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FAQS

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+Frequently-Asked Questions about Venice (*)
+-------------------------------------------
+
+(* - or at least those I think people will be asking)
+
+Q: What is Venice?
+A: The Venice Web Community System is a system for supporting online
+   communities and special interest groups.  A single Venice server will
+   support multiple SIGs, and all users authenticating themselves with the
+   Venice server will be able to join any SIG based on that server.  SIGs
+   will support features like Web conferencing, chat, and instant messaging.
+
+Q: Aren't there already conferencing packages out there?
+A: Yes, and some of them are very good.  However, Venice is being designed
+   first and foremost to support the Electric Minds community, and the
+   software will implement the appearances and behaviors they're used to
+   (at least for the most part).  Enough other people have already found
+   this useful that I think it will have broad-based appeal.
+
+Q: Who are Electric Minds, anyway?  What makes them so special?
+A: Electric Minds is a pioneering online community, originally founded by
+   Howard Rheingold, longtime user of The WELL and author of _The Virtual
+   Community_, in November 1996.  Electric Minds, among other things, hosted
+   the discussion site for the Kasparov vs. Deep Blue chess match, and went on
+   to become one of _Time_ magazine's top 10 Web sites of 1996.  His company
+   lost its financing, though, and was acquired by Durand Communications,
+   Inc., of Santa Barbara, CA, in July 1997, who shifted the community from
+   the existing WellEngaged conferencing platform to its own "CommunityWare"
+   online community software.  Electric Minds has been a lively place for
+   conversation ever since, despite the departure of Rheingold.  The current
+   host of the Electric Minds community is Harry "maddog" Pike, of New
+   Hampshire.
+
+Q: So where's Durand Communications now?  Never heard of 'em.
+A: Durand Communications was acquired by Online System Services (now Webb
+   Interactive Services, Inc.), of Denver, CO.  CommunityWare was folded
+   together with OSS' i2u product, and the result was introduced as WebbMe,
+   which was also an online community system.
+
+Q: So why does Electric Minds need Venice?
+A: Webb Interactive is pulling the plug on WebbMe at the end of January, 2001.
+   Electric Minds will be no more, unless it can be moved from its existing
+   servers.
+
+Q: Can't you just use the existing WebbMe software?
+A: Not practical.  WebbMe is written using Microsoft Active Server Pages under
+   IIS 4.0 on Windows NT 4.0, using a SQL Server back end.  Even if a server
+   could be found to support it, the software is old and very touchy to
+   administer.  (Webb Interactive's work is all in Java now, using WebLogic
+   and Oracle.  Very few people are left who remember much of anything about
+   how WebbMe works.)
+
+Q: Doesn't Webb have software you can use now?
+A: Well, they do have a Discussions product as part of their AccelX suite, but
+   it has a couple of major issues:
+   (1) It's not open source.  In my opinion, it is not desirable for a
+       community like Electric Minds to be held prey to proprietary software
+       storing its intellectual content.
+   (2) It's also heavy in its requirements.  It uses Enterprise JavaBeans and
+       requires the BEA WebLogic server and an Oracle database as back end.
+       For our purposes, that'd be overkill.
+
+Q: Well, then, what about {Slash|Scoop|Squishdot|mod_virgule|etc.}?
+A: Those packages are all good (and, in fact, Venice may incorporate some of
+   their features in future), but they were designed for other purposes.  It's
+   partially the nature of the software that makes Electric Minds the community
+   it is, and so, to preserve the community as we know it, we need to keep
+   the functionality as close as possible.  (This will also make it possible,
+   at a future date, to import the old discussions from the WebbMe Electric
+   Minds into Venice, for future reference and for posterity.)
+
+Q: Why call it "Venice"?
+A: During its early development (predating the Electric Minds acquisition),
+   CommunityWare was known as "Rome."  Rome was one of the primary centers
+   of advanced community in ancient times.  Similarly, Venice was one of the
+   centers of advanced community during the Renaissance...and, right now,
+   Electric Minds could use a renaissance :-).
+
+Q: But you're not ripping off CommunityWare/Webb, are you?
+A: Not at all.  Some of the design structures are similar to CommunityWare,
+   but there are many significant changes.  For instance, the Venice HTML
+   interface uses no <FRAME> tags, and the security model has been replaced
+   with a more self-consistent one.  As time goes on, Venice will continue
+   to incorporate features that distinguish it from the original WebbMe.
+
+Q: Did WebbMe have instant messaging, too?
+A: Yes, it did.  The original CommunityWare instant messaging and chat was
+   based on code derived from Durand's earlier MindWire product.  It was later
+   replaced with a not-entirely-reliable system implemented using IRC.  When
+   Venice implements IM and chat, it will likely be based on Jabber.
+
+Q: What's Jabber?
+A: Jabber is the world's only open-source XML-based instant messaging system.
+   Aside from offering its own instant messaging, it allows compatibility with
+   other IM systems like AIM, ICQ, MSN, and Yahoo!.  See http://www.jabber.org.
+
+Q: How will Venice use Jabber?
+A: Venice will most likely run in conjunction with a Jabber server that can
+   authenticate users against the Venice database.  Venice will include Java
+   applets for Jabber communication.
+
+Q: Venice should implement {cool feature} like {other software} does.
+A: Sounds interesting.  Email me and tell me more.
+
+Q: My question wasn't covered here!  Will you add it?
+A: Maybe, if enough people ask it :-).  Email me your suggestions.
+