As I mentioned a few days ago, the task of standardising identity on the web is a huge one:

…this is complex and requires a lot of organisation. It unfortunately takes someone with the size and power of Google or facebook to be able to pull it off.

The problem with any such initiative is that it needs the backing both from site owners and the end consumer. An established company such as facebook already has a high number of users so, while they may not all agree with the changes, a decent rate of uptake should be pretty easy to achieve. The question then becomes should it be an opt-in or opt-out system and four US Senators have even written to facebook to demand that the open graph implementation should indeed be changed to opt-in.

The interesting point here is not that the Senators consider the system as an invasion of privacy as of itself but that “users have less control over private information, and it was done without the users’ permission” and, therefore, once you have agreed to using it that there is not a problem.

Facebook, obviously, disagree and consider the behaviour to be fine as it is and you can see their point of view; it is only natural that they are going to want as many people as possible using the new tools or it will be a waste of time developing them. The aim here is to become the ‘de facto’ standard for web identification which will not happen if no-one enables it.

The position is different for web sites: as it’s base level the site merely adds the social plugins of their choice – many are already using facebook connect to manage logins; the problems occur when the site owner is also a facebook user and is concerned over the privacy issues. The benefits of having your site given, essentially, free advertising on facebook are immense but, as Steven Hodson points out, those site owners who are worried about the open graph could be effectively held to ransom over whether they install the plugins or not. The promise of the potential extra traffic a site may receive “is huge and that is very hard to turn away from”. This is a dog-eat-dog world and people will do just about everything they can to get an advantage over their competitors. It may not win me any friends but I have added the like button as I feel it can be of benefit.

Communication

The biggest issue with anything like this is communication. The open graph protocol was announced at the f8 developers conference and immediately implemented – perhaps there should have been a bigger lead in time and more communication detailing the changes provided directly to the end user. Personally, I do not have an issue with the opt-out nature as I am able to make an informed decision but your average facebook user does not read the same sites and, as such, is not aware of many of the issues.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing and maybe facebook could have handled this differently. By all means have the new functionality as opt-out but on the proviso that the user receive the choice as to whether to allow this functionality before they are able to continue using the service – perhaps a landing page giving all the necessary information which requires a user action before it will let you get to the normal facebook page. Changes of this magnitude warrant something like this.

Their is still a great deal of naivety over what the changes entail and how it all works. For example, I have seen comments such as not being able to log in to facebook because it is blocked (because of the country they are in) and then presuming that personal data will just be shared – this type of ignorance needs to be addressed by facebook and fast.

There also appears to be a deal of hypocrisy and belligerence surrounding the whole affair. Bloggers claiming that open graph is the root of all evil then proceeding to add the plugins to their site and statements such as “I see a “Like” Button: I leave the site.” serve no purpose.

Duty of care

The age old maxim “you get what you pay for” can often be applied to web services but with something as wide reaching, and with such huge implications, as open graph facebook have a duty of care to their customers to protect their personal data from misuse and abuse beyond anything that may be laid down by data protection legislation. Facebook are now firmly under the microscope so must tread very carefully and ensure they make the right decisions or face the wrath of user, providers and the Senate alike.

Image by j / f /photos

Social currency can be described as “the entirety of actual and potential resources which arise from the presence in social networks and communities, may they be digital or offline”. The mere presence within these networks and communities – and just spamming content – is, however, not enough.

Relationships

On our own your or I are worth nothing – we are just individual islands in the social ocean, cut off from everything around us. Where our paths cross is a different matter; those intersections, the relationships between us, are the interesting bits. The relationships we form provide the true currency that we can trade on the social web. This currency can be employed by individuals, service providers and others - such as advertisers – alike.

For us, the consumer, social media is a dead experience without friends or followers – the clue is in the name “social”. We must interact to garner any benefit from the service. Service providers need users creating relationships for the site to function as intended – an empty site is bad for business. Often user demand drives the path the service will follow especially with regards to functionality.

Advertisers sit above all of this looking down with a holistic view. Without any form of relationship it is hard to target ads effectively. While a good deal of information can be gathered by anonymous browsing statistics they only show isolated areas: 1000 people visited this page, 2000 that page etc. you do not have the relationships. They want to be able to see the links, e.g. who visited both to establish a better profile.

Patterns

Look at Amazon for example. For years we have seen the “people who bought x also bought y” information below the products we are looking at. If you have a known connection between two or more products then it makes sense to bundle them for a reduced price and hopefully make additional sales.

We need the patterns and the relationships to go one stage further; patterns of traffic, of use, of interest and of ‘likes’.

There’s the key word: likes.

Now we can see why facebook want to link the web together. Why else would they be willing to undertake this herculean task?

They don’t want to control the web, they’re not a content creator and don’t want to absorb the content of others – they want to provide a means to join the dots, find the patterns and, by doing this, leverage our relationships (with each other, with sites, with facebook themselves). Should we be so surprised?

Image by juhansonin

So, facebook announced then released some changes to functionality which they claim will turn the whole internet in to the “social web”. No more will sites be isolated islands in the stream – they can all be connected and find out who is visiting and what they like in a way never possible before. But, according to the naysayers, at what cost?

I won’t go back over the well trodden ground of what the announcements and changes give us – a good, easily digestible guide can be found here.

The price we pay?

Go back a year or so and you would hear cries of “we want to tear down the walled gardens – we don’t want our info tucked away where we can’t access it or share it with other services”. Isn’t that what we always used to say? We want a connected social web where everything gathers in one place, where everything is compatible and we do not have multiple systems spreading our footprint at random over the web. The problem that this is complex and requires a lot of organisation. It unfortunately takes someone with the size and power of Google or facebook to be able to pull it off.

We should have seen this coming – it was inevitable really. We had multiple, competing, disparate Social Media systems which were incompatible. Next came APIs and aggregators; an “open graph” is the next logical step, except it doesn’t aggregate on a third party site but back at the primary service.

We have had Diggs, likes, bookmarks, shares, all before but these were with isolated entities with little, or no, interaction with the rest of the social world. The big difference now is the element of control. Others have tried a single identity system (Open ID for example) but the publicity is minimal and there isn’t the sexiness of something like the facebook brand behind it. What else does OpenID give you? Nothing, I’m sorry to say!

We may resent any one company having access to all the info which can be used to their own ends (do you really think facebook are doing this from a purely selfless perspective – of course not) but, let’s face it, who else currently has the wherewithall to achieve such a wide reach?

Are we willing to prostitute ourselves to the facebook cause in return for the potential traffic that might be generated in return? I think you’ll hear a lot of “hell yes” responses to that question. But what of the privacy issues being raised? In many ways this is already a moot point. Those who would be most willing to use the open graph to its full potential are those who already live their lives plastered all over the web – if you conduct your daily activites in full view of everyone with a twitter or facebook account then you are, to a degree, already saying that you don’t care that much about privacy.

Privacy is not the real issue

If we accept that we are essentially already beyond the point where privacy is no longer an issue then we are left with the argument about openness. Facebook call it their “open graph” and, to a degree, some of it is but there are limits. Yes, you can dip your hand in the cookie jar and get out something nice but the concern is with only one entity having control. The fear is that facebook can, if they so wish, screw the lid on tight and cut you off from the open graph – no more cookies for you.

We must always consider the implications when we let one service profilerate into just about every facet of our online lives – just look at the problems Chris Brogan and CC Chapman have been experiencing with getting locked out of their own Google accounts but these incidents are not malicious.

Let’s be realistic: facebook are so in the public eye with this and, yes, they are going to utilise a LOT of the data for their own ends (usage patterns, links, targetted advertising etc.) but are they REALLY going to abuse that position and face the potential fallout / loss of trust / loss of revenue? I think not. You can’t blame a company for wanting to maximise their revenue potential – after all facebook is a revenue driven company just like Apple, Google, Microsoft but, with great power there must also come great responsibility.

The plus side

We must consider the idea that having one entity control your “online identity” in this way might be beneficial: we all know who facebook are. We have one, single, accountable entity – if something screws up we know exactly where to go or who to point the finger at. The key word there is “accountable”. As much as the doom mongers might like to criticise the way facebook are going about imposing their will over the web there is no denying that they are/will be accountable for any problems or misuse of the data collected.

How long before the open graph is accepted as the norm and the arguments are forgotten?

Image from Mashable

The problem with crusades is usually that once you have achieved your objective the next stage becomes “what now?”. This is the case with my personal crusade on this blog: to promote the use of social media thereby aiming for a degree of ubiquity.

As I aluded to in my last post Facebook and Twitter are now everywhere – they really have reached the mainstream. So, while I can’t take the credit for this happening, my own little crusade came to an end and left me with the dilemma of where to go next; a dilemma which I have still not managed to resolve.

The blog is not dead, it is merely a sleeping giant.