Understanding Facebook
Generally speaking—and I know I’m making a big generality here—I think people fall into two camps regarding Facebook: either they don’t get it, or they get it and love it.
I keep seeing it pop up all over the place. Danah Boyd made a post about it, which Scoble responded to far more completely and eloquently than I could have:
“But what I don’t understand is why so much of the tech crowd who lament Walled Gardens worship Facebook.” Because there isn’t anything better. It’s like why we are so gaga over the iPhone. The iPhone is locked up tight and doesn’t let us play. But it is so superior to the alternatives that we’ll put up with all the walls. I’ve seen this play out before, though. Remember in 1989? Apple had the Macintosh II and was way ahead of any other platform. They ended up with, what, five percent market share because a more open platform steamrolled over them. It’s why I watch Plaxo so closely and keep cheering them on.
Go check out the full post though, this is only a taste. I might also add that, while there are a lot of valid complaints and concerns about how Facebook is set up, the FB team has so far shown a knack for listening to good advice when it surfaces in the community.
I’ll be surprised if they don’t continue to do so.
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{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }
One “feature” (if you can call it that) of the API is… it can be cloned. It’s really not very proprietary in turns of concepts. Friends, groups, notifications etc. — these are things that all the networks support in one fashion on another. The API is simple & straightforward enough that there’s no reason MySpace et al can’t also support it. That’s essentially what happened with the blogger API.
I hope the other networks will take this opportunity to help Facebook app developers feel a little more confident that they won’t someday get shut out down the road. If there are multiple networks competing on the same protocols, Facebook will have a strong incentive not to go all evil empire-y on us.
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