Comments on: On OpenSocial

By: fred

fred — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 17:25:00 +0000

Hashim, I agree. Here's a comment on left on Scott Kevton's blog:

Scott, I think you’re right about the Google’s centrality in the mix. More than anything, this is a darkweb data-mining effort; they’re going to benefit from all of the also-ran social nets that will expose user data in the name of “openness” but are really hoping to use this as a strategic in to Facebook’s market. Unfortunately for them, this won’t afford competition with Facebook, but Google will get all of the data.

As Google’s algos are already graph based, they’ll be able to quickly manage this social graph data. In fact, the Spertus et. al. publication from 2005 Evaluating similarity measures: a large-scale study in the orkut social network pretty much lays out Google’s strategy. Just like Google Analytics, the DoubleClick acquisition, Adsense cookies, the Google toolbar - it’s all about collecting as much of our data as possible. This is a natural area for expansion of their data collection programs.

Where we differ is our trust level of Google. Google may uphold good data maintenance standards, but they’re a public corporation who is only responsible to the bottom line. I worry about what might happen to our data one day.

By: Hashim

Hashim — Fri, 02 Nov 2007 02:11:00 +0000

"So what is Google really trying to do? ...Google is demystifying how it will interconnect its properties."

That's secondary.

First, Google wants to create a marketplace and enabler for Social Adsense.

By: Jackson Fox

Jackson Fox — Thu, 01 Nov 2007 01:40:00 +0000

Luis, I don’t think you’re missing anything. While Google may yet make strides towards the “open social graph,” this isn’t anything of the kind. It’ll be nice to develop one app (widget if you prefer) that can run on a number of sites, and I’m intrigued about how LinkedIn will be using this, but it’s still just another widget platform.

Also, does this mean Google will be allowing open social apps on my Google homepage?

By: fred

fred — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 15:39:00 +0000

It is a platform – but it’s no more a step towards open social graph than XFN or FOAF. So I’d agree with you. This is primarily Google’s attempt to claim real estate in the social space – something they’ve done very poorly.

And yes…pretty much everything is ironic about my blog provider..but I was using them before they were owned by Google. One of these days I’m going to migrate to my own domain…

By: Luis Villa

Luis Villa — Wed, 31 Oct 2007 15:30:00 +0000

Fred, maybe you're the right person to answer this question I asked on o'reilly radar:

"Is this just another widget platform? Or is it the first step towards the open social graph? I guess I'd assumed from the pre-launch hype that it was the latter, but all I'm really seeing right now is the former. Am I missing something?"

[OT: I find it ironic that your blog provider does not let me sign in with openid ;)