beef up the faq

darcs-hash:20080630161024-84dde-6afe93a69b91af9270b9e0536dea0e6c17ae2297.gz

diff --git a/doc/about b/doc/about
index c6b50bc53bbf2a2f99303a3f41e9df9ab342375c..3036a51b9674b01fff52040a4e91320b082fb617 100644 (file)
--- a/doc/about
+++ b/doc/about
@@ -1,6 +1,3 @@
-About
------
-
 %%site.name%% is a
 [micro-blogging](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micro-blogging) service
 based on the Free Software [Laconica](http://laconi.ca/) tool.
@@ -11,4 +8,3 @@ about yourself, where you are, what you're doing, or practically
 anything you want. You can also subscribe to the notices of your
 friends, or other people you're interested in, and follow them on the
 Web or in an [RSS](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RSS) feed.
-

diff --git a/doc/faq b/doc/faq
index 905c1ab77c654ff12f683f4d8e5861022b67162b..0f59f4c634668cc401ace8a796eb6e09e457cb50 100644 (file)
--- a/doc/faq
+++ b/doc/faq
@@ -1,6 +1,47 @@
-FAQ
----
-
 These are some *Frequently Asked Questions* about this service, with
 some answers.
 
+What is %%site.name%%?
+----------------------
+
+%%site.name%% is a [micro-blogging](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micro-blogging) service.
+You can use it to write short notices about yourself, where you are,
+and what you're doing, and those notices will be sent to all your friends
+and fans.
+
+How is %%site.name%% different from Twitter, Jaiku, Pownce, Plurk, others?
+--------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+%%site.name%% is an [Open Network Service](http://opendefinition.org/osd). Our main
+goal is to provide a fair and transparent service that preserves users' autonomy. In
+particular, all the software used for %%site.name%% is [Free Software](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_Software), and all the data is available
+under the [%%license.title%%](%%license.url%%) license, making it Open Data.
+
+The software also implements the [OpenMicroBlogging](http://openmicroblogging.org/) protocol, meaning that you can have friends on other microblogging services
+that can receive your notices.
+
+The goal here is *autonomy* -- you deserve the right to manage your own on-line
+presence. If you don't like how %%site.name%% works, you can take your data and the source code and set up your own server (or move your account to another one).
+
+Where is feature X?
+-------------------
+
+The software we run, [Laconica](http://laconi.ca/), is still in its early stages,
+and many features people expect from microblogging sites are not yet implemented. Some important ones that are expected "soon":
+
+* [SMS](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SMS) updates and notifications
+* A Twitter-compatible API
+* More [AJAX](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AJAX)-y interface
+* Maps
+* Cross-post to Twitter, Pownce, Jaiku, etc.
+* Pull messages from Twitter, Pownce, Jaiku, etc.
+* [Facebook](http://www.facebook.com/) integration
+* Hashtags
+* Image, video, audio notices
+* Automatic url-shortening
+* Multilingual interface (using Gettext)
+
+There is [a list of bugs and features](http://laconi.ca/PITS/) that you may find
+interesting. New ideas or complaints are very welcome.
+
+