These are just random thoughts.

Why are shopping cart apps so convoluted and complicated? Something I’m hoping Shopify.com solves.

Having spent a significant amount of time untangling an OS Commerce store for my partner, I am amazed at the complexity being packed into these apps.

In the open source world the enemy of mass adoptions seems to be too many chefs, and a failure to say NO.

The idea of mashing up web services into new shiny new applications is actually an old idea.

Its simple, don’t reinvent the wheel, use the best of breed, whenever possible.

This is why I rely on Paypal, presently. Its not perfect, but what service is?

Paypal rocks by creating a relatively secure DMZ where customers and businesses exchange funds, without credit card information being stored on yet another server.

Unlike typical e-commerce systems, Paypal puts the customer in charge of their information.

How many sites store your information?

How much control do you have over it?

However, Paypal needs to do two things, to keep my business in 2006.

• Add Fedex to their shipping repertoire
• Allow more automation in subscription management

I want customers to be able to request upgrades and downgrades in their subscription level, without having to cancel and re-create subscriptions.

On another topic, why does every new web application require an account and password?

When will someone devise a system that is more transparent to users?

On how many sites do you use the same name and password?

Should users be allowed to define their own authentication system?

Why couldn’t I tell shiny new mashup #47 to authenticate my account against my IMAP server, based on a certain e-mail address? Or use an LDAP or POP3 server instead?

Don’t store my password, just my account key, and let me worry about the rest.