An open letter to Social Networks
To all concerned....
Like so many on this curious thing we call the Internet, I use Social networking. They are handy tools to interact with friends from the comfort of my home. The only problem is this. I have friends who are on Bebo, Facebook and Myspace, and very few of them want to switch from their current one.
So, what am I talking to you for? Well, my current situation is not convenient. Where thousands choose one Social network, I, along with thousands more, cannot. I also do not want to go zipping back and forth, tending to each page individually. This takes time which I cannot give.
I am not alone in this situation, and sure, you would want competition, but this competition is at the expense of your users! Not everyone is willing to choose. Bebo has Great usability, Facebook is clean, open and flexible, and myspace can support HTML, but your users need something more...
I propose that sometime in the future, I (or indeed someone else) will develop an application/widget to link all the sites together, and allow interactivity between the two. You must be aware that disgrantled users DO have the power to do this. The only question is therefore who, and when.
yours sinserly
Shedtroll Amaranthius Nightwish, Blogger...
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Comments
My Virb, mySpace, and Friendster accounts lay pretty dormant right now. But I know people still use those services, so it would be good if I could keep them updated by just changing details in my Facebook.
Everything 'Web 2.0' needs to be integrated; Flickr with Viddler; JTV with Wordpress, Vox with all other blogging services.
As you said, each service wouldn't want to link themselves with a competing site, but if your service is good people will stay.
For example: I like to view Wordpress and Vox blogs most — Blogger is kind of boring if the blog creator doesn't change the design; Live Journal is atrocious! — but some people won't even care, and just pay attention to the text at hand. There's also the person who is writing the blog; using the service most. I like the control I have in Wordpress. Some people may like Typepad more.
What I'm getting at is the viewer and the creator can be different people; people like different things. Why should my blog readers have to put up with a Blogger blog if they don't like it? They should be able to view the same thing (and comment; using their login — comments cross post back to ALL blogs) on a different service.
Tubemogul is doing this with video. But it should be done with everything. Last example: If you favourite an article on Ma.gnolia.com, it should be viewable on your del.icio.us/StumbleUpon/etc.
Is Google's Open Social going to fix all this?
Have you heard of 8hands?
It's a desktop tool that aggregates all your network and provides real time notifications.
My friends are too using different networks which forces me to keep several accounts, 8hands is the best way to handle it.
Hope you'll like it :)