Disruptive Conversations

Why Facebook needs an "unsubscribe" or "block event invitations"...

Wouldn't it be nice if there was a way you could easily ignore/block event invitations from a specific person? Today, Mari Smith directly involves me in a piece on her blog called " Facebook Event Invitations - Unsubscribe Option?" that goes right to this point.

THE BROKENNESS OF FACEBOOK

Here's the thing... I don't know Mari. That I can recall, I've never met her. I've never attended any of her online events, nor had I read her blog prior to this morning. Yet inside of Facebook I received the occasional message from her about upcoming events she was doing, none of which were honestly of interest t me. After her latest message about an upcoming event, I couldn't understand why I was receiving her message. Naturally I tried to see if she was one of my Facebook friends, but of course Facebook's <expletive deleted> brokenness didn't give me that answer:

I checked my Facebook Groups, too, to see if I had subscribed to any group that Mari coordinated. No luck there. So having no clue why I was receiving these messages, I sent her a Facebook message asking to please remove me from her distribution list, as it seemed to me that somehow I had wound up on some kind of list or group inside of Facebook.

Now, I'm glad I was polite, since my message to her wound up as a screen capture in her blog post today.... (goes back to my mantra "Never put online anything you wouldn't want to appear on the front page of the New York Times.")

She wrote back a polite reply, but as she notes in her post, there is no easy way to do what I requested inside of Facebook. There is no way to "Block Event Invitations from this person" or "Unsubscribe". You can, of course, "un-friend" the person, but what if you don't want to go that far? What if you only want to stop receiving their event invitations in your inbox? (And what if, as far as you can tell, they aren't one of your friends?)

Mari says:

With all due respect to Dan, I’m sure he doesn’t know if he had just RSVP’d NO or clicked the Remove from My Events link, he would not receive any further emails.

Actually, I did know this, but it only solves the issue for that particular event. If I RSVP NO or remove the event, I will not receive any more email notices about that event... but in my case, because I couldn't figure out why I was getting these email invites in the first place, I wanted to not receive any further email messages about any events. (Which sounds harsh, but keep in mind I didn't understand why I was getting these... see below...)

Mari's absolutely right that a "Block Event Invitations from this person" feature is necessary. If you have someone who you would like to keep as a contact in Facebook, but you are just tired of getting their event invites, you should be able to block their event invites, just as you can block application invites from a user.

She also suggests to organizers to create a "DO NOT INVITE" list, although I would suggest this should perhaps go the other way... create an "INVITE" list to which you add people - and then remove the ones who no longer want to receive your invitations. That might make it easier when you are creating an event invite.

MYSTERY SOLVED

Now I did figure out why I was receiving Mari's invites. It's simple, really...

She is one of my Facebook "friends"!

Yes, indeed, even though a search of my Friends in Facebook tells me "You have no friends named "mari smith".", there she was in the S's when I manually paged through all my Facebook friends.

So that's why I was receiving her event invites... because I had allowed her to do so... by at some point approving her friend request.

As I mentioned above, as far as I can recall, Mari and I have never met or interacted online. (Apologies, Mari, if we have and I simply don't remember.) I'm also very definitely NOT one to simply approve a friend request. I usually don't approve one unless: 1) I actually know the person; or 2) some combination of the following: a) when I look at their profile they look like someone interesting for me to follow; b) they write a very compelling personal message in their friend request; and c) they are also someone who is connected to a number of other people I know.

So at some point in the past something caused me to approve her friendship request. Perhaps it was last year when I was doing a lot more with Facebook and was actually following a great number of people through their status updates, the mini-feed and such. I don't know, but in any event, there was no mystery involved here (other than why Facebook doesn't make it easy to find people listed in your own Friends list!)....

FACEBOOK, CAN YOU FIX THIS, PLEASE?

A couple of lessons out of this for me:

1. DON'T RELY ON FACEBOOK'S SEARCH - If you want to find out if someone is a friend on Facebook, click on Friends on the top of the page, then the "Everyone" tab, and then manually page through your friends list (alphabetically sorted by last name).

2. FACEBOOK NEEDS A "BLOCK EVENT INVITATIONS" ACTION - I agree with Mari that this action would great to have for the times when you don't want to completely remove someone as a friend but you do want to stop receiving their event invitations. (Although I think that an email exchange like Mari and I had is also a great step because otherwise the organizer may still think you were invited and not understand why you haven't responded.)

What do you think? Does Facebook need this functionality?

P.S. And my apologies, Mari, for not realizing that we were connected on Facebook...

Technorati Tags: facebook

Calling all developers - Social Dev Camp East - May 10th, 2008 - Baltimore

If you are developing applications in the social media / social networking / web 2.0 space, you should know about Social Dev Camp East, coming up on May 10, 2008, in Baltimore. Some info is in PBWiki, although most of the activity is happening on the Facebook event page. It looks like some great topics and events and given that Dave Troy is one of the organizers, I expect it should be good. Dave's the guy behind Twittervision and several other sites and is also the one who put the open source Asterisk PBX running on top of a Roomba robotic vacuum cleaner (seriously... "Press 1 to start sucking"!).

On the wiki there are already a bunch of folks signed up and I look forward to hearing about what happens. (I won't be able to attend due to other commitments.)

Technorati Tags: socialdevcamp, applications, socialmedia, socialsoftware, facebook, facebook platform, development, programming, barcamp

Stanford's lessons - and using Facebook to teach application development

Interesting piece out of Read/Write Web: What Standford Learned Building Facebook Apps. Here's the intro:

Dr. BJ Fogg and Dave McClure taught a class last semester at Stanford on Building Facebook Applications. In 10 weeks, the 80 students had created 50+ applications and in total had over 20 Million installs - with 5 having more than 1 million users.

For the lessons, you need to read the article, but I was more intrigued by what they did in the class. One of the challenges for an instructor is always to "engage" your students and make the class both interesting and relevant. To make the students want to do even more and learn further. To make whatever you are doing "real" so that it applies to the students' lives.

To that end, what a great way to use Facebook to teach application development! The students:

1. Can very easily see their end result (their app) in usage;
2. Can compete with each other to see whose app gets more usage (which may drive further development/innovation);
3. Can get real feedback from users outside their regular sphere (i.e. "regular" Facebook users not just Stanford students);
4. Gain excellent experience and job skills for post-college employment;
5. Potentially get job offers now if their app is cool enough;
6. Learn all the other skills outside of just programming, such as metrics, marketing, customer interaction, etc.

Now I don't know how the class actually went... and I imagine that there are other colleges/universities doing this... it just was the first time I have ever thought about the potential of using Facebook in this way. How very cool!

Technorati Tags: application platforms, applications, facebook, facebook platform, standford, teaching, education

Seeing Obama ads in Facebook, with VT primary tomorrow...

Given that the presidential primary here in Vermont is happening tomorrow[1], we've naturally been subjected to a heavy dosage of advertising in all mass media. I was, though, rather amused to see ads for Sen. Barack Obama appearing on my Facebook page when I was visiting the site today (see image to right). I haven't seen any ads for Sen. Hillary Clinton, but perhaps this is because, according to TechPresident.com, the Clinton campaign is apparently NOT running any web advertisements! Seems a bit odd in this day and age, but given the degree of expertise within the Clinton campaign I would have to think they have their reasons for doing this. (I would also note that TechPresident was trying to reach the Clinton campaign but had not done so before running their article.

In any event, I thought it was great to see a presidential campaign using a site like Facebook to send out messages. Because I've provided demographic data in my Facebook account they can obviously run very targeted campaigns (such as "all residents in Vermont").

By the way, if you haven't checked out TechPresident.com, I've found it a very useful site to stay up with what all of the various campaigns are doing with regard to technology, social networks, etc.

[1] Yes, we in VT are one of the two "other" states (the other one being Rhode Island) who are voting tomorrow in addition to Ohio and Texas. However, due to the tiny number of delegates we have we don't get much mention and in fact neither Clinton nor Obama have visited VT.

MySpace enters the "application platform wars" against Facebook

So today MySpace squares off against Facebook with the release of the MySpace Developer Platform. One of the key features of the "MDP" is that it is supporting the OpenSocial initiative and has a lengthy page explaining the interaction between MySpace an OpenSocial. They also provide some nice tutorials starting with (of course!) a "Hello World" and then getting right into creating an OpenSocial application.

It's intriguing to me that MySpace is not launching this with any existing high profile apps. It's really just providing a box of parts and saying... "here, have fun, go nuts!"

In fact, serious application deployment is being put on hold for a one-month period while developers try out the platform. Apps are limited to being installed by 10 users during this one-month development period, which, as other sites are mentioning, has the effect of "leveling the playing field" and giving all developers, large and small, a chance to work with the platform before it goes "live" and mass deployment of applications to MySpace's hundreds of millions of users can begin.

It will indeed be very interesting to see what developers actually do with all of those parts and what applications emerge. We'll have a clearer picture in a month, eh?

More coverage on the announcement that I found useful:

• Mashable: MySpace Developer Platform Launches; Levels the Playing Field for App Builders
• Read/Write Web: MySpace Platform Aims to Pick Up Where Facebook Left Off
• TechCruch: MySpace Developer Platform Goes Live (Sorta)
• ZD Net: MySpace Developer Platform launches (for a quick summary)

(Now, the question for me personally is this... will this be enough incentive for me to actually pay attention to my long-neglected MySpace profile? Hmmmm.... )

Technorati Tags: apis, applications, opensocial, myspace, facebook, myspace developers platform, platforms

May the walls start to come down... Facebook joins with Google and Plaxo in joining Dataportability.org

As I've written about in the past, I continue to remain concerned that social networks are really just "walled gardens" that are isolated from each other. Late last week, Robert Scoble getting temporarily kicked out of Facebook brought the attention of many of us to "DataPortability.org" and its "dataportability-public" Google Group. Now, today brings word that Facebook, who has usually been a holdout in "open" announcements to date (like OpenSocial) will be joining in to the Dataportability.org project. The news can be found here:

• Particls Blog: "Individuals from Plaxo, Google and Facebook join DataPortability.org Workgroup"
• Read/Write Web: "Bombshell: Google and Facebook Join DataPortability.org"
• TechCrunch: "Facebook, Google And Plaxo Join The DataPortability Workgroup"

The news is outstanding, really, for those of us who want this kind of data portability. To have basically all the major players working together will be excellent. It would, indeed, be great to have the walls start coming down...

The devil, of course, lies in the details... time will tell whether true actions will emerge out of the DataPortability.org initiative.

Still, it's a great way to start - and I've definitely joined the GoogleGroup mailing list to join in the evolution. Let's see if the walls can shake a bit, eh?

Technorati Tags: facebook, dataportability.org, dataportability, data portability, social network portability, social networks, social media, social networking, google, plaxo

LinkedIn also releases their application platform (or at least talks about it more)

I've been too busy to comment on LinkedIn's announcement of their "Intelligent Application Platform" but there are certainly tons of others who have (see also here). Some of the posts I found most interesting were at VentureBeat and GigaOm.

LinkedIn, naturally, had a blog post with an introductory video that explains the platform.

While Facebook obviously has an enormous lead in terms of developers, it will be interesting to see what traction Linked does or does not gain. They indicate they will be supporting OpenSocial, which will allow developers to make apps that run in other OpenSocial-compliant social networks as well. They also have a strong user base within the business/professional community (include me) which could be quite attractive to developers as well.

In any event, I look forward to watching the announcements from LinkedIn as they roll out this developer program over the next few months.

Technorati Tags: facebook, linkedin, applications, apis, platforms

Twitter is Terrific for Thieves - The Dark Side of Status Updates

Consider these posts from a fictional Twitterer:

Man, this 60-inch plasma display looks totally awesome on our living room wall!
@<user>, what's even better is the incredible sound coming through our Bose home theater system - it so totally rocks!

And some time later, this partial exchange:

@<user2> - take <highway> to <city>. Get off at exit 9 for Main Street.
@<user2> - coming down Main St take the 2nd left onto North St. 3rd house on right. Blue with yellow shutters. Can't miss it.

And some more time later, this on a Friday:

Goodbye fellow twitterers! We are all going away to <city far away> for the long weekend. See you on Tuesday!

Could it get any better for a thief?

They have been given a juicy target... they have been given precise location (which often is also included in the user's profile- or enough is there that a thief could use other public information such as phone directories to get an address)... and they have been given a window of opportunity in which they know no one will be home. What more do they need? Well, maybe a tweet like this:

Darn. Alarm system is offline and company says they can't repair it until next week.

And I've seen people tweet things along those lines - and I've had to wonder what people are thinking.

Or perhaps they aren't really "thinking"... caught up in the fun that Twitter, Jaiku, Pownce and Facebook status updates can provide, it's easy to just post whatever random thoughts come into your brain. Without thinking of whether or not there are ramifications for the safety of themselves or their property.

Now the same can be said for blogging. I've certainly seen people blog all sorts of details about their activities that, in my opinion, they probably shouldn't. But "status updates" are so immediate... more like IM messages, except for this wee minor detail that they are potentially searchable via Google and easy to find publicly (depending upon the service).

How great is this for thieves? If I'm a smart thief all I need to do is do some searching for Twitterers (or users of another service) in a given area, aggregate their RSS feeds and just keep watching and reading for a while. Sooner or later I'll be able to identify some targets and then I really just need to wait for some window of opportunity to appear. If I'm a smarter thief I probably aggregate blog feeds and other information as well.

Of course, the reality is that if a thief is this smart, he or she is probably involved in much more potentially lucrative endeavors such as identity theft, phishing or other online criminal activities. Still, there is some potential for thieves and others to read your status updates and gain information that can help them know when they can target you or your property and what value might be there. I suppose I can summarize it as the pithy:

Think before you tweet!

Seriously, though, there are undoubtedly some "Status Safety Tips" or "Tips for Safe Twittering" that we can come up with. I'll offer some suggestions here:

• Do you really want the world to see all your updates? Twitter allows you to make it so that updates are only seen to those following you and that you have to request to receive updates. If I recall correctly, the default in Pownce is that a new post is only visible to your friends. Facebook keeps all of the status updates inside of its walled garden... unless, of course, you've done what I've done and put your Facebook status on your web page and/or had it go out to Twitter. You have the choice. Now the downside of keeping your updates private is that you lose out on the all the potential Googlejuice and other SEO/SEM goodness that comes with having your updates out there. You lose out on people finding you. On the other hand, it's probably a whole lot safer.
  
  It's a choice you have to make. My choice has been, for now anyway, to be very public with it all. I'm very deliberately using all these media as part of my own experimentation in online PR, personal branding, marketing, etc. But I've gone into it with my eyes wide open realizing that you need to be careful.
  
  
• Do you really want to post that your home is empty? I often use my twitter feed as an ongoing travelogue when I'm traveling to conferences, but readers may or may not have noticed that I typically don't post about travel when I'm NOT on business travel. I may post AFTER a trip "Just had a wonderful weekend in New Hampshire!, but I tend not to post about it before leaving. I do worry to a degree about my posts about travel in that it clearly states when I am not at home but my family is. However, I've made the personal decision that the benefit I gain through that communication about my travel far outweighs whatever small risk there might be to my family. Still, it is something to think about.
  
  
• Do you really want to post about that big expensive new toy you got? Sure, don't we all? That's half the fun of status updates. Posting about what we are passionate about and the cool things that intersect with our lives. Some of those may be expensive toys and we know that our geeky friends will love to hear about it. I do it. But the warning is to remember that if you are running with public status updates anyone can see them, including those who might not be friendly.

What other suggestions would you have?

At the end of the day, security is balancing act. Odds are that there probably isn't (yet) a ring of thieves in your neighborhood sitting there monitoring Twitter/Jaiku/Pownce, etc. Odds are that you can post about whatever you want very publicly and there will be no issue. The benefit you gain from engaging with your community... for developing those relationships... may far outweigh any safety risks.

But I do think it is something we need to think about. The amount of information we choose to share publicly is our choice. With every post, we make that choice whether we realize that we are doing so or not. I choose to be very public, but also do think about what I post. I know others who are more private with their information. It's a choice.

What is your choice?

Technorati Tags: facebook, jaiku, pownce, privacy, security, status, twitter

Privacy and Social Networks... a great video from the Privacy Commissioner of Canada

Thanks to a tweet from Donna Papacosta, I learned of this great video from the Privacy Commissioner of Canada called "Privacy and Social Networks":

The terms of service the speaker references is the hideous ToS of Facebook, which I discussed previously and continues to make me concerned about what information I upload into Facebook.

Technorati Tags: facebook, privacy, socialmedia, socialnetworking

Any Vermonters out there want to head up to FacebookCamp Montreal on Wednesday (Nov 7)?

Are there any readers of this blog in the Burlington, Vermont, area who want to head up to Facebook Camp Montreal on Wednesday? I'm planning to go and given that the event starts at 6pm (and goes to 10pm) I'm figuring to start driving up around 2 or 3pm to avoid rush hour. Normally it's only about a 1.5-2 hour drive, but I've always found the traffic in the late afternoon to be horrid in Montreal.

Anyway, if there are any Vermonters reading this who want to head up, I wouldn't mind the company. Please drop me an email or call (802-735-1624).

P.S. If you don't speak French, no worries... neither do I. (Outside of the 20 or so random words I picked up from living in Ottawa for 5 years.)

Technorati Tags: facebook, facebookplatform, facebookcamp

Still thinking about Google's Open Social... does it truly tear down the walls of social networks? Or just make widgets work across socnets?

Unless you have been under a rock for the past few days, you should by now be aware that Google released an API called OpenSocial. There is a new Google blog that had the announcement, which included this:

OpenSocial is a set of common APIs that will work on many different social websites, including MySpace, Hi5, Ning, orkut, and LinkedIn, among others. In addition, this allows developers to learn one API, then write a social application for any of those sites. Learn once, write anywhere, if you will. And because it's built on web standards like HTML and JavaScript, developers don't have to learn a custom programming language.

The list of OpenSocial partners is quite extensive... basically everyone in the social networking space except Facebook, but also including other companies such as Salesforce.com and Oracle. Having the big players like MySpace and LinkedIn is definitely key. Google has also provided a wealth of information:

• FAQ
• Articles (including tutorials to help get started)
• Documentation
• Developer's Forum

I find it all intriguing. There is a great amount of talk in the blogosphere about how this "tears down the walls" of social networks... and it does - in one aspect. It seems to me that this is really a direct shot at the Facebook Platform in that it gives application developers the ability to create applications that work across multiple networks. So from the point-of-view of a developer, this truly does open up the world of social networks. You can now write an app that is not just restricted to the confines of Facebook's walled garden, but instead can run in any of the other social networks out there (that support OpenSocial).

So it solves part of the problem out there in social networking... and it looks like quite a compelling way to do so. I'm certainly going to be reading the tutorials and experimenting with sample code.

But please let's remember that there are other issues with the walled nature of social networks. For instance:

• Why do I have to sign in with a different username and password to each of them? Why can't I just have a common (and secure) username/password that I use? (such as OpenID)
• Why do I have to recreate my friends list in each social network? (something the "social network portability" folks are looking at)

OpenSocial lets apps be created that work across multiple networks. I commend the folks behind it and supporting it. But let's please remember that it solves only one part of the overall "open" issue.

I need to really play with it more before I can comment further. In the meantime I'm capturing here a number of links related to OpenSocial that I have found useful:

• Marc Andreessen: Open Social: a new universe of social applications all over the web - and also a screencast and screenshots
• It’s Official: Google + MySpace = OpenSocial
• Facebook’s dilemma: To be OpenSocial or not to be
• Read/Write Web: OpenSocial: Three Big Concerns
• Read/Write Web: Confirmed: MySpace Joins Google's OpenSocial (includes link to video from Scoble)
• Wired: Salesforce and LinkedIn: OpenSocial Means Better Business-Centric Apps and Services

Stay tuned for more...

Technorati Tags: apis, applications, facebook, facebookplatform, google, opensocial, socialmedia, socialnetworking

Facebook event created for IABC Heritage Region Conference next week...

If any of you: 1) are attending the IABC Heritage Region Conference next Monday and Tuesday near Cincinnatti (it's actually in Kentucky); and 2) are a Facebook user, I have now created a Facebook event for the conference. Given that the conference is happening so soon, there's obviously not much pre-conference networking that can be done. Still, it will be interesting to see if IABC members in this region (northeastern US) are also Facebook users (and are going to the conference).

I'll be there... getting in late on Sunday (missing the opening reception at an acquarium that sounded rather nice!) and doing my "Podcasting 101" session on Tuesday. If you are an IABC member attending the conference, please do say hello!

Technorati Tags: conferences, facebook, podcasting, iabc, socialmedia

O'Reilly - Facebook apps aren't as hugely successful as some would like you to think!

Over on his O'Reilly Radar blog, Tim O'Reilly pierced a bit of the Facebook application hype with his post last Friday: "Good News, Bad News about Facebook Application Market: Long Tail Rules" where he notes this:

The good news has already been widely disseminated: there are nearly 5000 Facebook applications, and the top applications have tens of millions of installs and millions of active users. The bad news, alas, is in our report: 87% of the usage goes to only 84 applications! Only 45 applications have more than 100,000 active users.

He subsequently noted that he did mis-use the "Long Tail" term a bit... the story here really is that the "short head" is where all the action is. Tim is careful to note:

This doesn't mean that Facebook won't become an important platform for developers, just that a throwaway Facebook app is not the ticket to quick riches. Embracing the Facebook opportunity requires more than just optimism.

Translation - all of those out there hyping the Facebook platform as the greatest invention since sliced bread need to slow down a wee bit. The Facebook platform is very cool and is an evolving application platform. It's definitely a space that people need to pay attention to... and it very well may be a place where your application may be a runaway hit - but it may not bring the instant riches that your startup's business plan envisions. At least... not yet.

Good to see this kind of data emerging and I would expect that we'll start seeing similar reports emerging from the mainstream analyst houses. Kudos to O'Reilly for being the first one I've seen out there on the topic.

P.S. I should, of course, note that Tim's blog post references the report published by O'Reilly Research: "The Facebook Application Platform" which is available for purchase for $149.

Technorati Tags: applications, facebook, facebookplatform, oreilly, oreillyradar

Awakening to a "social media birthday"...

As has been commented on by others in this space, social media brings a new element to birthdays. Already, messages are appearing on my Facebook wall, and Skype contacts have been sending me birthday notes as well. (Helped to a degree by the fact that many of the folks so far are in Australia or Europe, so the day is already well underway for them.) It's quite nice, really... it definitely puts the "social" aspect in the media.

While I share Christopher Penn's concerns about privacy and giving away your birthdate, I will admit that today is my birthday. Because of those privacy concerns, I tend NOT to post the year of my birth, although that's not terribly hard to figure out due to the fact that there is already so much information online about me. I also seem to have included it in my Skype profile (was I required to do so?) and so my Skype contacts understand that this particular birthday is a bit more of a milestone than others. (Hint for the rest of you - I was actually born during a Star Trek episode during the original run of the original series. Trekkie's can figure it out from there... )

Thank you to all who have sent their greetings!

Technorati Tags: socialmedia

FacebookCamp Montreal - Wednesday, November 7, 2007

In the spirit of BarCamps and PodCamps, I was pleased to see that there will be a "FacebookCamp" up in Montreal, Quebec, on Wednesday, November 7, 2007. It's from 4:00pm into the evening and is for people interested in developing apps for Facebook. As I write this, there are 57 confirmed guests and 36 people who are "Maybe Attending"! If you are in the Montreal area and interested in developing apps for Facebook, do check it out:

• Facebook event
• Facebook group
• FacebookCamp Montreal wiki

I am in that "Maybe Attending" category myself. Montreal's only about 1.5-2 hours (and a border crossing) away, so I may shoot up the highway for the event.

Technorati Tags: facebook, applications, facebookcampmontreal

LinkedIn succumbs to the Facebook effect and adds a profile photo

One of the reasons some people have cited about going over to Facebook is that Facebook allows you to have a photo on your profile. LinkedIn always seemed to resist, with some people mentioning that it was more "professional" in that you weren't getting into seeing how people looked.

Whatever the past rationale, LinkedIn announced on their blog Thursday that users would be able to upload profile photos. The interface is pretty simple. In your "Accounts and Settings" area under "Profile Settings" there is a link for "My Profile Photo":

Add in a photo and you now have the option to display that photo to your contacts or to display it publicly:

The LinkedIn blog entry goes into more details. Personally, I'm quite glad to see it primarily because over time I find I've lost track of who some of my LinkedIn contacts are and it would be very nice to have a photo to remind myself of exactly who they are. Also, in a global namespace with people having similar names, it's nice to have the visual confirmation when searching that the profile belongs to the person you know. Now it will be interesting to see how quickly people do or do not upload photos.

Technorati Tags: facebook, linkedin, socialnetworking

Facebook brings the twin taboos of politics and religion into the workplace

Some time back I became a Facebook "friend" with someone I had known professionally for several years. I did not work with the person all that much, but had great respect for the person based on the several dealings I had had with them. However, now that we were "friends" I was almost immediately exposed to two pieces of information that they had included in their Facebook profile: political affiliation and religion. As it happened, this particular person's views were pretty much completely opposite to my own and before I could really think about it I experienced a deep knee-jerk reaction of "Oh, you're kidding, he/she is not really one of them?" For a brief moment, until my brain could re-engage, my respect for that person plummeted through the floor. A moment or two later, the rational side of my brain kicked in and reminded me that I had had a great amount of professional respect for the person 10 seconds before and nothing had changed that should have altered that. Still, there was that deep emotional response.

Politics? Religion? In the workplace? With professional colleagues? Huh?

At least here in North America, those are two topics that are generally taboo in the work environment. Verboten. In fact, in most areas you are not legally allowed to ask employees or potential employees about those topics. Within a work place there of course may be lunchroom discussions about recent politics and so you may learn of others viewpoints. Religion might come up, but again probably with people with whom you work closely.

But with customers? Or partners?

Never. At least in my experience.

And why should it come up, really? When you are buying a product/service from someone, or selling it to someone, what do politics or religion matter? (or gender or race?) If you are partnering with someone to deliver a service/product, again, why does it matter? What matters is whether both of you can work together and deliver the product/service - and presumably make some money through the deal.

Religion and politics should not matter in business dealings.

Now, of course, there are "business directories" that many churches offer trying to connect people within the church community, but that's a different matter as it is within that community and trying to help each out. There are also websites out there that can help you steer your business toward companies with similar views as yours. But in general, the political leanings and religious preference of a supplier or customer do not factor into the normal course of business.

Yet here we are in Facebook choosing (or not) to provide all that information to (potential) customers.

I recognize that there are a good number of folks out there who are apathetic about all things related to politics and/or religion. They don't care at all about what someone's religion is or what their politics are. I've met many. Often they say they don't care about religious/spiritual issues, haven't attended a church (or spiritual service) in years (or ever) and haven't voted in any elections. Religion and/or politics mean nothing to them and so they take no offense or don't even notice when someone states their political or religious preference.

Leaving the completely apathetic aside, though, most people have some opinion about politics and some view about religion/spirituality. The stronger those views, of course, the more deep the emotional reactions. A hard-core liberal in the US may have (or at least appreciate) a bumper sticker "Friends don't let friends vote Republican". A hard-core conservative may view all liberals as traitors and the source of all the country's problems. A strong "born again" Christian may see that the problems of the world are because people have not accepted Jesus Christ as their lord and savior and need to do so. A strong atheist may see that the problems of the world are because of the very existence of religion and that it is the root of all evil. These are deeply-ingrained views:

Politics and religion are part of our core identity that helps form who we define ourselves to be.

When that part of our identity is confronted by a polar opposite, we naturally react. Conservative Christians will have second thoughts about atheists, and atheists will have second thoughts about conservative Christians. Ultra-liberal Democrats will instinctively distrust ultra-conservative Republicans - and vice-versa. It's just part and parcel of being human and building these beliefs into your identity.

Within the work environment, though, these twin areas of politics and religion have not been part of normal discourse... but yet, if you choose to fill out those fields in Facebook, they are suddenly exposed to all your "friends".

It works the other way, of course. Some time back I added another "friend" whose politics and religion closely aligned with me. Again, without any rational thinking, the thought popped into my brain "Oh, he/she's that. No wonder why we got along so well." In the mass of people out there, we seek out those communities of like-minded people... those affinities that we can use to build stronger connections.

Which is why having fields for politics and religion make so much sense for Facebook's original audience of college students. You are about to land in a campus of 10,000 people, of whom you know basically no one. How do you find new people? How do you find potential friends? Searching on "interests" is one way... but searching on political views or religion is another great way. Odds are that if they claim a similar religious view (or upbringing), they probably have a similar world view to yours. Likewise if they have similar political leanings, you probably have more in common upon which to potentially build a friendship. It makes total sense in that environment. Likewise, if Facebook is just used among your "friends", odds are that they probably already know these views about you. But today we are overloading the term "friend" and so now it encompasses true "friends", family... and business contacts.

So it's one thing to share political/religious info with friends, family and classmates, but in business? I don't know... on the one hand there is the greater "transparency" and the chance to make connections with other people. On the other hand, there is the strong chance of potentially alienating others.

In any event, the fields are there in your Facebook profile if you choose to fill them out (and many people seem to during the process of signing up). Of course, you are limited to the choices that Facebook provides for politics. They don't offer the "It's Complicated" choice that they have for relationships, which would be quite useful. The "Religious Views" field is free text entry, so you can really write whatever you want there. It seems to me that you really have four choices:

1. Leave them blank - probably the safest choice, but potentially then losing out on some networking possibilities.
2. Enter generic choices - you could be safe and choose "Moderate" and write in something vague for a religion.
3. Fill out only one - you'll see I have a political entry but not a religious entry.
4. Fill them both out - embrace full transparency and let the world know (or at least your "friends") your affiliations and beliefs.

To me this is just yet another one of those areas where we don't fully understand the full impact of the profiles of Facebook and, in fairness, all the other social networking services. In the rush to join these services, we just fill out all sorts of information, not necessarily taking the time to think about the potential impact exposing that information may have.

What do you think? If you are a Facebook user, have you filled out those two fields? Do you think people should in an effort to be more transparent? Do you think we understand the full ramifications of exposing information like this? (Or do you think the issue I raise here is really not an issue?)

Technorati Tags: culture, facebook, politics, religion

Facebook brings the twin taboos of politics and religion into the workplace

Some time back I became a Facebook "friend" with someone I had known professionally for several years. I did not work with the person all that much, but had great respect for the person based on the several dealings I had had with them. However, now that we were "friends" I was almost immediately exposed to two pieces of information that they had included in their Facebook profile: political affiliation and religion. As it happened, this particular person's views were pretty much completely opposite to my own and before I could really think about it I experienced a deep knee-jerk reaction of "Oh, you're kidding, he/she is not really one of them?" For a brief moment, until my brain could re-engage, my respect for that person plummeted through the floor. A moment or two later, the rational side of my brain kicked in and reminded me that I had had a great amount of professional respect for the person 10 seconds before and nothing had changed that should have altered that. Still, there was that deep emotional response.

Politics? Religion? In the workplace? With professional colleagues? Huh?

At least here in North America, those are two topics that are generally taboo in the work environment. Verboten. In fact, in most areas you are not legally allowed to ask employees or potential employees about those topics. Within a work place there of course may be lunchroom discussions about recent politics and so you may learn of others viewpoints. Religion might come up, but again probably with people with whom you work closely.

But with customers? Or partners?

Never. At least in my experience.

And why should it come up, really? When you are buying a product/service from someone, or selling it to someone, what do politics or religion matter? (or gender or race?) If you are partnering with someone to deliver a service/product, again, why does it matter? What matters is whether both of you can work together and deliver the product/service - and presumably make some money through the deal.

Religion and politics should not matter in business dealings.

Now, of course, there are "business directories" that many churches offer trying to connect people within the church community, but that's a different matter as it is within that community and trying to help each out. There are also websites out there that can help you steer your business toward companies with similar views as yours. But in general, the political leanings and religious preference of a supplier or customer do not factor into the normal course of business.

Yet here we are in Facebook choosing (or not) to provide all that information to (potential) customers.

I recognize that there are a good number of folks out there who are apathetic about all things related to politics and/or religion. They don't care at all about what someone's religion is or what their politics are. I've met many. Often they say they don't care about religious/spiritual issues, haven't attended a church (or spiritual service) in years (or ever) and haven't voted in any elections. Religion and/or politics mean nothing to them and so they take no offense or don't even notice when someone states their political or religious preference.

Leaving the completely apathetic aside, though, most people have some opinion about politics and some view about religion/spirituality. The stronger those views, of course, the more deep the emotional reactions. A hard-core liberal in the US may have (or at least appreciate) a bumper sticker "Friends don't let friends vote Republican". A hard-core conservative may view all liberals as traitors and the source of all the country's problems. A strong "born again" Christian may see that the problems of the world are because people have not accepted Jesus Christ as their lord and savior and need to do so. A strong atheist may see that the problems of the world are because of the very existence of religion and that it is the root of all evil. These are deeply-ingrained views:

Politics and religion are part of our core identity that helps form who we define ourselves to be.

When that part of our identity is confronted by a polar opposite, we naturally react. Conservative Christians will have second thoughts about atheists, and atheists will have second thoughts about conservative Christians. Ultra-liberal Democrats will instinctively distrust ultra-conservative Republicans - and vice-versa. It's just part and parcel of being human and building these beliefs into your identity.

Within the work environment, though, these twin areas of politics and religion have not been part of normal discourse... but yet, if you choose to fill out those fields in Facebook, they are suddenly exposed to all your "friends".

It works the other way, of course. Some time back I added another "friend" whose politics and religion closely aligned with me. Again, without any rational thinking, the thought popped into my brain "Oh, he/she's that. No wonder why we got along so well." In the mass of people out there, we seek out those communities of like-minded people... those affinities that we can use to build stronger connections.

Which is why having fields for politics and religion make so much sense for Facebook's original audience of college students. You are about to land in a campus of 10,000 people, of whom you know basically no one. How do you find new people? How do you find potential friends? Searching on "interests" is one way... but searching on political views or religion is another great way. Odds are that if they claim a similar religious view (or upbringing), they probably have a similar world view to yours. Likewise if they have similar political leanings, you probably have more in common upon which to potentially build a friendship. It makes total sense in that environment. Likewise, if Facebook is just used among your "friends", odds are that they probably already know these views about you. But today we are overloading the term "friend" and so now it encompasses true "friends", family... and business contacts.

So it's one thing to share political/religious info with friends, family and classmates, but in business? I don't know... on the one hand there is the greater "transparency" and the chance to make connections with other people. On the other hand, there is the strong chance of potentially alienating others.

In any event, the fields are there in your Facebook profile if you choose to fill them out (and many people seem to during the process of signing up). Of course, you are limited to the choices that Facebook provides for politics. They don't offer the "It's Complicated" choice that they have for relationships, which would be quite useful. The "Religious Views" field is free text entry, so you can really write whatever you want there. It seems to me that you really have four choices:

1. Leave them blank - probably the safest choice, but potentially then losing out on some networking possibilities.
2. Enter generic choices - you could be safe and choose "Moderate" and write in something vague for a religion.
3. Fill out only one - you'll see I have a political entry but not a religious entry.
4. Fill them both out - embrace full transparency and let the world know (or at least your "friends") your affiliations and beliefs.

To me this is just yet another one of those areas where we don't fully understand the full impact of the profiles of Facebook and, in fairness, all the other social networking services. In the rush to join these services, we just fill out all sorts of information, not necessarily taking the time to think about the potential impact exposing that information may have.

What do you think? If you are a Facebook user, have you filled out those two fields? Do you think people should in an effort to be more transparent? Do you think we understand the full ramifications of exposing information like this? (Or do you think the issue I raise here is really not an issue?)

Technorati Tags: culture, facebook, politics, religion

"Hi, my name is Dan. I am a screen shot addict."

I had to laugh when I saw in my Facebook News Feed that several of my friends had joined a new Facebook group "I am a screen shot addict" (You must be a Facebook member to see the group). I laughed a bit more when I saw Betsy Weber's blog post which in turn pointed me to the creator of the Facebook group, Bryan Eisenberg, and his post "Confessions of a Screen Shot Addict".

You see, I am a screen shot addict. Always have been. Probably largely because I used to write a lot of courseware related to computer programs and so naturally I needed to illustrate those documents with screenshots. Now, I take screenshots galore for these blogs. I just like illustrating my articles with graphics... and screen shots are one of the best ways to do that.

On my Windows laptop, I was using TechSmith's SnagIt and loving it. I was also using TechSmith's Jing Project for quick screen shots that I wanted to reference in, typically, an IM conversation. Now that I'm on the Mac, I've got a wonderful built in utility (I love Shift+Ctrl+Cmd+4) and I'm also checking out Jing for the Mac.

So yes, I love screenshots... if you do, too, and are a Facebook user, feel free to "join the group".

Technorati Tags: facebook, bryan eisenberg, screencaptures, screenshots

Why is Facebook's Application Directory Search so incredibly broken?

One of the greatest bits of buzz around Facebook these days is the application APIs, the "Facebook Platform".  It's also one of the most frustrating aspects from a user perspective.  Very often I'll see on my News Feed that someone installed an application and I'll think to myself that I should check out that app.  However, if I don't do it right at that precise moment, well, the odds are that I won't... because it seems next to impossible to find apps in the directory!

Has anyone else been able to successfully use the "search" feature in Facebook's Application Directory?

Take today... I saw on my Facebook News Feed at some point in the day that someone I know had installed the "Appsaholic" application.  Subsequently in a lunchtime conversation I wound up learning about this app enough that I got curious.  So I went to my Applications page inside my Facebook account and entered "Appsaholic" in the search box.  This was the result (click on image for larger version):

Oops.  I tried several other variations on the name to no avail.  Finally, I just went to Google and searched on "facebook apps-a-holic" which brought me to this article which gave me the application URL inside of Facebook.

Crazy.

Why should I have to go outside of Facebook in order to find an application? 

Unfortunately, this has been my experience several times on different days, and I find it a bit of a concern.  So much of developing an app for Facebook is about being found.  Obviously the viral path through newsfeeds is one way to be found, but the application directory is an obvious one.  If you make it to one of the provided lists, you'll be found, but searching should work, one would think.

Have others experienced this problem?

(Now I would note that I couldn't find any of the applications I've already installed when I searched in the directory - perhaps the issue is that the search engine is down itself.  If so, it would be best for Facebook to put up a statement that the search engine is having problems rather than just saying "No applications found.")

Technorati tags: facebook, facebook platform, search, facebook applications

Facebook fuels student revolt (and eventual victory) over new logo for Middlebury College

Seems the students didn't quite like the new logo their school came up with - and took to Facebook to mount a campaign against it! Today's Burlington (Vermont) Free Press ran this article: "Middlebury Facebook revolt contributes to college logo revision".  Unfortunately, the online version of the article doesn't include the graphics, (Huh?  Free Press staff - why couldn't you put the logos there?) but the dead tree version that I got this morning did... and I can see the students concerns.  The new logo, shown on the right, is much more "corporate" and looks like something more Canadian.  But I'm getting ahead of myself... here's the background from the article:

In fall 2006, as they began to plan for a major fund-raising drive, college officials thought about coming up with a new logo. A review committee was formed, 10 design firms were considered, three finalists were interviewed, and the winner -- the New York firm of Chermayeff & Geismar, which boasts a portfolio of prominent corporate and university brands -- set to work.

The ultimate design -- a stylized double leaf outline, reminiscent of maple -- went through customary reviews. Like any proposed logo, it drew different reactions -- some people liked it, some didn't, but on balance the reaction was favorable, said Mike McKenna, the college vice president for communications who spearheaded the process.

This summer, as college officials were getting ready to order new stationery for the next academic year, the new logo was "unveiled" to the campus community. What happened next took McKenna and just about everyone else by surprise.

Students weren't very happy when the new logo appeared on the website and so they started a Facebook group called "Just Say No to the Middlebury Logo".  From the article:

Hundreds signed on to register their scornful, amusing comments about the double leaf. Some complained it looked too corporate, others that it was too much like Canada's national symbol, or even that it evoked a marijuana leaf.

At least three students designed T-shirts parodying the logo, and Franco, who also runs her own blog, posted their images on July 11. Two played off the Canadian motif, and one -- designed by student Alex Benepe, who helped Franco with the Facebook project -- worked the logo's "M" into an entirely new college insignia, "LaMe."

Benepe said Franco's creation "grew faster than any Facebook group I've seen."

"In seven days, 777 people joined," Franco said. That was about the time, she said, when the college administration changed course and withdrew the new logo for general use.

McKenna, who already had received plenty of feedback on the logo, said he hadn't expected the Facebook reaction or the numbers. Roughly one-third of the college's students signed on -- in summertime, no less.

So one-third of the college's students joined the group - in the summer! 

In the end, the Middlebury administration went back and revised the existing logo a bit. As the article says:

While the college administration would not make policy based simply on people going online to express their opinions, McKenna said, the opposition couldn't be ignored, either. What he found heartening, he said, was the strength of students' institutional commitment, along with the favorable comments about the college's traditional, Latin seal.

The college decided to keep using a slightly updated version of the school's traditional "latin seal-style" logo on stationary, official documents, etc.  The new logo will be used on their 5-year fund-raising campaign that is going to reach out to the wider community.  (More information is available in Middlebury's page on their Graphic Identity System and specifically their "About the process page".)

Kudos to the Middlebury administration for working with the students - and somehow I expect we'll see more of these type of stories coming out of Facebook activity!

Technorati tags: facebook, middlebury college, middlebury, vermont

Garrett Smith launches "Facebook Observer" web site...

After stumbling upon the "Facebook Observer" site the other day, I was pleased to learn (from the About page) that the author was none other than Garrett Smith, who I have known in other contexts from his blog, "Smith on VoIP".  He seems to have launched the site in early August, but I just noticed it recently.  So far he seems to have some good articles up there and indicates that he has the goal of  "becoming the destination for marketers and businesses in general to learn about how they can use Facebook for their own gain." 

Technorati tags: facebook, garrett smith, facebook observer

Facebook - Why can't I schedule an event more than 2 months out? (Earth to Facebook: We're not all students who only think a few days or weeks ahead!)

Here I was at the end of the work day just tying up a few loose ends.  One of the things I had on my list was to set up a Facebook event for O'Reilly's Emerging Telephony conference, upon whose program committee I sit.  Given that we're seeking speaking proposals, I thought that experimenting with Facebook might be an interesting way to get the word out within the tech crowd using Facebook.  However, I couldn't create an event for the ETel conference.  Why not?

Because Facebook won't let me create an event past October 2007!

Huh?

The conference is on March 3-4, 2008, and so I wondered if I was in trouble when I went to create an event and saw only this:

What's missing?  (click for a larger image)  Yes, indeed... there's no year in the start or end time.  Clue #1 that something was wrong.  My immediate reaction was that I was annoyingly going to have to click through the calendar "next" buttons to get to the right month.  So I started doing this and found, as you can see in the picture below, that Facebook events can't be set later than October 2007!

At least, I could find no way to do so.  If someone else can, please do let me know.

Now, even though it was most of 20 years ago, I do remember life as a college student and I do recall that my "event horizon" for planning was really only the next few days or weeks.  If it was farther out, it simply never entered my brain.  I'd worry about that sometime later... after the next round of projects or papers were due.  So perhaps Facebook is based on that mindset... if it's not within the next 2 or 3 months, you don't care!  (And I realize that certainly not all students fit into this stereotype and that there are some students who plan farther ahead.)

However, if Facebook does seriously want to get into the business space, they definitely do need to open up this window a bit more.  I've got conferences and events I know I'm going to 6months... 12 months out.  Wouldn't it be great to be able to network with other people planning to go to those conferences farther in advance?  Or if you are an organizer, wouldn't it be great to be able to promote the event within Facebook?

Technorati tags: facebook

Facebook: All your email belongs to us! (Inside of the walled garden... and do your recipients know that the Facebook ToS lets them do anything they want with your email?)

Back in May, when I wrote my "Facebook is a walled garden" post, I wrote this:

We've gone from the closed communities of email services to the complete openness of Internet e-mail and now seem to be returning back to those gated communities, with email/SMS helping keep us aware of updates. 

I was talking at the time how Facebook let you only send messages to those within Facebook.

Well, today Facebook took an interesting step.  As noted as in the Facebook blog, you can now send email to people on the outside who don't have Facebook accounts:

If you're like most people, you may have a few stubborn friends who haven't joined Facebook…yet. This can make reaching friends complicated—there are some friends you can send a Facebook message, and others you have to email. Not anymore. Now, when you're writing messages, you can send the message to people on Facebook, and to people not on Facebook.

Now you can enter a friend's email address into the To: line when you send a message or share an album, and Facebook will email them the message. Your friends will be able to reply without signing up, and they will be able to see content you share with them. Keep in mind that all rules of privacy still apply; some Facebook content that you share (photos, groups, notes, etc.) won't be visible to your friend.

It does work, as you can see in the screenshot below (click for a larger image):

Over in my Gmail account, it comes out like this (click for a larger image):

The sending email address shown for my Facebook message is: "notification+o46j2=yc@facebookmail.com".  I can reply back and the reply winds up in my Facebook inbox.

On the one hand, I applaud Facebook for allowing communication to go out through the walls and come back in.  However, two points:

1. You still can't forward messages from inside Facebook out to external recipients. Perhaps this is part of the whole "privacy" thing, but there are times when it would be great to get something from inside out to someone on the outside; and

2. Do your external recipients realize that anything they send in becomes the property of Facebook?  The Facebook Terms of Service are still dated as of May 24th, and that's well before I posted my note/warning about all your content belonging to Facebook.  Now I'm not sure what Facebook would realistically ever do with all the content... but I think it's fair to be sure that people on the outside realize that whatever they send in becomes the property of Facebook to do with it whatever they want (if they so chose).

 The Facebook blog entry concluded with this:

As we continue to make Facebook more useful for everyone, these changes mean that there's no need to switch between Facebook and email for your daily communication needs.

Translation:  Just use Facebook as your portal for everything.  No need to go out to those pesky Gmail, Hotmail, AOL accounts...

Luke, a Facebook engineer, is never using email again. Ever.

 But, of course, Luke is using email... just email inside of Facebook.  We've gone from walled gardens of email to open standards and then back into walled gardens of email.  Strange world we're in.

Technorati tags: facebook, social networking, walled gardens, email, webmail

Identitude - using your Facebook account for an OpenID identity!

What if you could use your Facebook login as a source for an OpenID identity?  Courtesy of a Facebook status update by Aswath Rao, I learned of Identitude, which does exactly that.

Here's how it works.  First, within the walls of Facebook, you add the Identitude Facebook application to your profile.  After you do that, you claim your OpenID URL essentially as you would with any other identity provider. For instance, my Identitude OpenID identity is:

http://danyork.identitu.de

(Note that the URL ending in ".de" (Germany) looked strange to me until I realized you are supposed to read the whole URL similar to "del.icio.us".)

So now, when I go to any site that allows me to login via Open ID (directories here, here and here), I simply enter my Identitude URL as my user name.  Identitude, as the Identity Provider, then checks with Facebook to see if I have approved sharing my identity with this site.  Assuming I'm logged into Facebook already, I'll then get this screen below (when I went to Twitterfeed.com and logged in with my OpenID):