It seems that Google had more up their sleeves than the early announcements that leaked out. Today they added MySpace, Bebo and Six Apart (of Moveable Type, LiveJournal, TypePad and Vox fame) to the list of relatively minor players. MySpace announced back in June that they’re looking to open up and it would appear that this deal with Google goes back over a year.
This significantly increases the potential market for the OpenSocial platform and will be a definite draw to developers looking to engage with MySpace and Bebo users. This is unlikely to change my personal views on either of these sites but by having a standard API to write for it removes the problems of having to pander to NewsCorp’s whims.
Alison commented yesterday about Facebook’s next move:
I’ll be interested to see how long it is before Facebook choose to support Open Social… surely that’s the next obvious step for them?!
I’m more tempted to agree now, but it’s still not a given. Facebook are saying they’ve not been asked to join, itself not a great surprise but Google won’t be able to stop Facebook from joining in once the API is released. A bigger factor is perhaps Facebook’s plans for their Social Advertising Network. If they see OpenSocial as an opportunity to push targetted adverts out on competitor’s sites through embedded applications then there’s a strong financial motivation to join in.
Google and partners (including LinkedIn, Hi5, Friendster, Ning and others) are launching a new open API for interfacing with Social Networks. I’m not going to go into it too much because plenty of people have written about it already but I’ll give a few comments.
If you’re looking for one blog to read to get a feel of OpenSocial before all the gory details come out at Google Code then check out what Marc Andreessen has written. He’s the founder of Ning so clearly has an interest in OpenSocial succeeding but cut through the spin and there’s some valid points.
Where does this leave Facebook? At the moment it’s still the largest social network amongst university students so ignoring it doesn’t make sense. What OpenSocial allows is for developers to avoid vendor lock-in by writing applications for multiple platforms. Where previously there was no clear second choice to base features and implementation around, now there is a large aggregate user base to target. It will help developers to write cleaner code which can more easily be repurposed for new platforms, even alternative interfaces such as mobile phones.
This is also a pretty canny move from Google. Their own social network, Orkut, while big in Brazil has not found a significant following in the major markets. By introducing a system based on standards – the API is based on JavaScript and HTML – they’re lowering the barriers to developers by not requiring them to learn another markup or query language as is the case with Facebook.
Ultimately while this move might be supporting the growth of rival social networks, Google’s dominance and the sheer quantity of data it holds about everyone will enable it to grow Orkut and its other social websites (Documents, Talk, YouTube, Picasa, Blogger, Calendar and the rest all have further scope to become more social).
I had an interesting discussion with Brian Kelly (from UKOLN) earlier and he alerted me to an article in The Independent from last week entitled “Networking sites: Professors – keep out“.
As I will be speaking at the forthcoming “Exploiting The Potential Of Blogs And Social Networks” event next month I was interested to see what all the fuss was about so I read with interest.
The article highlighted a number of perceived issues with University staff getting involved in social networks. However I tend to disagree with the majority of them!
Last year we launched the Hi – Applicant website. It’s not ‘a Facebook’ but it does have features which allow applicants to chat (unmoderated!) to each other, view others profiles and form communities. Our staff got involved in answering queries (both formerly and informerly) in topics ranging from ‘am I entitled to a bursary’ to ‘what’s your favourite soup’ and we didn’t witness a revolt as many would expect. Why?! Well I believe it’s because we were open about University life, we gave applicants the freedom to discuss what they liked, how they liked and when they liked. We encouraged them to ‘be a community’ and it worked well for us.
I view Facebook in the same way. I don’t think we should be telling people to use it but I don’t believe we should discourage it’s use either. Yes some students may be outraged that their lecturer ‘be-friended’ them but others may think it’s pretty cool to be able to see a ‘real life’ side of the person who’s teaching them. It’s all down to individuals preferences and Facebook really does mean you can pick and choose. You don’t have to accept a ‘friend’ invitation, nor do you have to join a group but the fact is you can if you want to.
I do wonder why there is such a perceived fear of Facebook. I even struggle with the issue some people have with using it to store information. I wouldn’t advocate using it store all your files and photos but if it’s a medium to share copies of these then great. If Facebook want to claim the IPR on the copy of the information you put on their site – no problem. I can do what I want with my ‘original’ copy so I don’t have an issue.
Facebook is great because it’s evolved. It’s not a prescriptive site. It has developed the way the users have wanted it to and so why worry so much about how our students are engaging with it?! If they are then cool. Let’s get in their and do some stuff too but if not then we’ve plenty of other channels to go on.
I’d never advocate a Facebook (or any other social networking site) route for all communications or learning but as a complement to everything else I am prepared to Feel the Fear but do it anyway…
Facebook have announced they’re working on allowing users to categorise their friends:
Sort out your friends.
We’ll let you organize that long list of friends into groups so you can decide more specifically who sees what.
This is great news and will allow my online presence to more closely reflect the information I give out in the Real World. Will this be the end of Facebook Stalking?! Also useful for those who get a lot of junk emails via Facebook will be the ability to combine these into a once-a-day digest.
Via TechCrunch.
You could see this one coming – Facebook has finally overtaken MySpace in terms of unique visitors. TechCrunch UK is surprised that Facebook is no longer the fastest growing network:
In something of a revelation however, Facebook is no longer the fastest growing social network. Instead Perfspot, the US-based site where people “share their interestsâ€, is fast gaining traction in the UK.
TechCrunch UK is forgetting that it’s percentage growth so small sites can get much higher growth rates more easily – PerfSpot is still less than one-twentieth the size of Facebook. It’s still worth taking all these figures with a large pinch of salt but it’s interesting that the one-time unstoppable MySpace is now looking decidedly shaky.
Om Malik has interesting thoughts on maintaining your Facebook privacy. It’s hard sometimes to maintain your network especially as it moves from social to work “friends” but Facebook has very flexible privacy settings – you just need to take the time to learn them.
According to TechCrunch it looks as if MySpace are looking to follow Facebook down the route of an open platform for developers.
I can’t say I’m particularly surprised (given the success Facebook’s experienced) but I wonder if this is perhaps too little too late. At the moment MySpace still beats Facebook in the stats and they do have a greater critical mass but in the last few months many of it’s users have switched their allegiance to Facebook and with the networks growing every day I wonder how ready they’ll be to switch back.
For me Facebook offers so much more than MySpace. Aside from the obvious developer tools it has the stickiness that MySpace doesn’t. I can find out what my friends are up to alongside details of my colleagues and peers. Through Facebook I can find out about events I may be interested in, have discussions (in a relatively closed environment) about those events and strengthen my professional networks. Would I be as comfortable doing this on MySpace? I think not.
I think Facebook has a greater appeal for all ages. It has something for everyone. As a Web Developer many of the MySpace profiles make me cringe whereas I know what I’m getting with Facebook – it’s more about the information and the interaction than the layout.
It’s all down to individual preferences at the end of the day but I don’t think MySpace’s announcement will make much difference to Facebooks popularity and my money will still be on Facebook overtaking MySpace as the number one social networking in the not too distant future.
I will be giving a presentation at the IWMW in July entitled “Let the students do the talking…” and in advance of this Brian Kelly (UKOLN) asked me to write a blog post relating to my talk.
When I submitted my abstract back in February I was thinking of social networking and collaborative tools and how these could be utilised within our University from both a marketing and student support perspective. At the time my experiences were very positive and like many others, I was enthused by the buzz surrounding what we label Web 2.0 and excited about what this could mean for us. I still am but a number of recent issues have led me to tread a little more cautiously.
I firmly believe that as a University we should be moving towards user owned technologies. The bulk of our students (and staff) join us with a range of skills and preferences and whilst we still have to do some hand holding, the majority know the services they like to use and engage with so I believe we need to adapt accordingly and allow and encourage their continued use.
- Use gmail for your email? Use it for your Uni email too.
- Don’t want to wait for email and prefer IM? Sure no problem, that’s available too.
- On Facebook? We’ll plug you in through our portal so that you see any changes alongside the key messages we need you to see.
I still believe this is where we need to be but I also know this kind of step change is not be without its problems. Why? Because we loose some of the control. We can’t guarantee gmail’s up-time (although I’d be pretty confident it would work 24/7). We can’t moderate things like Facebook (just look at the outcry caused at Keele) so we potentially loose the power to manage some of the internal issues, without then appearing in the public domain. Naturally that’s a worry for any organisation but is it a big enough worry to prevent us from moving forward? I don’t believe it is.
We have more to gain in terms of a competitive edge by being in these spaces. User owned technologies and collaborative tools in a University environment are niceties at the moment and an added benefit but it won’t be long before they are the expected norm. On the internet word of mouth, user reviews, recommendations etc. are proving more readily available and more popular than our “corporate” offerings so the more we engage with and allow these things the more we can use them to our advantage.
How?! Well going back to my presentation title we let the students do the talking. Put the tools in the hands of the people that use them. Let them decide how to use them, how much/little to engage, what they say, how they say it. If we concentrate on providing the experience we claim to do then (which is what we’re all about) then we should move in this direction with confidence.
Recent posts on Brian’s UK Web Focus blog indicate my thoughts are echoed by others too which is encouraging. So whilst I’m treading carefully I’m still convinced it’s in the right direction…
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