Third Voice

Third Voice was WebAnnotation software: a way to "post sticky notes" with your comments on any site on the Web. Others in your group, or everyone using the Third Voice product could see them.

This was a kind of "usenet news group" enabling people to talk about the content of sites, and point to the content they're talking about.

• No changes were made to the target sites.
• Users could only see the notes if they obtained the Third Voice plugin for InternetExplorer 4.0.
• Users could "turn off" the notes when they got tired of looking at them.
• Users needed to register (free membership) to post notes.
• Notes may (or may not) have been deleted at any time, based on unclear policies.

ThirdVoice was unpopular with many Web site owners, who were disturbed by the idea of people posting critical, OffTopic, or obscene material that would be presented on top of their site. Legal action was discussed.

Some people felt the plug-in was too intrusive, or the content too sparse. It was similar in style to the SmartTags? MicroSoft added to InternetExplorer (and soon withdrew due to widespread criticism).

Third Voice stopped its service in April 2001. Its Web site, http://www.thirdvoice.com/, is defunct as of 2002-11-30. Amusingly, the Web site of the "Say NO to Third Voice" campaign outlasted it by several years before disappearing itself. [WaybackMachine copy of the latter: http://web.archive.org/web/20050204121018/http://www.worldzone.net/internet/pixelsnttv/]

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CategoryWebAnnotation