Another Word on Prologue
January 30, 2008
UPDATE: Based on popular demand, Prologue has been updated to version 1.2, available now on WordPress.com and through Subversion. Check out Joseph Scott’s post for a rundown of the improvements.
Since its release yesterday, Prologue, the new theme that brings easy, Twitter-esque short messaging to WordPress, seems to be getting a fair bit of attention. You never know how projects like these will be received (particularly when opening yourself up to comparisons with a product as beloved as Twitter) so it’s just nice to see that we’ve captured folks’ attention, if only for a moment.
For the most part, people seem to understand that we’re not setting out to compete with (or “kill”) Twitter. Many of us at Automattic are fans! That said, Prologue was designed for something different—easily setting up and sharing a dialogue within a group. It puts aside the standard “behind the scenes” method of blogging and makes the act of posting part of the experience. It creates a kind of archived and searchable conversation, like an IM window that’s archived, taggable, and accessible from any web browser.
Here’s a collection of posts about Prologue, spanning the gamut of reactions I’ve read:
- VentureBeat: WordPress’ Prologue: part Twitter, part Basecamp, all business
- TechCrunch: Automattic Launches Group Twitter-style Platform
- Marketing Pilgrim: WordPress Announces Twitter Inspired “Prologue”
- Mashable: Twitter − Public Timeline = Prologue
- Dennis Howlett: Automattic does Twitter for business
- Mathew Ingram: WordPress pays homage to Twitter
- CenterNetworks: “Na na na na, na na na na, hey hey goodbye” says WordPress to Twitter (really we’re not, but I appreciate the enthusiasm!)
You can follow the whole discussion on TechMeme. I’m looking forward to seeing what people do with it!
A funny aside—during development the project took on the codename “Prolog,” a mashup of “project” and “log.” Knowing it was the name of a programming language (not the image we were going for) and realizing that some question our spelling abilities anyway, it was changed to “Prologue” just before launch. It wasn’t until after Matt posted the official announcement on WordPress.com that I figured out the new name could be considered a combination of “project” and “dialogue,” meaning the new name still made sense, even if, in this case, the egg came a bit after the chicken. :)
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MT, you spilled the beans on the name, now I’ll have to cover my head in shame :-)
Hah, hey Joseph, nobody has to know who came up with the names. :)
Thanks for the update. It would be awesome if you could add comment moderation into the comments.php file so if moderation is turned on and someone leaves a comment, it lets them know with a message saying comment is in moderation like most other themes. Thanks in advance for all you’ve done.
“Prologue was designed for something different—easily setting up and sharing a dialogue within a fixed group. It puts aside the standard “behind the scenes” method of blogging and makes the act of posting part of the experience.”
I had that feeling from the start, but I think as the little glitches got fixed (like Pages and Categories) the central logic has lost its focus.
“Purity of concept” ... if you loose track of what you set out to do it becomes difficult to find a good way of doing it. ;-)
I’ve posted my ideas at http://42words.wordpress.com … and in different blogs … but can’t find anyone else who’s interested in bringing it to fruition. (Unless y’all are talking about it behind the scenes, back-channel … which would be a severe bummer.)
cheers—bentrem
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