As the year the project was officially released, 2010 will always be an important year for Ode. But this little project is still a baby. The good news is that after the first year I have every reason to believe the Ode is workable. Nothing has happened to make me change my mind about that, and that's really positive. The bad news, if you want to call it that, is a lot of work to do!

If Ode were an infant it would be taking its first tentative steps, and shifting to new kinds of play (from fine motor control to bigger movements). The advice would be that each baby is an individual and develops at his or her own pace. Though admittedly somewhat of a stretch, in this context I'd say Ode is right on track.

As some of you know I believe that while intentionally small and simple, I believe Ode is an important project representing a crucial point of view.

I'm a proponent of the open web, and you're at all interested in Ode I'm guessing you are too.

Access to information has never been more important - of course there has never been a time when I wouldn't have said the same thing. The point is that the open, distributed nature of the web makes it exceedingly important. What has been demonstrated in the last couple of decades is that open and distributed solutions that scale as the web has, both in terms of architecture and acceptance, is a very rare thing. We have it now, for once, and may not get it again any time soon. We should cherish it.

Ode exists to help you and me be more active participants in the Open Web, and so play a small part in encouraging the web's future growth and development, while allowing more of us to better understand the web. Ode's motto is 'simple means you know how it works'. The idea behind it is to make web design and development as simple as possible without losing any of the creative freedom, flexibility, and independence the Open Web affords all of us.

I like to say that Ode is a 'personal publishing engine for the web'. The goal is to create as simple a platform as possible for creating content for the web without dumbing-down the experience. And I like to think that Ode on it's own is a pretty compelling platform.

Firstly, because it is so simple.

Adding and editing content is as straight-forward as creating a text file or email message.

Because Ode is extensible you can help to make it do anything you like.

Because it's open source, you can remake it into something else, port it to some other language, integrate and use it with some other project, and do just about anything else you want. (If you're thinking along these lines, please contact me because I'd like to know about it - and maybe help out if I can.)

Secondly, and more importantly, because you have the full power of web at your disposal.

Ode's themes are standards compliant HTML and CSS and do nothing to limit your ability to create any design you like.

You're free to take advantage of the flexibility of the web in any way you see fit and on your terms.

Having said all of that, Ode on it's own is really just the beginning, which is exactly as it should be. With Ode you can tap into the wealth of sites and services that make the web great. And the good news is that there are a lot of them!

Facebook may have the media spotlight (and it's ludicrous valuation), but it quite literally isn't in the same class as the Open Web. Where the Web is open, global, standards-based, highly-distributed, and free from the agenda of any one commercial entity; Facebook, is the antithesis of that.

Though it is not often identified as such, what needs to be said is that the web is itself a social application.

What we need are more open, distributed protocols and other standards for interaction between sites.

So what's so appealing about Facebook? Well contrary to popular misconception, Facebook is appealing not because it's big, but because it's small. Facebook allows us to make the sorts of connections that are more difficult to make on the Open Web. Facebook is popular for the same reason people attend small liberal arts colleges (it's not the education). We all want to be found and the web makes us feel lost. We all want to feel big, and the web makes us feel small. We all like to pretend we're important, and the web doesn't lie to us about that.

So Facebook is in a lot of ways a solution to many of the web's problems. However, it's a deeply flawed solution. I believe that this is clearly a case of the cure being worse than the disease. I have a better solution. Let's move past the social web, which doesn't work for the vast majority of us, and let's make the web personal

I'm as committed as ever to seeing Ode grow and mature. Hopefully it will be a good year. If you're looking to get involved in a project like this, now's a great time and your contributions will certainly be appreciated.

I hope all of us are able to do things we find personally gratifying in the new year.