I have just done a longish summary-sort of entry about Microsoft’s take on what Ray Ozzie calls the ‘services transformation’.
I wrote that entry, and am writing this entry, using Window’s Live Writer.
This is a nice example of the services transformation in action: I am using a local application which works seamlessly across the network. And it talks to non-Microsoft applications.
This is a desktop application which gives wysiwig editing, some image import and manipulation features, and spell checking. There is also the Live Writer SDK for those with the inclination and ability to extend its capacities.
However, what makes it really interesting is that it will publish to the main blogging applications through their APIs. So, I can use this nice editing environment to write something, and then publish it to Lorcan Dempsey’s Weblog with a couple of clicks. There are some nice features. It knows about my Movable Type categories for example. It also allows me to specify which ping servers I want to ping (although I will have to rediscover and enter the appropriate URLs, which is a bit tiresome).
The first entry went fine, with a couple of small, avoidable glitches. I might try it for a while and see how it goes.
I think the above is interesting. What is really interesting though is that one can imagine a variety of other ways in which this type of capacity could be used with other ‘servicable’ applications as we really do begin to see the ‘services transformation’ change the way we routinely do things.
Of course there are other examples of this kind of thing, but that this is Microsoft is intriguing. There is a lot of tranformative potential there.
Update: I notice via TechCrunch that Writely is now accepting registrations again.
