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Thoughts on the Social Graph
Posted by
CmdrTaco
on Mon Aug 20, 2007 08:13 AM
from the something-to-think-about dept.
from the something-to-think-about dept.
Jamie found an excellent story about the trouble with social graphs. The author discusses the proliferation of social networking websites, the annoying problems this creates, and proposes an open solution to much of the problem. Essentially he is talking about an API for all those relationship systems not under the control of any single commercial entity, coupled with a shared login system. Had things like this been popularized a half a decade ago, we'd be looking at a different internet.
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Yawn. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Yawn. (Score:5, Informative)
It seems to be talking about a system where anyone can run their own server according to the open standard APIs, and hence will not be centralised.
Although he's right that people are tired of readding friends on each network, one flaw is that "friend" has different meanings. On some, it's simply "This person is my friend". On some like Facebook, it also means they can see information about you that others might not. On LiveJournal however (which was created by the author of this article), it goes far beyond simply "friend"; it indicates which journals you want to read, and who can see your "friends only" entries. So conceivably, who I want as a friend on Facebook isn't necessarily the same as who I want as a "friend" on LJ.
Now theoretically this can be handled in that "people whose journals I want to read" could be a subset of anyone I list as my friend (i.e., you have an option for each friend whether you read their entries, whether they can read yours, or whatever is specific for that site). But that's more hassle for individual users.
Parent
Re:Yawn. (Score:4, Interesting)
Parent
He identifies the solution is out there... (Score:5, Interesting)
I subscribe to Netflix. I added a Netflix app to Facebook, it let's my friend's see my queue... yawn... It also let's my Facebook friends, if they get Netflix, quickly add me as a Netflix friend (subject to my approval). The Netflix app mirrors some of Netflix's UI, but not everything. I still go to Netflix to manage Queue's and add movies, but I can see what's going on quickly on Facebook.
The problem is that most Web Developers suck. If your data store for your web-app is good, then you can EASILY create a Facebook front end. If your front-end has all your database calls (no stored procedures in the database, not even a DB functions file in Perl/PHP/whatever you coded in), then you see it as "be a Facebook App OR a website."
The promise of HAVi in the AV world was that we would connect our equipment via Firewire, and they would export a front-end in Java that our TV or Receiver would render for us. The data in MPEG-2 with fixed compression caused content producers to go ape-shit, but the idea is valid on the web.
If you want to process information, you need to collect it and do something with it. The days of a "single HTML interface" are now over. You need a mobile version, an iPhone version (possibly, we'll see adoption rates), and now a Facebook version.
I collect my photos in iPhoto on my Mac. I upload them to Facebook via an iPhoto plug-in to show my friends. I upload them to Shutterfly via an Export Plugin (well, did until they haven't supported iPhoto '08 yet), so my extended relatives can buy pictures.
I have other friends that are into photography, they use Flickr. However, there is a Flickr "interface" for Facebook, so their Flickr Albums are viewable on Facebook. Sure, if they have pictures that they want the Facebook features (tag a friend), they need to upload to Facebook, but if they want Flickr sharing (tags, etc.), they upload to Flickr and put it on the Flickr App on Facebook.
Open APIs will let US aggregate OUR data, not have one site steal it from others.
Parent
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
That would be a web server though. There are different types of server, e.g., email server, which need different protocols. Sometimes people come up with new protocols (e.g., OpenID).
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Not necessarily, the data could be distributed, redundant, and synchronized.
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Social networking is about voluntary information sharing. If you don't want the whole world to know your address and phone number, don't put those things on your MySpace page. If you do, it doesn't really matter which other social networking sites have that information, because it's already public on the internet.
This isn't about scraping and publicizing information that you want to keep private, it's about giving you the freedom to syn
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IP (Score:3, Interesting)
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Is it an IP infringement if I list my phone number, email and address on one site, then put it on another site too? Of course not. No matter what th
So you want to change the Internet... (Score:5, Insightful)
Security Issues (Score:2)
This is also why there are more big sites where you
Re:Security Issues (Score:5, Interesting)
The people I communicate with on Facebook are not the people I interact with on Linux forums or on Slashdot. The meaning of a "friend" (or whatever) on each site is totally different. Not only do I not want these connections treated identically... I don't want those separate accounts to be related to one another!
Frankly the downsides to having my online social activity interconnected are numerous: spamming, ease of monitoring me, etc. The end result is that I will either reveal personal information I didn't intend to, or conversely I will use the sites less freely because I'll be worried about revealing information (e.g. if I know potential employers will easily find the information).
Considering the numerous downsides, I have trouble seeing the benefit, to the end-user, of having a comprehensive, widely-accessible 'social graph.'
Parent
To which I respond... (Score:3, Insightful)
...who cares?
Use a social netowrking site, don't use one. Use MySpace, Facebook, or don't. Is this really a problem? No. Is it bothering anyone else? No. Is this news? No. Nothing to see here -- move along.
anti-human (Score:2, Interesting)
And we want this *why*? (Score:5, Insightful)
Just that? Why, sure, I'll gladly make enough info public on myself and my friends to make identity theft nearly trivial. And hey, as a perk, if I ever find myself on the run from the police (for example, after someone steals my identity and gets me flagged as a major contributor to Al Qaida), they'll have a convenient list of everyone I might contact. Golly, what not to love about that?
People are getting sick of registering and re-declaring their friends on every site
Why, exactly, does "every site" need to know my friends? For that matter, why should any sites know my friends? And I don't mean in the Slashdot Friends/Foe sense - I have plenty of both, solely for the purpose of moderation. Of over 100 people on my lists here, I only actually know three of them, and one of those I've never even met.
If a site actually needs to know my friends/family/coworkers, you can safely bet on my not wanting to use that site.
For the record, I get sick of registering at websites not because it takes too long to come up with fake info, but because for the majority of them, I shouldn't need to create a personalized account in the first place! If I find something through Google, I don't want a lasting relationship with a site, I just want my damned content. If I buy something as a one-off purchase, I don't want an account, I just want the transaction completed and all my info expunged from the site. Unless I specifically ask a website to give me a persistant profile, don't force one on me - it only wastes time, and I won't rememeber what fake info I put in next time anyway (hell, I must have over fifty logins at the NYT).
This sounds like yet another one of those non-issues that give marketing gurus wet dreams and serve no purpose beyond stripping us of any semblance of privacy and anonymity. Brad can keep his thoughts, I want no part of it.
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Actually, this is the sense that is meant. Usually sites, just like Slashdot, use "Friend" to imply some specific feature, whether it's who you want to see certain personal data, or whose journals or comments you want to read. It's unfortunate that the word "friend" has been overloaded,
Re:And we want this *why*? (Score:5, Funny)
You truly are Slashdot material. Welcome my brother.
Parent
Re:And we want this *why*? (Score:4, Insightful)
If you mean that I can't call myself one of the 1.4 million "friends" of the latest boy band - Yes, it has. I simply do not see the point of Myspace or Facebook other than as a free-as-in-beer webhost (with the hidden expense of having all your "friends" receive slightly better-targetted advertising).
If, however, you mean a real social network - I limit mine to people I actually know, people that (with very few exceptions) I have physically met. Friends and acquantances whose real names and at least partial contact info I know, whose birthday I might celebrate with them, whose voice I would recognize on the phone or whose face I would recognize in a crowd.
Call me a Luddite, but it disturbs me greatly to think that we have diluted the term "friend" to nothing more than a form of moderation roughly translating as something between fandom and "I like something about your web page".
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Hmmm - what scrumptious irony it is that I have added you to my Slashdot friends list because I completely agree with your post.
Re:And we want this *why*? (Score:5, Insightful)
I know how to use the web in such a web that I'm "sufficiently anonymous." I know true anonymity is impossible (e.g. with an IP address and a subpoena), but I know how to restrict the information I give out to a level I am comfortable with, and totally out of my control.
One problem with ubiquitously-connected social networking is that I not only have to be careful what I reveal, but I am now very much dependent on what my "friends" decide to reveal about me. If they go mentioning personal information about me, and it's cross-connected through every social networking site I visit, then this represents a release of information beyond what I'm comfortable with.
Obviously this problem already exists (and currently results in, e.g., people wasting time un-tagging themselves from Facebook photos)... but a widely connected and widely available social graph exacerbates the problem. Suddenly I'm dependent upon the net savvy of every single person who is connected to me? (And, given the whole "six degrees" issue, that's a lot of not-so-savvy people.) No thanks.
The end result of more detailed, more available, social information is merely that those of us aware of the privacy implications will stop using social networking sites. Is that really the intent here?
Parent
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All you need to know on the subject is: (Score:2)
MySpace - Kids/teens
Anything else - non starter.
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I, for myself, would like to have the possibility to merge my social webs.
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Security/MS Passport (Score:2)
Saying that it does seem better if the entity you entrust this information to (not just password but friend relationships
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
OpenID is decentralised. Being open or a standard doesn't imply centralised (think email - you can email people on other servers, without needing some centralised trustable email server).
What about XFN (XHTML Friends Network)? (Score:2)
It already exists - FOAF (Score:3, Informative)
Vendor lockin is the reason it isn't simple to migrate across all the sites.
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Non-geek usage (Score:2)
Non-geeks are not going to be developing new applications and mashups, they'll be using it. Moveable Type pioneered a blogging API, that turned out to be a nice defacto standard, that most other blogging engines support. Result is that thousands of non-geeks can now blog from outside their blogging-silo.
I imagine a simple REST/XML webservice p
what i don't understand about slashdot (Score:2, Flamebait)
huh?
universal id is universal id folks. it's the same thing
someone might point out that one is open and free, and the other is under the control of a central authority. what are you smoking?
you don't get it: any kind of universal id is open to the same kinds of abuses you could a
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The vilified universal ID is assumed to be attached to all personal information and controlled by an entity with no particular vested interest in that person's well being. Big Brother bells sound and people start thinking of how to get off the grid.
A single sign on is a little different. It doesn't implicitly involved any information that the indivi
Not going to happen (Score:5, Insightful)
It's my understanding that a crack team of programmers has been assigned to this problem. That team includes Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, and the Great Pumpkin. Good luck and godspeed.
What's the problem again? (Score:2)
And why is that such a problem? I'm quite happy with that state of things in the "social graph" arena.
"People are getting sick of registering and re-declaring their friends on every site"
1) Really? Some people (esp teens?) seem very happy to have new opportunitie
!fair (Score:2)
So he wants like some sort of library of users that a site can tap into on launch? Why should a popular site hand over its hard won users to the new kid on the block? Doesn't seem all that fair to me. If your social site or application is cool enough the Internet will beat a path to your NIC. If the users don't show then build a better site/app.
Relax, it's just Trillian for Social Networks (Score:3, Insightful)
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Mugshut (Score:4, Interesting)
Conclusion? (Score:3, Interesting)
quote:
How 's that for a conclusion?
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What you're looking for is "authoritarian" or "totalitarian" if they have a guiding dogma.
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