Web Singletons? 254
tcmb writes "There are an uncounted number of web mail and picture sharing services, there are more than enough web sites for online bookmark management and friend-finding, but as far as I know there is only one Internet Archive. Which are the true web singletons, services that exist only once in this form?" And does anything approach the singular time-wasting abilities of IMDB or Wikipedia?
What? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Well a singleton is a software design pattern designed to allow exactly zero or one instances of a class to exist (typically a database connection). But whoever thought the term applies to the services provided by web apps is just an idiot. Especially since as soon as anyone creates something new and vaguely useful, a dozen clones pop up within a week and do it better (though tend to fail anyways, since they never get the initial market share or publicity of the original - see: twitter). The only organiz
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Patent trolls don't create anything (except pain, suffering and economic hardship for their victims).
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Well that's the beauty of the singleton design pattern - you can create exactly zero instances if you want. Which in the context of patent trolls is definitely a bad thing, but it still technically fits the misused term.
Re:What? (Score:5, Insightful)
On the subject of patent trolls, Blackboard fits this, despite being such a horrible piece of crap.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
A-fucking-men to that chief. Blackboard is, bar none, the single nastiest most unintuitive piece of shit I have every had to deal with. It makes Lotus Notes circa 1995 look like genius. It makes Microsoft Clippy look like a good idea. I hate it. I want it gone. I would rather spend hours photocopying stuff and calculating grades by hand without a calculator than deal with that nasty piece of crap.
RS
Which twitter? (Score:4, Funny)
Especially since as soon as anyone creates something new and vaguely useful, a dozen clones pop up within a week and do it better (though tend to fail anyways, since they never get the initial market share or publicity of the original - see: twitter).
Are you talking about the microblogging service with a dozen clones or the Slashdot poster with a dozen clones [slashdot.org]?
Re:What? (Score:4, Informative)
The word "singleton" wasn't invented to describe the design pattern, douchebag. It means there is only one of something and is used correctly in TFS.
Re:What? (Score:5, Funny)
He isn't a douchebag, just a simpleton.
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
The word "singleton" wasn't invented to describe the design pattern, douchebag. It means there is only one of something and is used correctly in TFS.
Lemme guess. Your a singleton (an offspring born alone).
While the term may be used correctly it doesn't address the target audience correctly. For the slashdot community the title is quite misleading. A title of "Web Singletons?" and it's not about the design pattern? Not cool or geeky. Wouldn't "unique web apps?" or something else better describe what the article is about?
I know I was disappointed when I found out the article wasn't (directly) related to coding and by the responses I've seen so far it
Re: (Score:2)
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Obviously, a good grasp of the English language doesn't fall into "news for nerds, stuff that matters."
I'll bet as far as some people here are concerned, they'd be perfectly fine conversing in byte code, though perhaps they might have trouble agreeing upon the architecture.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/singleton
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/singleton
singleton
One entry found.
Main Entry:
sin*gle*ton
Function:
noun
Etymology:
French, from English single
Date:
1876
1: a card that is the only one of its suit originally dealt to a player
2 a: an individual member or thing distinct from others grouped with it b: an offspring born singly <singletons are more common than twins>
I like the way MW has a joke for Singleton. If you look up other words [merriam-webster.com] with a single definition it doesn't say "one entry found".
It reminds of the definition of recursive in the hacker's di
Re: (Score:2)
I think it's simply because nobody's figured out how to make a buck off it. Once that happens, there'll be hundreds of them.
Re:What? (Score:5, Insightful)
Some day, I'm going to have to introduce you to a new game called 'Bridge', something called 'set theory' or perhaps just to the concept of 'twins'. Then you might learn a few whole new meanings for that word and wonder why you were such an idiot about it before.
Re:What? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:What? (Score:5, Funny)
(Archive the archive (the archive (the archive (the archive))))
Re:What? (Score:5, Funny)
Both of them?
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Singleton is a township in the Hunter Valley region of New South Wales, Australia. Famous for its wineries and mining. It's a nice place. Friendly people. And it has one of the worlds largest sundials.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singleton,_New_South_Wales [wikipedia.org]
For timewasting (Score:3, Informative)
Or not.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
You are doing it wrong, think TV Tropes [tvtropes.org].
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Re: (Score:3)
I've seen someone driven to tears because someone else was reading out the jokes from that site.
(There's taking the joke the wrong way, and then there's "fuck you all, I hate you, you don't know what you're making fun of, I was abused by my uncle when I was eight".)
Zombo (Score:4, Funny)
Everyone knows about Zombo [zombo.com] of course. You could waste hours there without even thinking about it.
Re: "For large values of once" (Score:3, Insightful)
Sorry AC.
You missed http://www.obmoz.com/ [obmoz.com]
------
(Can you talk to Mods?
"Hi Mod. I know I am Informative, but since neither of the sites are, save your juicy Mod point for something better.")
The grand-daddy of them all... (Score:5, Insightful)
...is still alive! [badgerbadgerbadger.com]
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Not singleton.
Here's a clone: http://crotchzombie.com/ [crotchzombie.com]
Re:Zombo Round 3! (Score:2)
Beautiful. That's what makes the Net a grand place. I couldn't have ever found this variant.
There can be only one... (Score:5, Funny)
Timecube.
Unique and a waste of time.
Re:There can be only one... (Score:5, Funny)
Wrong; not a singleton: http://www.thymecube.com/ [thymecube.com]
Re: (Score:2)
Not to mention this. [uncyclopedia.org]
What site is this again? (Score:5, Funny)
And does anything approach the singular time-wasting abilities of IMDB or Wikipedia?
looks up at teh awesome bar (cough).
looks at uid.
sighs.
Re: (Score:2)
looks up at teh awesome bar (cough).
looks at uid.
sighs.
I know what you mean.
Re: (Score:2)
Hey whipper-snapper, get off MY lawn!
Re: (Score:2)
Yo.
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
It is one of those new-fangled words the youth use. See: http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=yo [urbandictionary.com]
Now, keep it down over there or I'll call the cops.
Re: (Score:2)
Wait.. still?
Kids these days...
Re: (Score:2)
Bite me, Grandpa!
Slashdot (Score:5, Insightful)
I'd say /. is relatively unique.
Re: (Score:2)
And does anything approach the singular time-wasting abilities of IMDB or Wikipedia?
Erm... /. ?
Oh, and b3ta [b3ta.com]
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I imagine that the Internet abhors a singularity like nature abhors a vacuum
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At any rate, I think that the following sites are unique, at least insofar as no other site has done the same thing with even a comparable amount of success and therefore they stand alone: Slashdot, Woot, Wikipedia, Google, Babelfish, Cornell Law's LII, archive.org, packing.org (now dead but lacking appropriate
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Not true. Look at yesterday's slashdot.
Odds are a number of today's stories are repeated on there.
Therefore, slashdot is not a singleton.
QED.
I hope it's unique! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:I hope it's unique! (Score:4, Insightful)
Tubgirl, lemonparty, meatspin, 2G1C, etc. The implementation may vary a bit, but goatse certainly isn't the only shock site out there.
Re:I hope it's unique! (Score:5, Funny)
No, no, you got it wrong (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Don't forget bottleguy.com
I will not link that.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
For what it's worth, it's almost exactly what it sounds like.
Re: (Score:2)
that's a good example because there's just one image that represents the idea. People are not making images to imitate this, they just point to the original or copy of it. It's not like there are copycats like lambsex or sheepbutt.. one Goatse.cx is enough to get the point across.
Yeah, for time wasting (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:2)
Try Wikia (Score:4, Informative)
A lot of stuff that doesn't quite make it onto the regular Wiki is found here.
It also hosts some very concise, fictional world Wikis, like Wookiepedia [Star Wars]. and Memory Alpha [Star Trek].
Re: (Score:2)
Just wanted to mention that the Battlestar Wiki is quite good as well.
Qik (Score:4, Interesting)
www.qik.com allows you to stream live video and audio from your cell phone. As far as I know, it's the only service on the internet like this.
You mean like Google? (Score:4, Funny)
Singletons (Score:5, Funny)
I hear that eharmony is a good place to find singletons.
Uh... (Score:5, Funny)
You must be new here.
TinEye.com (Score:5, Interesting)
TinEye.com [tineye.com] is an image search engine that works like this:
It analyzes images it finds online, by looking at their pixels and dimensions.
To search, a user uploads an image, and TinEye returns a list of links to similar images, said images' dimensions, and links to the pages on which said images are posted.
It's useful for finding originals from photoshopped images and for finding images in a series if you have only one image and know it's part of a series.
And no, I don't work for them(but I do use the site almost daily).
Re: (Score:2)
Now when in the hell would I ever use th-
Oh. Nice.
That's a lot of image series. You do realize it is available in video form, too?
Re: (Score:2)
Nope, not google... (Score:3, Interesting)
Archive.org isn't unique (Score:3, Informative)
Check out Australia's web archive run by the National Library of Australia: http://pandora.nla.gov.au/ [nla.gov.au]
It may not be the same size yet, but many of the web app clones have the same issue as well. Its scope is also different as well - aiming at Australian content, but again many clones limit their scope as well.
Zombo.com (Score:2)
Zombo.com
OurCampaigns (Score:3, Interesting)
There are lots of political sites, but my site OurCampaigns [ourcampaigns.com] is a bit different than anything out there.
It is custom programmed and is a structured international view of politics at allows user contribution. Lot of current and historical race result data, going back hundreds of years. High level to local level. Right now a half million political races. News items, endorsements, candidate information, party information.
Re: (Score:2)
Nah, yours isn't so different. There's a lot of confused, poorly laid out, and poorly designed sites on the web.
wheresgeorge.com (Score:5, Informative)
I lost interest when it seemed like very few of the bills I entered were later tracked.
Re: (Score:2)
There's also the problem that defacing us currency is quite illegal.
My homepage (Score:2)
(*) All those other websites just don't talk about myself as well as I do (**).
(**) I could tell you where it is, but I'd have to kill you (***).
(***) Yes, it's that special. Accept no substitutes.
Snopes (Score:3, Insightful)
TV Tropes (Score:5, Insightful)
And does anything approach the singular time-wasting abilities of IMDB or Wikipedia?
Google for "TV Tropes". No, I'm not giving you a URL. If I had to go find the URL, I might accidentally look at the URL. And then I'd end up clicking some of the links there. But there's no way to read through a Trope page without being curious enough to click on at least two of the links there, and then two of the links on each of those, and then... well, I just put dinner in the oven and I do not want to suddenly snap out of a fascinated reverie an hour from now when the smoke from my kitchen burning down reminds me that I'm starving.
But does it contain itself? (Score:2)
And if not is it a set of all sets that do not contain themselves?
Re: (Score:2)
Make a list of all singleton web sites.
Make a second list of all web sites that are not singletons.
The first and last entries on this list are unique by the fact that they are the first and last non-singleton web sites. Move them to the first list. Repeat.
All web sites are singletons.
All things are notable.
Q.E.D.: All your base are belong to us.
One, One, One (Score:3, Interesting)
Singleton:
- a single object (as distinguished from a pair)
- a set containing a single member
- In mathematics, a singleton is a set with exactly one element. For example, the set {0} is a singleton.
One good reason for finding "singletons" on the web (unique web properties) might be to find an entry point for competition where the market is not yet saturated. At the same time it's often hard to compete against something that's firmly established (e.g. David and Goliath). Maybe submitter has a obsessive compulsive disorder and feels a strong need to find one of everything on the web. Speculation. Maybe I'm a jackass.
Time-wasting singleton? (Score:4, Funny)
This does -idle.slashdot.org [slashdot.org].
space-time continuum monitoring (Score:4, Interesting)
There is only one space-time continuum monitoring service, http://space-time.net/ [space-time.net]
Stephan
LHC destruction monitor (Score:5, Funny)
Fippypopulosa (Score:2)
How about... (Score:2, Funny)
http://www.palinaspresident.com/ [palinaspresident.com]
I've been back to visit it every day for entertainment and don't know of anything like it :)
isitchristmas? (Score:2)
http://isitchristmas.com/ [isitchristmas.com]
Singletons? (Score:3, Funny)
I can honestly say that I know quite a few web simpletons, but no singletons.
Everything? (Score:3, Interesting)
Time wasters?
How about slashdot's sister site, everything2 [everything2.org]?
InternetMoodReport.com (Score:2)
Think this is a singleton at the moment..
internetmoodreport.com [internetmoodreport.com]
Also quite a waste of time so a match on both counts! ;)
Things that should be a single authoritative site (Score:4, Interesting)
There are quite a few situations where life would be simpler if there were just one definitive instance of something - mostly indexes / official repositories of some kind, but sadly at the moment we have a multitude of these things with no single instance providing 100% coverage :
- Airline flight schedules : presumably every airline has planned its timetable months in advance, but there is no obvious place to search across all of them (cf. www.nationalrail.co.uk which I think does have the authoritative timetable across all mainline railways)
- List of all properties for sale in the country; in the UK the seller has to choose which estate agents to list with, and the buyer then has to go around a load of different agents to find out what's available. It'd seem obvious for this to instead be a nationalized thing - what added value do estate agents / letting introduction agencies provide anyway? (as distinct from letting agencies that also do some property management)
- Web Search : there is scope for different search-engines to provide fundamentally different types of search (ie. text, image, audio etc) : but why do we need more than one of each type?
- Scientific Journals : pre-print servers (arXiv.org) are starting to solve this problem, but lots of papers still get published in obscure / less-popular journals and if your university library doesn't subscribe to that one then you can't easily read it - and once you leave university they become pretty much unavailable to the average member of the public.
Pretty much all the things I can think of that would be better as a single instance have the problem that they are run commercially - so there are problems with monopolies if we ever get just one of them, and the tin-foil-hat brigade might have something to say if they were nationalized (and in many cases could just be right too : imagine if our primary news outlet were government controlled)
Free stuff seems to find its own level of singleton-like-ness, some keeping just one instance : ....
- IMDB, CPAN, w3c.org,
others forking to meet differing preferences like linux distributions, tech news website etc.
Singular? (Score:3, Funny)
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
By listing two sites with this "time-wasting ability", you have proven two things:
1) That it's not singular
2) That you have a poor grasp of English
Plus I think way more people waste their time on Slashdot.
Re: (Score:2)
Seconded. I've on several occasions jumped over to TV Tropes just to look up a single term, then middle-clicked my way through a page, middle-clicked my way through another page, and 3 hours later found myself with 20 tabs open just on that site. And of course I can't bring myself to close them without reading them...
Re:I'm Sorry, but . . . (Score:5, Funny)
Usually, I'd rather be right than happy.
Re:I'm Sorry, but . . . (Score:5, Funny)
They do if you have any sense.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
There is no shortage of idiots on the web.
Re:gnaa (Score:4, Insightful)
There is no shortage of idiots.
Fixed that for you.
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Not really. There's berliOS, Google Code, Launchpad, and probably others I can't name off the top of my head.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
SourceForge stands pretty much singular in its function.
Um... Freshmeat.net?
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Um... Source hosting? Online docs? Revisioning?
Back to SourceForge!
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Re:Here's a semi-unique time waster for 'ya ... (Score:5, Insightful)
Singletons are the loneliest objects that I've ever seen...
Factories can be as bad as a Singletons
They're the loneliest objects since the Singleton
False is the saddest value that you'll ever know,
True, it's the saddest value that you'll ever know...
Re:Here's a semi-unique time waster for 'ya ... (Score:4, Informative)
Actually, it was first recorded by Three Dog Night in 1969 and written by Harry Nilsson. allmusic [allmusic.com]
Re: Dept. Of glorious Zombo Trivia (Score:2)
Text of Zombo.com
Welcome to ZomboCom. This is ZomboCom. Welcome. This is ZomboCom. Welcome to ZomboCom. You can do anything at ZomboCom. Anything at all. The only limit is yourself. Welcome to ZomboCom. Welcome to ZomboCom. This is ZomboCom. Welcome to ZomboCom. This is ZomboCom. Welcome. Yes. This is ZomboCom. This is ZomboCom. And Welcome to you who have come to ZomboCom. Anything is possible at ZomboCom. You can do anything at ZomboCom. The infinite is possible at ZomboCom. The unattainable is unknown at
Re: (Score:2)
Can we reward anyone who takes the time to reverse a bad mod with their own Mod point? (Underrated?)