Ironman 2006 Canada, again. Hopefully will do better my third time around.

The logo is ok. I think the true test of the logo is if you can slap it on a t-shirt and see if anyone buys it. You think we'll see an IE 7 shirt for sale anytime soon? Yeah, not so much.

The only way to do that is by lifting weights at least 3 days a week on a pyramid or periodization schedule. Basically, it's:
- bench press (regular and incline)
- lat pull downs
- bicep curls
- shoulder work with dumbbells

The simple pyramid is 4 sets of each e.g. 10 reps, 8 reps, 6 reps and 4 reps going up in weight each time. Do the same thing three days a week. Here's the site that's a pretty good resource for all this stuff:

http://www.exrx.net/Exercise.html

The downside is that once you gain muscle weight it's hard to get rid of it which I wish I could do now. Muscle weight in the upper body not so good for triathlons.

Otherwise, not very happy with Linux World Expo. All the .org were up on the second floor away from the sales "droids" as dmose politely called them on the main floor. If the highlight was candy bar give aways from the Red Hat booth...yeah.

Two things I saw that were neat were: Scalix and Zimbra. Both were open source solutions for Groupware that were "ajaxed". Zimbra looked more interesting. Like I said, the next thing coming out of msft, twx, goog, or yhoo is going to be an "ajaxed" calendar even though no one is still using online calendars.

The only other thing I saw that was interesting wasn't related at all to Linux World Expo but was last Thursday after LWE over at OSAF, a Wikipedia talk given by Jimmy Wales. I'll talk about that in the next post.

Paul's had some good/bad/ugly/on the mark stories for us over the years. In a very strange way, he is part of the Mozilla family who sometimes you wished lived on the other side of the globe and just sent you money on your birthday and Christmas.

Good luck to you!

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