Against a sweaty, neon Las Vegas backdrop last August, a handful of Netscape officials stood before a Comdex audience and introduced us to Constellation. Their vision was grokked by most of the press as an alternative to Microsoft's announcement that the browser would become the desktop (or was it the other way around?) and that seamless integration between the Web and your local computer was just around the corner. Netscape's vision sounded reactive at the time, and besides, this would all ship in the "second half of '97," which was more than a year away ... an eternity in the world of weekly betas and quarterly financial reports.
But things have changed. Netscape did the impossible. They finished their code early! Generating an even larger wave of hype, Netscape announced last week that Constellation, now known as Netcaster, will be out within 30 days, with a final version shipping in June - not six months from now, as had been expected. At a press conference thick with industry people and big-time media, Marc Andreessen wryly noted that this may be the first time a software company has ever released a pre-announced piece of software ahead of schedule.
While that may be the case, it's important to examine exactly what Netscape is offering in their Netcaster release. It's not exactly in line with the far-reaching vision of last year, but it does compete directly with what Microsoft eventually plans to do with Internet Explorer 4.0.
First, the basics. Netcaster is another component in the Communicator suite of Net applications that Netscape has been developing. It allows users to "subscribe" to "channels," or, in essence, create a set of advanced bookmarks that check for new content at regular intervals. It works like this: Upon launching Netcaster, you'll find a small tab on the edge of your screen with the Netscape logo on it. Clicking that tab will reveal a Channel Finder and a list of your subscribed channels, plus a few tools for managing your subscriptions. The Channel Finder lists a set of default content providers - ABC News, CNNfn, Infoseek, and Wired were demoed at the press conference. There's also some link leads to a more expansive collection of channels. You simply find the one you want, click Add Channel and you're subscribed.
From now on, these content providers will be shipping content directly into your cache, which gives you two advantages. The content appears instantly when you surf through it because it's on your drive, not out across the network. This allows content providers to explore higher-bandwidth experiences, since they won't be tied to a point-and-click-and-wait user experience. Secondly, you'll be able to read this content offline, since a network connection isn't necessary once you've cached your channels.
Thankfully, you aren't limited to these large content providers, either. You can subscribe to any Web site you like by surfing over to it, opening Netcaster, and clicking the Add button, then setting how often you want the site cached. Content providers can also create a button (using "20 lines of JavaScript," according to Andreessen) that automatically adds the site to a user's channel list when clicked.
These channels have three possible interfaces. They can take over the screen, removing all browser chrome, and offer an immersive experience. They can become part of the user's desktop, with windows and icons from other applications appearing in front of the content "stage," or they can simply appear in a browser window, like current Web sites. This functionality can be set by the channel's designer, but can easily be changed by the user in an options dialog box.
The Netcaster interface is built entirely in Netscape's version of dynamic HTML and JavaScript, and therefore can be updated incrementally - it's not bound to Navigator's or Communicator's release schedule. And Marimba's Castanet Tuner is going to be bundled, meaning channels (and Netscape) can take a step beyond self-updating content and start distributing applications over the network - applications that can be incrementally updated.
It's important to note that Netscape left some key features out in order to ship early. Last August's announcement included a "your desktop anywhere" functionality that let users access their Netcaster-configured computer from any device on the network, including productivity applications and documents. This, they promise, is yet to come.
In essence, we've been presented with the first concrete example of the browser vendor's vision of the Web's push-media future. At this point, it looks like there will be Microsoft and Netscape versions of this future, just like nearly every other new browser technology we've seen over the past year and a half. But, as has always been the case, competition spurs faster development and better implementations. And again, we as users end up the winners.
