The meaning of openness in the realm of social networks continues to be difficult to pin down. At a panel discussion Tuesday at Supernova 2008 in San Francisco, representatives from Facebook, Google, and Plaxo discussed their various interpretations of openness and got into the ongoing controversy between Google and Facebook over their friend-connecting APIs.
Kevin Marks, Joseph Smarr, and Dave Morin prepare to go onstage.
(Credit: Dan Farber)"The point is that the individuals have shared custodianship of it because they have overlapping knowledge of each other's connections," said Kevin Marks of Google regarding who owns the social graph data. Users understand that if they violate the implicit social contract, it will upset fellow users. "The goal of OpenSocial (Google's set of application programming interfaces for allowing applications to access a social graph) is to have an abstraction so the social contract can be enforced by the containers," Marks said.
"Open is when users are mashing up things and in control. It's driven by what is valuable to the user," said Plaxo's Joseph Smarr.
Facebook's Dave Morin defined openness as giving people control over the information they share and providing developers with the capability to build on top of the Facebook platform. Social data breaks down into three categories, Morin said: identity data, social graph data, and feeds and social actions. With 80 million users, Facebook has a responsibility to make sure that users understand what and how they are sharing information, he added.
"You should be able to take your identity wherever you go and keep social graph in sync," Morin said. The notion of "dynamic privacy" is at the core of Facebook's openness efforts. Users set up privacy controls inside Facebook to share more information and to be more open, and have it always in sync, Morin explained.
It's on the point of being able to take your identity across social networks that has put Google and Facebook at odds.
Last month Facebook blocked Google's Friend Connect service, claiming that it violated its terms of service. According to Facebook, Google Friend Connect's violation was redistributing user information from Facebook to other developers without the users' knowledge.
"When Facebook Connect initially launched and Google Friend Connect launched, both implemented different technology. We found Google to be in violation of our terms of service, so we asked to talk about it with them," Morin said. "We are in direct contact with Google representatives to find ways to work together. It's important that on this panel we are talking about this...It's important that we figure out how to make it work together.
Marks asked Morin what Google would need to change in Friend Connect to make it work for Facebook.
Morin answered, "We would like to work together on how to make dynamic privacy happen for everyone, so every privacy setting on our site works on other sites."
Marks was unclear as to what Google was copying from Facebook in its Friend Connect implementation, using OpenID, OAuth and OpenSocial, that would cause a violation in Facebook's terms of service.
Morin said he preferred not to talk about legal matters. "Our representatives are talking so a fight on the panel doesn't need to happen."
It wasn't a fight but Morin's answer that representatives are talking makes it seem that lawyers instead of engineers, who are at the core of the two companies, are running the show.
Smarr chimed in, "We see each other all the time, and we are all in Silicon Valley, so there are overlapping back channels."
"What Facebook is doing (with dynamic privacy) is very laudable--if you choose to share something in one place, it should appear in another. It's just not clear on how this dynamic privacy will work. If Facebook tries to do it by themselves and not with other people, it will be hard to make it really scale," said David Recordon of Six Apart, who has been involved in data portability efforts.
Correction, 5/15, 6:15 p.m.: The purchase price for Plaxo was previously misstated. The price is thought to fall in the $150 million to $170 million range.
Comcast is adding a social dimension to its services through the acquisition of Plaxo, a deal the two companies announced Wednesday afternoon.
Terms of the deal were not disclosed, but the purchase price is thought to be in the $150 million to $170 million range.
The acquisition is a big win for Plaxo, whose Pulse social network service, with 1.5 million active monthly users, has been overshadowed by the likes of Facebook and MySpace. It's a smart move by Comcast, which can enhance the user experience across its 14 million high-speed Internet subscribers, 3 million voice customers, and 24.2 million cable subscribers.
The acquisition is built on a preexisting relationship. In May 2007, Comcast partnered with Plaxo to offer a networked address book to subscribers of its various services. Comcast is Plaxo's largest customer and partner, with Plaxo hosting all Comcast subscriber e-mail address book accounts.
"The address book and Pulse combined will change the way people navigate through thousands of choices of content," said Sam Schwartz, executive vice president of Comcast Interactive Media. "You could know what shows your friends are watching, what they are downloading or what they are recording on DVR. Plaxo can help us build that vision. It's less about the Comcast.net portal and more about bringing the social aspects to all media consumption."
Plaxo's software could also be applied to Comcast's tru2Way project, which will allow developers to create applications that run on any set-top boxes.
"Many users on Pulse share Flickr photos with their friends and family. We want to extend that sharing whether they are in front of the TV, on the phone or at the computer," said Ben Golub, CEO of Plaxo. "Whether you are on Fandango (Comcast's movie ticket service) or on demand TV, it gets that much better with social graph layered on top."
Acquiring Plaxo will help Comcast socialize its cable, voice, and Internet services, including FanCast. "FanCast is major initiative in last couple years," Schwartz said. However, creating a user interface that can make sense out of all the content choices and devices will be even more difficult than creating a universal remote that a mere mortal could program and use.
"We understand that consumers are looking in lots of places for content, and it should be tied into one easy-to-use interface. You can ask it where to get content and it will tell you if it's on TV, in a theater, on demand, or on FanCast," Schwartz added. "We are very much innovating in terms of how consumers manage content. With the choices becoming almost infinite, you need better ways to navigate. The key is making it simple for the user. Right now we are in period of time where users could be confused--did they order it on Netflix, did they buy it on iTunes, did a friend buy it, is it loaded on a DVR. We can help create the best possible environment for the consumer."
Plaxo includes features common features in today's social networks.
Plaxo will fall under Comcast Interactive Media, which is tasked with growing Comcast's Internet business. "Pulse features will be turned on in some Comcast properties starting this year, but it is a multi-year strategy as we give the social media experience to all platforms we are on," Schwartz said.
Comcast could have chosen other routes to gain a social dimension, such as Google's nascent Friend Connect. "Friend Connect is complementary to Plaxo Pulse. It's trying to light up the long tail of the Web site. This is about making social media a natural part of the (Comcast) experience," said John McCrea, vice president of marketing at Plaxo.
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