Ray Ozzie has proposed Simple Sharing Extensions or SSE to solve a long term problem of sharing information between two or multiple entities. Per the FAQ:
SSE defines new XML elements that add replication information to items in an RSS feed. These new elements enable SSE applications to implement bidirectional RSS. In other words, two endpoints can mutually publish and subscribe to each other’s RSS feed. When changes are made in one endpoint, they are propagated to the other and vice versa.
Furthermore,
SSE is ideal for replicating data that can be published in an RSS feed. That includes lists of items such as calendar appointments, contacts, favorites, and news items. In addition, SSE is ideal for bidirectional, asynchronous replication, particularly for scenarios where multiple people can edit or create entries.
Excellent Idea!
Dave Winer who participated with some of the refinement is happy to see that Microsoft and others are now “empower(ing) each others’ creativity." As it is “simple” and “available for everyone to use.”
Russell Bettie pointed out, SSE is for syncing only and what is missing is how to represent the data within an RSS Feed.
The SSE just manages the syncing itself – there’s no place for the data to sit besides what’s in RSS already. Where does this other stuff fit? In plain text in the description field? No way. Either he’s talking about using this system with a bunch of different namespaces generated from various applications, or the next step must be an arbitrary field-data namespace for this sort of info
For calendaring, the answer is simple; embed iCalendar in XML Format (xCal-Basic) as its own RSS namespace. xCal is ideal for the basis for RSS Calendar (something IntelliCal has been working on….) while enabling translations back to the many existing calendar clients which support the iCalendar standard.
First step is to draft a spec to embed xCal into RSS (most likely under the Creative Commons License)
Let us know if you want to help out on the spec!