Did you know Amazon has a Social Network?  In fact, it’s pretty robust!  In Amazon, if you click “(your name)’s Amazon”, then “Your Profile”, you have the option to set up a profile, including a biography, information about yourself, and get this - a list of all your friends currently on Amazon.com. It can show your recent purchases, your favorite items, your wish list, and more. It even gives you a blog in which you can send messages to those that are friends with you. You can also import your own blog’s rss into the blog feed. Amazon has even MySpace beat, with an activity feed of recent activity by your friends.

The real power comes for authors. As an author, I can have people add me as a friend, and I can keep an open dialog with my readers. I can introduce deals, notify when new editions of the book are released, and more. You can see my favorite books, movies, and music, my wishlist, and my biography. You can also see the other books I have written. Amazon also lets you verify through a publisher or agent that a book was written by you, so your books on Amazon can link back to your profile.

Amazon has quite a tool here that I wouldn’t put past them building on in the future. If you think the MySpace OpenSocial announcement was big, imagine if Amazon were to embrace an API such as OpenSocial. In the USA alone, Amazon has over 60 million members in its network. Each one of those members is tied to a bank account of some sort and has probably bought something at some point from the site. Add to that the existing APIs Amazon provides, allowing users to query the Amazon database, associate affiliate IDs and sell items based on commission, Amazon could have the first proven revenue model for a Social Network.

Amazon and Google aren’t the best of friends. Would Amazon embrace Google’s OpenSocial, or create their own as they have through Amazon AWS? Visit my Profile and add me as a friend on Amazon!:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/pdp/profile/A1NYWKPQAI1F5R

It used to be, one could make a deal on just a handshake.  People could leave their doors unlocked on their homes and their cars without worry of break in.  A man’s word was his bond.  Everyone knew everyone, by name.

This wasn’t the world I grew up in, but I’m told by my Grandparents, and I’ve seen stories of ancestors where this was, at one time, the way things were done in the world.  We just trusted each other back then.

You see, back then, communities were much smaller.  In the days when trust was in its prime, everyone did know each other by name, because they could know each other by name.  Communities were much smaller back then and accommodated this lifestyle much easier.  Crime was much harder to commit because everyone in the town knew you, and you knew them.  Think, the Scarlet Letter - the worst punishment of that time was shame.  There was no anonymity.  There was no privacy.

Sound familiar?  We are quickly overcoming the bonds of large society which put us in this untrustworthy time to live.  The internet came at a time when society wasn’t ready to be exposed.  People enjoyed their anonymity and their sheltered lives.  They were used to contracts, and handshakes never meant what they used to.  Society fought the internet, and it appears, finally, the internet is fighting back.

Social Media is bringing back an era which we thought we would never see again.  People are being held responsible for their actions online, and again, communities are getting much smaller.   Now, circles of friends can virtually know everything about each other, know each other by name, and start to trust each other again.

I argue, the lack of privacy in Social Media is a good thing.  When you know who your friends are, you can build trust with them again.  Contracts are no longer necessary, and back is the handshake and word as a bond.  Small Community has been re-architected through a virtual means which no one saw coming.

Now, imagine the cell phone, when virtual lives become melded with real life.  Virtual “small communities” become real, and back again is the small town, weaved into the fabric of a very large Society.  Social Media is bringing back the days when man could actually trust one another!

I had the privilege last week to interview with Phil Windley, host of Technometria on the IT Conversations podcasting network.  He talked to me about Facebook, its use in business, privacy and security issues surrounding Facebook, and some quick questions on how to set up an application on Facebook.  I think we covered a lot (I need to get over my “uh” problem), and this is a great thing to forward on to that business person in your organization that is contemplating a Facebook Strategy.  I think we covered quite a bit across the board of what we go over in the book.  You can listen to the interview here:

http://itc.conversationsnetwork.org/shows/detail3517.html

It appears I spoke too soon.  About 5 minutes ago Google announced Orkut will launch their applications to all users the last week in February.  I was close - an announcement was made, and they will be launching OpenSocial 0.7 tomorrow, the same day MySpace opens to developers.  In essence, OpenSocial is going live tomorrow.  It just won’t be visible to the public until the last week in February.  It appears, as I said, Google had to have the last word.

As I mentioned earlier, I think the MySpace launch is way bigger than just MySpace.  Watch carefully tomorrow.  There have been several announcements at Google that hint that you may just see Orkut go live tomorrow as well.  From the Release Notes for the latest version of OpenSocial (0.7), under Orkut container update:

 ”Close for gadget whitelist submission Feb 5″

I’m not quite sure what this fully means, other than it looks like things are finishing up for Orkut tomorrow.  Also, today Google released a blog post, of which they stated:

The best news is that, based on numerous discussions with both app developers as well as container sites, we believe OpenSocial 0.7 has all the necessary pieces to launch OpenSocial apps to users at scale. In fact, both hi5 and orkut will be using OpenSocial 0.7 for their upcoming user-facing launches.

On the mailing list today (just 6 hours ago), an Orkut developer stated:

We haven’t pushed v0.7 yet, but we’re planning to do it soon.  In the
meantime, use feature=”opensocial-0.6″ and I’ll post when v0.7 is
live.

It’s looking like 0.7 is soon to go live “soon”, and will more than likely with it, make it very possible for sites like Orkut who have been in testing for so long to go live with it (rather than just a developer sandbox like it has now).  MySpace itself will release in a sandbox for about a month on it (I just got word MySpace has officially launched to developers).  Is Orkut getting ready to do a one-up on MySpace tomorrow?

I noticed this set of guidelines posted to the Facebook Developers Wiki on Saturday. The guidelines are not surprising, considering the recent backlash surrounding forced invites in many of the applications currently on Facebook. The guidelines are as followed, and I’m sure more will be added:

Invites

• Do not force a user to send invites.
  • Show the invite page after performing an action.
  • Make it clear the action has been performed, and that the user is not forced to send invites to continue using the app/perform the action.
  • You may also include a link to the invite page somewhere in your application.
  • Sending invites for an app using another app is prohibited by the TOS.

• Do not use invites for ranking purposes.
  • When using invites as part of an application’s function, such as user ranking, make sure there are other ranking methods that can replace invites.
  • Using invites alone increases the chances for the application, and the user’s rank within it to lose value.

• Do not use blocked markup, or attempt to use sketchy methods to gain a user’s attention in the Requests page.
  • Usage of CSS, large fonts, and other prohibited markup is looked down upon by the community. We highly discourage this.
  • Usage of blocked markup can also lead to the removal of your application due to violation to the TOS.

User Interface

• Do not use Javascript alert().
• JS alerts are annoying to the user, disrupt the smoothness of the experience, and does not fit in well with the Facebook UI.
• JS alert() is not allowed by Facebook.

Are there any other guidelines you think need to be added that frustrate you?

I mentioned previously about the death of the Mormon President, Gordon B. Hinckley.  What I found fascinating was the response on sites like Twitter and Facebook to his death.  Gordon B. Hinckley is the President of the LDS church that truly brought the church into the 21st century.  Yesterday was his funeral, and as a token, I thought I would post this image, showing the true devotion, through avenues like Facebook, those in and out of Mormon communities have for this man (note only one non-GBH feed item at this point in time).  I think this shows as a tribute to where Gordon B. Hinckley has brought the LDS church in this century:

On a related note, you can follow live here to find out who the next President/Prophet of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints will be, tomorrow at 11am.

I noticed a rather controversial tag added to the Facebook developer’s wiki today. The tag is called fb:21-plus. From the documentation, fb:21-plus “Restricts content to users who match the ages.”. Here’s an example of it’s use:

<fb:21-plus>Oh la la<fb:else>Barney?</fb:21-plus>

The only use of this that I can see is for the production of more mature content. Does this mean Facebook is going to become a haven for pornography? Facebook terms of service says one cannot:

upload, post, transmit, share, store or otherwise make available any content that we deem to be harmful, threatening, unlawful, defamatory, infringing, abusive, inflammatory, harassing, vulgar, obscene, fraudulent, invasive of privacy or publicity rights, hateful, or racially, ethnically or otherwise objectionable;

Is pornography one of those things, and is this an area Facebook really wants to get into? What are your thoughts?

UPDATE: I just realized there is also an fb:18-plus tag just added as well (why not just do an fb:age-above tag?)

I’m extremely happy and relieved to say that “I’m on Facebook — Now What???” is off to the press, and the eBook is now available for purchase on the HappyAbout.info site.  It has been a long time coming, but we’re finished!  “I’m on Facebook — Now What???” is now officially one of the first books of its type available for sale, anywhere.  Jason and I are pretty proud of that, and hope you enjoy it as much as we have enjoyed writing it.  If you’ve pre-ordered an eCopy, you have probably already received it, or will receive it in the next day.  Purchase your copy here!

We love reviews!  If you have a short review, we’ll post a link to Amazon.com for the book as soon as it is up, and you can post your reviews there.  The more reviews we have there I am told increases our visibility on Amazon, so feel free to write one up, but save it for when I post it here.  Also, you may start blogging about the book now!  Our publisher has a terrific affiliate program, so if you’d like to make a little money off of your review in your blog, you can do so here.  Also, don’t forget to add yourself as a fan to the Facebook Page, and subscribe to our blog at FacebookAdvice.com!  Thanks again to Jason for his hard work and example in writing the book - he has been an excellent co-author to work with.  Also, thanks to Lorenzen and Scoble for their great contributions to the Foreward and Afterward!

Wait, there’s more…

I’ve had so much fun writing this book, that I’ve decided to write another one.  Today, I just signed a contract with O’Reilly to write what will be probably the first published manual on Facebook FBML.  It will be a “small animals” book, which means it won’t quite be a full sized book, but it’s not quite a Pocket Reference either.  It will most likely be called, “FBML Essentials”.  So, if you’re a developer, anxious to develop Facebook applications, stay tuned!  I will probably be putting together a separate site for that book too, similar to what we have done for facebookadvice.com.  Please, feel free to share below your frustrations with Facebook development - I’d love to hear the most common complaints and perhaps resolve those in the book!

O’Reilly is also helping me get to Graphing Social Patterns West (no one has invited me to speak though, sorry - I am open for speaking engagements while I’m out there though!) March 3-4.  If I get any other appointments I might leave earlier in the week, so feel free to book me for your user group meetings, radio, TV, podcasts, or whatever while I’m out in the L.A./San Diego area (that is my home away from home, as my grandparents live there)!

I sat down for lunch at Applebees with Joseph Scott, a Developer at Automattic, who was the developer on the Prologue project. As I mentioned earlier, Prologue is essentially, as I term it, “OpenSocial for Twitter“, and allows you to create your own Twitter-like community on any Wordpress blog with the addition of just a simple Wordpress theme. In the demo, he shows how it works, and then we discuss potential uses for the theme, and ways one can use Prologue in their own Blogging environment. It was an enjoyable and interesting conversation!

Demo of Prologue With Joseph Scott, Developer at Automattic from Jesse Stay on Vimeo.