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Here's the 1998 year-in-review website..
http://www.scripting.com/davenet/98/review/
It's DaveNet in soundbite-form, with links to the original articles. All the blemishes are there, all the too-bold predictions, all the flip-flops. It's a humbling but valuable exercise for me.
But it was fun too. You'll find stories about the Taco Bell dog and Barry Goldwater, Frank Sinatra, Karla Faye Tucker, and even my uncle Sam, and of course Bill Clinton and Bill Gates. The Bees were back, and so was Java. Websites became easier to use. XML got broader, more confusing, and deployed, all in the same year!
***Summing it up
The best most to-the-point quote this year was in the last piece:
"If we're ever going to work together again, there will have to be give on both sides, sooner or later. We'll have to see ourselves as one country, responsible for what we do, no matter what party you belong to or support."
It's funny because that quote works in every part of every story I wrote last year. It's equally true for the United States, for the software industry, between the genders, as well as the Frontier community.
Everywhere at all times, we can look for things we have in common, things we agree on. So often we focus on is how different everyone is. I do it too. But I'm happier when I can see what bonds us together, where our common interests are, which values we share, ways in which we're alike, not different.
So let that be my summary for 1998, let's look back on this year as a time when we started working together, or saw why we should work together, and look forward to 1999 and beyond for ways we can do more of that!
Dave Winer