A worthwhile blog post from our Identity group. I do disagree with the extreme position that any opening up the social graph is wrong. There needs to be some level of federation between social network sites and social network services within a proper governance model. The problem/challenge is: we have not figured out that phrase: "proper governance model" and we have not determined the best method for social graph interoperability / portability. So we are left with a potpourri of tactics to triage the issue that include: terms of service on social network sites, regulatory acts (and their various jurisdictional interpretations), compliance guidelines, corporate policies and procedures and so on. And no, Open Social and the DataPortability organization are not going to be much help here in the short run since many of the hard issues deal with "real law" in some situations. This topic will remain "messy" for quite some time.
Related Posts:
Social Networks: Multiple Facets, Multiple Personas
Unified Social Networks: A Case For Federation?
Burton Group Identity Blog: Antisocial Networking
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Last week, Robert Scoble’s Facebook account was suspended, reportedly because he was running a Plaxo script which exported his contact information from Facebook via the Facebook API.
Michael Arrington notes that Plaxo’s script was deliberabtely circumventing Facebook’s terms and conditions, which forbid exporting the email addresses of your contacts from Facebook.
Mathew Ingram thinks this is fine because Scoble’s contact information belongs to Scoble. He’s wrong.
Ed Felten correctly notes that it’s not about ownership, and he explains somewhat less clearly that what it’s really about is relationships.
By the way, I also posted a position that Scoble was in the wrong by violating Facebook's terms of service and member expectations.
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So let’s examine the matter. When you accepted Scoble’s friend request in Facebook, you did it in the context both of a relationship with Scoble and in the context of the rules of a particular social environment (Facebook).
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If Facebook does not live up to its obligations to prevent exfiltration of your data into the public, it will cease to be a social environment and become merely another public space on the public internet - like USENET with a prettier interface.
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Opening the social graph will destroy social networks, and turn them into sterile public spaces in which formation of meaningful and intimate relationships is not possible. Opening the social graph is a bad idea. Relationship information is not the property of individuals - it held in joint custody among all parties in a relationship, and it cannot be used or disclosed in violation of the rules under which it was brought into the relationship - or else the relationship will die and the individuals in it will be harmed. If you don’t understand this, or come to understand it, you will never have any real relationships, and neither will the software you write.
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