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Wanna Learn Facebook Development? Check Out My New Video Series

Posted on March 19, 2012 by jessestay

Facebook application development isn’t just a skill, and it’s not just for developers either – it’s a mindset and a culture that you have to understand to truly understand and implement its value. It’s something both marketers, business owners, as well as developers should understand to fully have a grasp against the competition in this increasingly social world. That’s why I jumped at the chance to work with the popular online learning site, Pluralsight, to do a new series on Facebook application development. My first video went live yesterday, and I hope will be the first in a line of videos you can use to hone your skills both as a marketer and developer to take advantage of the most of Facebook Platform.

In my first course, you’ll learn why Facebook is such a valuable tool to integrate with your business or marketing strategy. I’ll show you example apps that have seen success on the Platform, and then take you through, step-by-step, on how you can set up a custom Facebook Page tab on Facebook without any HTML knowledge necessary to get started. You’ll end understanding the different integration points you can use to build an app, or just integrate Facebook into your existing website or app design. I teach you social design philosophy and the different touch points you should understand no matter what your skill set.

Whether you’re a marketer, a developer, or business owner I think you’ll enjoy this course. I think you’ll be surprised with what you’re able to accomplish by the end, and what your understanding will become when you’re finished. If you’ve ever wanted to get your hands dirty with what you can fully do on Facebook, this is a course you can’t neglect, regardless of your skill set.

The course is part of Pluralsight’s learning platform, and I hope will be one of many future courses you can learn from on these topics. It also joins Facebook’s own Yasser Shohoud’s Facebook Platform Overview that serves as a great primer for where my course will take you.

When I considered this I thought about just doing my own video series and charging monthly for access to those. I would have likely charged around $100-200 for access to that for it to be worth it to me. I realized though, that by partnering with Pluralsight, you could get my content, as well as hundreds of other courses from other experts that are top at their game. Instead of $200 for one-time access to my videos, you can pay as little as $29 per month (you cancel whenever you like) or $299 per year and get unlimited access to mine and anyone else’s courses on their platform. To me I think it’s a great deal.

With this course you’ll get:

Material for all types to understand – marketers, business owners, and developers
Step-by-step videos taking you through the entire process, which you can step away from at any time.
Assessment to test your knowledge at the end of the course and grade you on your understanding of the topics covered
Knowledge of why you should understand Facebook Platform
Step-by-step tutorials on how to build custom Facebook tabs
Hands-on videos giving you the basics of Facebook’s developer platform, allowing all to understand all they need to get started
Access to all future courses on Facebook by me and others.

If you want to understand Facebook in a way your competitors don’t, go register for my Facebook development course today! The tips I cover are things not many in the industry know, and you’ll have the upper-hand in your industry.

To register, just click here and follow the instructions. Then go over here to my course’s Facebook Application Development page to get started in knowing what your competitors don’t!

For the first 20 commenters that ask below I’ll give a code for a free unlimited 7 day trial to try the service and take my course.

Still Think Facebook’s Not Threatened by Google+? Facebook Now Supports "+" Tagging

Posted on March 8, 2012 by jessestay

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As a Google+ user (Author of Google+ For Dummies), and also avid Facebook user (Author of Facebook Application Development For Dummies), I often find myself getting my keys mixed up going back and forth from Google+ to Facebook. This is particularly frustrating for tagging friends. When Google+ launched, I found myself constantly putting in the “+” button to tag friends on Facebook, only to realize Facebook’s form of tagging was the “@” symbol. It appears some time in the recent past Facebook has now adopted the “+” (plus) sign to allow tagging in status updates.

From the start, Google+ supported both formats. This is no surprise, as Google+ had the most to gain from trying to adopt users that were used to Facebook’s tagging format. At the same time, the “+” sign added a level of branding to the Google+ experience making it unique to Google+.

It would seem that some Facebook employees are also enjoying Google+ perhaps a little too much, because someone likely got annoyed enough (or maybe their user testing showed they had a problem) to where they felt the need to support the “+” symbol as well when tagging your friends on Facebook. Now, to tag your friends on Facebook, you can either tag them by starting to type with the “@” symbol followed by their name, or starting with the “+” sign followed by their name.

I think it was awfully nice of Facebook to think of us Google+ users as they integrated this. I wonder how long this has been happening. I only realized it after doing it a few times and not even realizing I was doing it. I always argue Facebook and Google aren’t competitors – that would be nice if Facebook’s just being nice for this reason. However, I have a feeling Facebook is seeing some pressure from the other Google+ users using Facebook and running into the same issue.

Either way, I’m happy to not have to think twice now whenever I use that “+” sign to tag my friends.

How to Replace Your RSS Feed Automatically With Facebook’s Like Button

Posted on February 20, 2012 by jessestay

As I seek to make this blog more and more a part of the social networks you participate in (I call this “From Fishers to Farmers” – something I speak about in my talks), I’ll be documenting my progress along the way. I just showed how I’m doing this with Facebook’s Frictionless Sharing on this blog (just click through to the blog, and click the link over on the right to start adding these posts to your timeline). There’s one more piece though which I think is dwindling. Some call this the “RSS is Dead” argument. I actually talked about the RSS Subscription problem here. What’s happening is the subscribers to RSS feeds such as the one on this site, through analytics sites such as Feedburner, are either slowing or diminishing.

This process is natural as more and more people receive their news on sites like Facebook, Twitter, and Google+, and away from sites such as Google Reader or traditional RSS Readers. Those tools simply aren’t social, and much less interesting than a typical social network. Therefore I argue content owners need to be looking towards more social ways of distributing their content. I’m doing this specifically on Facebook with an app called RSS Graffiti.

Enter RSS Graffiti and Facebook Open Graph

RSS Graffiti is a Facebook app (it also integrates with Twitter) that will apply any RSS Feed to a Facebook Page you specify (see why I say RSS isn’t dead?). The cool thing about it is on Facebook I can make any website a Facebook Page.

On this blog, if you view the source, do a search for “og:url”. This, and a series of other meta tags (og:site_name, og:description, and og:image, as well as fb:admins are all useful for this) tell Facebook that this URL is also a Facebook Page. To register it with Facebook, just make sure the “fb:admins” tag is in place and lists the id of your Facebook Profile as the value, and go to Facebook.com/Insights to register your URL.

Once you do this, your Blog is now a Facebook Page as far as Facebook is concerned. Now all you have to do is add a Like Button Social Plugin to your website as you see at the top of this site above, and people can “like” your website! Seriously – click through to this blog and go click “like” at the top!

Here’s where it gets cool though – now that I’m listed as an admin of that URL, I can send posts to the fans of that URL. Every person that clicks “like” above I can send my articles to. It’s the same as subscribing, but much more social!

How to Create Your Own Social Distribution Channel Using Facebook and Open Graph

Here’s what you need to do to make this happen:

Add the following HTML within the tags on your website or blog – fill in the “content” sections with the appropriate values for your site or blog:
Go to Facebook.com/Insights and click “Insights for Your Website” (the green button in the upper-right) – enter the domain you specified from the “og:url” meta tag above, and click on the “Get Insights” button. Your site is now registered (and you can go back here to see stats around your domain!).
Now go to apps.facebook.com/rssgraffiti/ and find your website on the left (it will be under the name you specified in “site_name” above). Go there, and add your site’s RSS Feed. Save it, and it will automatically start posting content to your Facebook Page for every post you make!
Now you just need some subscribers. You’ll do this with a Facebook Like button, just like you see at the top of this blog. Go to developers.facebook.com/plugins – click the “Like Button” link. Now, just fill out the form – be sure to add the URL you specified in the “og:url” tag above! Click the “get code” button, and now copy and paste that code where you want your like button to go!

If you perform the above steps you should have everything you need to allow your site’s visitors to subscribe to your site through a simple Facebook “like”. Now, when they click “like”, not only do they subscribe to your site, but their friends see it too!

If you want to take this further, you can add the above tags to the other pages on your site, with an og:title tag to specify the title of articles. This will allow you to customize how Facebook sees each article on your site as it shares it out to the fans of your website. If you want to get more specific, be sure to see the documentation of the OpenGraph Protocol over here.

What about Google+ or Twitter? As I mentioned, RSS Graffiti supports Twitter, so you should be taken care of there if you wanted to add a “Follow” button at the top of your website. However, there’s nothing for Google+ at the moment. I think Google would really benefit from either allowing apps to publish to at least Google+ Pages so apps like RSS Graffiti could do something similar with the +1 button. Google+ currently allows you to tie +1 buttons (through Page “Badges”) to Google+ Pages, and if they just allowed apps to publish to Pages you could theoretically do the same with Google+. Maybe if they allow that I’ll post how to do that here as well.

Stay N Alive Supports Facebook’s Open Graph

Posted on February 20, 2012 by jessestay

Just the other day I got approval from Facebook that the “read” action, available for Facebook’s Open Graph “Frictionless Sharing” was approved for StayNAlive.com. What this means is that if you click the link on the right of this blog, under “Click below to post to your Facebook Timeline when you read articles on Stay N Alive”, every post you read on this site will be automatically shared to your Facebook Timeline under the “News” section of your timeline. This means your friends will see what you read here, just like anything I were to share to Facebook. (Some day I need to design it so it’s more enticing to authorize this – hopefully soon)

You may have seen this done before with other blogs and news sites, such as the Washington Post Social Reader. When your friends see articles you read, they are more likely to click through and read them because they’re associated with someone they’re familiar with. Then, they can read and participate in the experience with you.

I just wrote about how traditional blogging is dead, and instead needs to evolve to more social models of content flow. This is one way I am trying to make that happen. Like I said, this blog isn’t dead. It’s just that it will become more and more a part of the social networks you most actively participate.

If you feel so obliged, please click through to this article and click that link over on the right. It’s one of the best ways you can spread the word about what I write, and the things I stand for. Or, just click below – I’m embedding the form right below via a Facebook Social Plugin (click through to the article to see it on the blog).

In a future article I’ll share how I did this, on a Blogger.com blog, nonetheless!

Facebook’s Need for Consistency in the Competition With Google

Posted on November 11, 2011 by jessestay

UPDATE: After removing everything in the description and any mention of competition, the ad mentioned here that I created was approved. However, there are still some issues of consistency that Facebook needs to get around. Maybe it’s just a communication issue? Read on…

When people such as Google and Twitter mention their inability to integrate with Facebook, I traditionally shake my head. Knowing people at all three companies, and being fairly close to Facebook, it’s just not the Facebook I know. After all, I see things such as Youtube integrate just fine with Facebook, but Google complains they can’t seem to integrate Facebook’s platform into Google. And Facebook currently allows users to automatically post to Twitter, so why can’t Twitter allow you to identify your Facebook friends on Twitter? It just hasn’t made sense. I always thought it was something Google or Twitter were doing wrong – maybe they weren’t following Facebook’s TOS or maybe they weren’t trying hard enough. However, lately after the publication of my book, Google+ For Dummies, I’m starting to understand the confusion. Facebook isn’t being consistent, or clear, in what they view as competition, and who can integrate with their network.

Just recently I tried to create an ad for my new book. Of course, the book is about Google+, which according to Mark Zuckerberg himself, is a “little version of Facebook”. It’s clear Facebook sees the competition. So it was no surprise to me that an ad I submitted that shared a book about Facebook’s new competition would get denied. What is surprising however is that they allow me to create a Facebook Page about the book, but don’t allow me in any way to promote that Page. There’s the consistency I’m talking about.

I mentioned the Youtube example. If you use Youtube you’ll notice the Facebook integration prevalent throughout the site. I’m sure Facebook sees great benefit to this – people love sharing videos, and Youtube is a great place to post videos. Yet, when other elements of Google try to integrate Facebook, they get denied with little reason for the denial. Ask Kevin Marks, Google’s former OpenSocial and Friend Connect (APIs for building Google apps) lead who tried to integrate Facebook Connect (as it was called at the time) with Google’s Friend Connect universal login. Facebook allowed Youtube’s Facebook integration, but denied that of Friend Connect, citing claims to the way they were accessing the API, and being unwilling to work with Google on the way they were accessing Facebook. Google eventually gave up. In fact, there was a time Facebook was supposedly, at least according to various claims on Google+, even blocking invites to Google+ in their news feed.

I thought some of these competitors of Facebook may have been blowing it out of proportion, until I talked to a few of them personally. I received pretty good information from close sources at Twitter that Facebook has actively blocked them when they have tried to integrate Facebook into their network in the past. So what? Facebook can integrate Twitter but Twitter can’t integrate Facebook? From what I’ve been told by employees at Twitter, it seems that way. I’ve heard the same from friends at Google.

Facebook has competition – you can’t blame them for wanting to block out the competition. I’ve heard some of their competitors say they’d do the same if they were in Facebook’s shoes. However, what I don’t get is the lack of consistency. If I can’t create ads to promote my Facebook Page promoting a book on Google+, I shouldn’t be allowed to create a Page about a book on Google+. If Google can’t access the Facebook API, Youtube shouldn’t either. If Facebook can integrate Twitter into their site, Twitter should be able to integrate Facebook into theirs. From a user perspective, I use all these networks for different reasons – to me they aren’t competitors, and I shouldn’t be forced to pick one or another. It’s an extremely confusing place to be when you’re actually a part of this inconsistent game. This is getting ridiculous.

Facebook Just Downplayed The Biggest Launch They’ve Made Since Platform for the Web

Posted on October 11, 2011 by jessestay

I’m still trying to understand what just happened. The other day I wrote about finding some information about the upcoming HTML5 platform for mobile launch awhile back. There was a piece of their developer documentation that they had left open, which listed all the launch partners, and provided sample apps, which were publicly visible at the time. I had images, HTML, and the entire mobile SDK to look at and play with – all available publicly when I found it. Of course, taking the honorable route, I notified my friends at Facebook and they promptly closed the documentation in preparation for their launch. I’m now wondering if I had just written about it, if it would have been more talked about than what Facebook just did.

Today Facebook launched their iPad app. At least that’s what you would think if you were just a normal user and had no privy information to building apps for Facebook and weren’t following Facebook’s developer blog. Facebook wrote a blog post, announcing the new iPad app, and only briefly mentioned an app ecosystem that had launched with it. When in reality, Facebook just launched something bigger than the original F8 Platform Launch back in 2007.

What Facebook just launched should have had the pomp and circumstance of another F8, when in reality all they published was a blog post to developers. This should have been a press event lead by Mark Zuckerberg, and it should have been touted as “something awesome”, just like Zuck did at the Skype video integration launch a few months ago. Yes, it’s that big, and I’m extremely excited for this launch – my hope is that others can see the potential. I’m a little worried Facebook didn’t hype this up enough.

Facebook HTML5 Mobile Platform’s Potential

When Facebook Platform launched for web back in 2007, Facebook only had 20 million users at the time. Shortly after launch, regardless of that size, developers were immediately seeing their apps built for Facebook platform go from 0 to millions of users in a matter of days. That was for web only.

Today, with the almost exact same type of launch – this time on mobile – Facebook is giving developers an audience of over 350 million users to target their apps. While not called such, all these apps run under similar experiences to the web “Canvas Pages”, and allow developers’ apps to run as a native part of the existing Facebook app experience. Users never have to leave the Facebook app (which is now on the iPad as well) to use their favorite Facebook apps (think Farmville, or Words With Friends).

It doesn’t stop there though. Developers’ apps now appear in the news feed of the mobile apps, allowing for greater discovery of the apps they build. If users search for their app they can also use it by just typing the app’s name in the search box. That’s the potential of 350+ million users all sharing your app with their friends. In addition, Facebook extended the requests dialog to work with mobile – this means your friends can also invite you to use the mobile apps they’re using on their devices.

With today’s launch you can expect Facebook on mobile devices to grow even further. It’s at 350+ million users now. Just as in the days of their original platform launch, users are now more likely to use the mobile apps, and more likely to get their friends using the Facebook experience on mobile. That means more viewers and users for developers, and a much greater opportunity for entrepreneurs.

HTML5 Goes Mainstream

Perhaps the biggest affect of today’s launch is the affect it is going to have on HTML5 mobile apps. Now, in one fell swoop, Facebook has created its own “app store” which reaches hundreds of millions of users. Developers can create their apps natively, or in HTML5 – it doesn’t matter, and they’ll all work in the experience, across numerous devices. Facebook can just be the means of distributing the app – the HTML5 apps don’t even need to exist inside Facebook!

I think the game has changed for HTML5 after today’s launch. Now developers finally have a choice. They finally have a means to standardize and use a technology that works across any device, and in any browser, but looks like a normal app. Today, with Facebook’s Platform for Mobile launch, HTML5 just went mainstream.

I am stoked about today’s launch of Facebook’s HTML5 Platform for mobile – it’s a huge game changer. It’s revolutionary. To me it’s even bigger than Timeline and the real time ticker that they launched at F8. I just don’t get why Facebook didn’t launch this at F8, or at least, why they didn’t do a special press event to get people more excited about it. I’m really worried Facebook didn’t get their PR in order for this launch – it should have been better prepared, and much better explained to the mainstream press and users.

Today’s launch is big – real big, and I’m not sure I’m seeing enough people talk about it. If you ask most members of the press, they’d say just an iPad app launched today. I’m not sure that’s the news Facebook wanted out of today’s launch.

One Thing is Clear About F8 – the Focus of a Facebook Conference is on Relationships

Posted on September 23, 2011 by jessestay

I just finished my 3rd consecutive Facebook F8 developers conference. While I missed the first one (I followed it remotely though), the Facebook conferences I have attended thus far just get better year to year. This year was no exception. I noticed something this year though, reflecting on years past and other, non-Facebook conferences I’ve attended in the past. There’s one thing Facebook (and a lot of that credit, according to many Facebook employees I talk to, is due to Mark Zuckerberg himself) really, really understands is relationships. That understanding bleeds into everything they do, and that includes their conferences.

Looking at other, non-Facebook conferences I’ve attended, they try to get attendees excited by giving them freebies – a free laptop, a free tablet, or even a free phone or similar device. Attendees flock there out of hopes they’ll get to learn the latest things about the products they’re passionate about, but many also have in the back of their minds that, on their company’s money, they’re going to get something free out of the experience.

While the people attending may be focusing on meeting new people and getting to know their industry, the conferences themselves weren’t really designed around building relationships or networking. There are often closed room session, with single speakers in a very intimate setting designed around learning. The focus of most conferences is just that – learning. At Facebook’s F8 it’s different though – the entire experience is designed around networking. They’re designed around relationships.

From the sessions, all in open rooms that you can walk through from room to room, to the main floor, which stands centered amongst all the sessions so people can easily pass by other developers and Facebook engineers, everything is designed so you have to pass by other people in order to participate. Booths are set up around the conference where you can swipe a card that is tied to your Facebook account, and on Facebook it checks you in, or uploads a photo of you, and other things, showing you the other of your Facebook friends that are also there with you. Even the DJ booth is programmed so that when you swipe that card the songs are played by your Facebook likes and friends’ Facebook likes, making even the music experience a more social experience.

It’s not uncommon to see even Mark Zuckerberg roaming the halls, talking to anyone he has time for, and most of the executive team also make themselves available. In past years Mark has even brought his family to the events with him – yes, it’s a family event too!

My entire experience ended with a party, usually with a well known artist of some sort, but right in the main hall where everyone can participate (last night was an exception for me, as I was invited to another party, but Facebook’s still went on without me!). Delicious food is served by the wonderful chefs at Facebook, and participants are encouraged to celebrate with each other, and the entire Facebook staff and their families all come to join in on the fun with the participants. It is the epitome of a social event!

Having worked with the Facebook team over the years and having the privilege of intimate knowledge of how they work, there is one thing you quickly realize – Facebook gets relationships in a way no one else can understand. It’s a different culture and way of thinking than I’ve ever experienced. The best way to learn of this is by attending their annual F8 conference, where the same culture extends to the developers participating. If you haven’t been able to attend previously, maybe you can attend in the future. If not, at least be sure to check out the recordings of all the keynotes and sessions from yesterday’s conference and at least you can catch a glimpse. It truly is a unique experience I haven’t experienced anywhere else!

Disclosure: Facebook comp’d me a press pass for this since I’m an author of Facebook developer books and blog about Facebook. I’d say the same thing if I paid for the conference though. It would be worth every penny.

Here’s What I Can Predict With Absolute Certainty

Posted on September 20, 2011 by jessestay

Including this year, I’ve been to 3 Facebook F8 Developer Conferences now (I missed the first year, but followed it remotely). There is a repeat pattern for each, that I want to just get out of the way before this conference starts, and predict, with absolute certainty, will happen. I thought this warranted its own post:

Bloggers will complain. Users will revolt. People will leave the service.

This happens with every single major Facebook update, and it has happened after every F8 conference (maybe not the first one). It is so predictable now that I just smile and laugh.

The fact is, no matter how many people say they are quitting, no matter how many people say they hate the new changes, people still stay. They always come back. They’re always more vocal leaving than they are coming back, too.

The truth is, as long as Facebook continues to innovate, and as long as they continue to adapt and listen to their users, yet innovate as they do so (meaning they are the first to an idea, not necessarily their users), they’ll always lure people back into their service. I guarantee they’ll make mistakes. I guarantee users will hate them for that. However, Facebook always adapts when it’s clear they made a mistake, and the users always come back. They’ll continue to grow, and in more and more areas – I can guarantee that.

You’re already starting to see this – “Facebook’s another Yahoo”. “Facebook is dying”. “The sky is falling”. This happens again and again, year after year. It’s almost predictable, and it will keep happening. You’ll keep coming back though. You’ll keep finding new and better ways to use the service, and you’ll continue to realize this is one of the best services for your closest friends and family to connect.

BTW, you may be asking, “but what about Google+?” I really don’t think they’re direct competitors. Certain people will use Google+ – many people will, in fact (I wouldn’t have written a book on it if that weren’t the case). However, different types of people will use Facebook. The two will compete, and that’s good. I don’t think either service is “dying” though. We’ll all find better ways to use the best tools available.

In fact, for any service, when people are yelling you’re dying, when you’re still growing, that’s a good thing! It shows you’ve touched a few nerves and you’ve got people’s attention.

You’ve Heard the Rumors. Here are a Few Predictions That "Just Make Sense" For Facebook’s F8

Posted on September 20, 2011 by jessestay

Facebook’s developer conference, F8, is coming up this Thursday, having developers like myself drooling at what Facebook might be launching. Last year I was pretty close in my prediction (I had the code right – just not exactly what the code did – this was all the launch of Facebook’s Social Plugins), having got some clues in their open source Javascript SDK that were launched in the code before they were released to developers. The thing is, this year I’m stumped. I can’t see a single thing in Facebook’s code (with the exception of some sort of “Questions” XFBML tag, but I don’t think that’s new – perhaps in testing?). None of their employees are giving any hints whatsoever of what’s launching, and overall, there have been no obvious clues as to what might launch. The truth is, I don’t even know if I’d blog about it this time even if I did find anything – there is something to the element of Surprise and letting others experience that at F8 as well. I’d like to respect that. I figured I’d put down my thoughts though, and rather than trying to predict anything, I’d share what makes sense to me, out of pure speculation, but with a little bit of backup as to why I think this way.

To start, let’s talk about what the other tech blogs are sharing – it should be noted that even these are rumor, and should not be given any source of credibility until some sort of proof is shown of their pending launch.

The HTML5 App Market and Platform (Spartan). This was covered, and scooped thoroughly by Techcrunch’s MG Siegler. I think he’s pretty close to where they’re going with this. I’ve said frequently that Facebook would do well if they had some sort of control of the client, and launching such a platform makes sense. I predict they’ll likely release some sort of app marketplace, via a native app that controls the installation of Facebook-enabled HTML5 apps. They’ll also probably provide native apps for photo sharing and other native-only features of phones so that HTML5 apps can easily tie in and integrate with those features, under Facebook’s control. This is also why they’ll launch an iPad app – it gives them more control.
BTW, I predicted this 3 years ago.

Some sort of Music solution. This too has been covered. I haven’t seen any hint of it by anyone, but it is well known that Facebook employees have loved the social experience of musical apps like Spotify. Not only that, but it would make a lot of sense for Facebook to control the music library of your phone or portable device. There’s just something really social about music, and wanting to share your favorite music with your close friends and family. The more Facebook controls this, the better experience they can provide. I bet this launches as a mobile solution of some sort. It could potentially also launch as a browser plugin (which I’ll explain below).

“Read, Watch, Listen.” AllThingsD covered this well. Tonight was the first I heard about it. It fits with the music sharing idea I mentioned above. It also fits with the expanded, 5,000 character limit status update posts that are anticipated to launch tomorrow (see the comments in that link), according to Blake Ross, Facebook’s Director of Product. It seems Facebook is getting ready to launch better ways to curate content – they definitely seem to be trying to get Robert Scoble’s attention with this (he seems to know more than he’s telling). Robert loves curation – he’ll be all over this. I think it will also be really good for Facebook.
One question I do have though is could Facebook also be partnering with, or starting their own movie and media streaming and sharing service with this? They seem to have been experimenting already some with Livestream at Facebook.com/live.

The other option (which could be combined with the above) is Facebook could be ready to launch a true Google+ Hangouts competitor using their Skype relationship, allowing people to better share and collaborate and “watch” their favorite videos with groups of their closest friends and family. I get the feeling this Skype relationship is only the beginning.

New, revamped profiles. This will be interesting. Mashable reports that some anonymous sources are reporting that a new profile focused more on what media users are listening to or watching will be launched, the intent being to bring more attention to the profile of each user, and encourage others to spend more time on each user’s profile. Kinda reminds me of Myspace – I hope not.
There are a few things that do make sense here though. With the new emphasis on subscriptions, I anticipate they will likely turn on some sort of capability for individuals to create custom tabs like they do Facebook Pages. Facebook will also likely need to turn on analytics (they’re “Insights” product) to give full reasoning to have people with dual personal Facebook Pages and Profiles have a reason to switch.

Also, being able to go to my profile to see what music I’m listening to is also an interesting concept – not sure why they wouldn’t use the news feed for that, though. Instead, perhaps they’ll use some sort of concept more similar to Google+’s Hangouts or turntable.fm where you can actually listen together to the music, comment on what you’re listening to, and give others the ability to control your own music flow. The same could apply to movies as well.

With those out of the way, let me share a few things that just make sense to me, with the recent launch of subscriptions, and the direction Facebook seems to be going. I should be careful to note that I haven’t gotten any official confirmation from any Facebook employee on these. They are pure speculation on my part – they just make sense though. I predict some or all of these could be launched, and if they aren’t launched at F8 we will see them at some point in Facebook’s future:

A browser plugin platform, to complement the HTML5 Mobile platform. I’ve lauded the web with no login button for awhile now. The concept being you can go from site to site, and have each site automatically identify you based on information supplied by your browser. What if it was a Facebook extension or plugin in your browser that actually did this? What if Facebook provided a platform for this, so that other apps could easily tie in and augment the experience, based on permission from the user.
It just occurred to me today that it’s been a little eerie that there have been no hints of anything new in the code in Facebook’s website or their SDK. True, Facebook could just have a stronger security model than they used to (likely), but it could also be that some of their employees are also using a browser extension to test sharing, and other features. With this, it would be much harder to detect what’s happening, and you wouldn’t see anything in the code of the website itself.

Also interesting is the activity I’m seeing by Facebook’s Director of Product, Blake Ross, recently. He seems to have had a major role in the launch of many of these recent products. For those that don’t know, Blake Ross was one of the founders of the Mozilla Firefox project (yes, the browser).

I should also be clear that anything I ever see from an employee friend I never reveal on this blog – to me a friend is a friend, and I would never abuse that relationship. I can certainly write about what I’m not seeing though! (and of note, I have not seen anything this year, oddly!)

Better, and more accessible search options. With Facebook’s subscriptions recently launching, along with a better lists user experience and easier ability to target posts publicly, or to specific lists, it makes sense that more and more people on Facebook are going to begin posting updates publicly. This is what Facebook’s been trying to make happen for quite awhile now. I think finally they did it.
As a result, it makes sense that Facebook would release a better search user experience, to search these public updates. This is what currently makes Twitter powerful. And with the “Read, Watch, Listen” theme, it would make sense that Facebook wants you to be able to discover content easier. Will we be able to search public updates? Will there be trending terms and other stats (similar to their Lexicon that used to be available). I talked about this potential a few years ago.

The ability to “subscribe” to Lists. Several people, including Facebook’s Blake Ross (again, see the comments in that link), have hinted that Facebook is getting ready to launch better ways for family and friends to only get the content they want to see from you. This is the problem I’m running into right now with the new subscriptions. I post a lot more with subscriptions, but half of my posts my family and friends can’t even understand! The majority of my subscribers can though. So how do I set it so that my close family and friends don’t see those public updates?
A solution I think makes a lot of sense is the idea of creating Facebook lists that others can subscribe to. Right now, when someone subscribes to my public updates, I get a notification saying, “so and so has subscribed to your public updates”. What if that notification was also programmed to say “so and so has subscribed to your technology updates”? The wording seems to make that possible.

I think it would make a lot of sense if I could create lists targeted towards things I’m interested in. I could create a “technology” list. I could create a “facebook” list. Or, I could take one of my existing lists. Then I could have the option to make that list “subscribable”. Doing so would then, instead of only allowing me to decide who gets updates targeted towards that list, allow anyone who wants to be on that list also receive updates I want to intend towards people on that list. It would be a lot like an email list where anyone can subscribe to get updates, a common feature of many mailing list providers.

The death of Notes. As I said above, Blake Ross also confirmed tonight that tomorrow, a new change will be launching allowing Facebook posts to have a maximum limit of 5,000 characters, and potentially even more after that. The current limit is 500 characters. This, in essence, removes the need for the Notes app on Facebook. I think it makes a lot of sense that this app will go away. There’s just not much need any more for the app if I can do the same thing in my status updates.

The reintroduction of ActivityStreams, in a distributed consumption (and publishing) model. Chris Messina gave an excellent presentation on the vision for this model. Google+ just launched support (read-only right now) for ActivityStreams, in a limited format. It would make a lot of sense for Facebook to do the same. They’re already rumored to be launching Twitter integration and the ability to post updates to Twitter. What if they also end up having a content consumption model, using ActivityStreams’ standard to be able to import content that has a different source than the current site the content is being shared on. This, in essence, could allow for a distributed subscription model.
Also of note, Chris Messina worked on the SpreadFirefox project at Mozilla with Blake Ross

The launch of OpenID Connect support. OpenID Connect just released their spec. Both Facebook and Google have been very public supporters in the development of this spec. Facebook has always been one of the first on board to the new OAuth specs for developers, with their launch of OAuth 2.0 support last year. It would make a whole lot of sense for Facebook to launch their first implementation of OpenID Connect during this conference.

Revamped Facebook Pages. It’s already been rumored that profiles are getting a revamped look and feel. What about Facebook Pages? Up until now they’ve been pretty neglected. I think it makes a lot of sense that Facebook Pages would get a better interface. More moderation capabilities. Easier management. Better promotional opportunities to gain more likes. I think this is very likely this conference.

An actual Phone based on their Open Hardware initiative? Facebook has been very big on their open hardware support, with the launch of their new server hosting facility near Seattle. In fact, David Recordon, Facebook’s Senior Open Programs manager, was quoted recently by Jolie O’Dell at Venturebeat saying that Open Hardware was the future over open source software.
What if one of their focuses currently is on an open hardware phone? There’s nothing like that out there right now. Google’s focus with Android has been on open source, not Open Hardware. Facebook could really take the mobile game to the next level with this approach.

Of course, all these predictions are just speculation, but you have to admit they all make a lot of sense. Whether we see them at F8, or in the months following, I bet we see a lot of these come to fruition. The innovation in this space is just mind boggling (and I’m sure overwhelming for many users!). While I’m sure competitors such as Google+ are a motivating factor, Facebook truly seems to be thinking outside the box in their efforts going forward. As long as they keep doing so, we’ll continue to see this playing field move forward at a pace we’ve never seen before. Let’s just hope the users can keep up!

In the meantime, let me know in the comments if you’re coming to F8 – I’d love to meet you! Of course, as always, you can subscribe to me any time on Facebook to get more updates like this.

"Relative Finder", Using FamilySearch.org, Shows the Future of Social Genealogy

Posted on August 25, 2011 by jessestay

Family History, or Genealogy as it is also known, is one of the most popular hobbies in the world. There’s something fascinating about learning whom your ancestors are and where you come from. In a way, we all want to figure out how we’re linked together as a world. Imagine if you could index the entire, living, human family tree. If a new app on Facebook gets its way, you may just see this some time in the near future. The Facebook App, “Relative Finder”, seeks to do just that by searching family tree data provided by a new beta of FamilySearch.org (owned by my employer), and find out which of your Facebook friends are related to you based on the family trees of those individuals.

The new FamilySearch.org beta is currently limited to congregations of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and some select test audiences, but allows for individuals to type in simple information of their immediate relatives, and if a tree exists for those individuals it automatically links your existing family tree with that of other people in the database. So in essence, much of the family history research for many of your friends, and yourself, is already done, and will be available to everyone on the site to use in due time, according to the what FamilySearch says on their site.

Relative Finder, written by a group of BYU Computer Science students working on a class project, takes advantage of this data, and uses your social graph on Facebook to scan your friend list and go into the family trees of each on FamilySearch.org, identifying the relatives found in the FamilySearch database. It then gives you a list of your friends that are related to you, and tells you how far you are related. For me, most of my friends were between 7th and 10th cousins, but I found out very quickly a couple of my Facebook friends that were actually 3rd and 4th cousins. The great thing is, unlike apps like Geni or FamilyLink or others that rely that you manually upload your data to match living relatives, all of this happens automatically because of the data provided by FamilySearch!

Right now Relative Finder requires each of your friends on Facebook to authorize Relative Finder through Facebook before it identifies them as relatives (as far as I can tell). I’m unsure though why they require this (maybe for load balancing purposes?). If they wanted, with Facebook API they could retrieve the same data about your friends by just authorizing you, and not requiring your friends to authorize. If they did it that way, then I could find out how many of all of my friends I am related to, instead of just those that authorize the app and have a FamilySearch.org beta account. Regardless, this is truly revolutionary, and shows the tremendous potential for indexing the entire family tree of every living individual on this earth. Can you imagine the world-changing potential to find out how we are all related?

At the moment only members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, for the most part, will be able to use this app due to the limitations of the new FamilySearch. However, as soon as the new FamilySearch.org beta opens up to the public (it says “look for a future announcement” on the website), everyone should be able to use this feature. Once we do, can you imagine how fast an app like this will grow?

To me, the future of Genealogy is social. In many ways, the future of Social is genealogy. In the end this is all about finding out how we’re all related, what our common connections are, and how we can work together better as a society based on those common connections. My hope is that other sites, like Facebook and Google+ also realize this connection, and can find ways to integrate technologies like this into their own platforms so we can all learn more about each other, and share through common connections (I’m happy to make introductions if anyone at either company is interested).

Relative Finder has really exposed the tip of the iceberg in what social genealogy could look like. I really love this app, and can’t wait for everyone in the world to be able to start using it. I’ll include some screen shots below.

Disclosure: FamilySearch.org is owned by my employer, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. While I don’t work directly with them I do occasionally talk to them. I have not talked to them or consulted with them specifically about this though, nor have I had any participation with Relative Finder, produced by a group of BYU students (BYU also owned by the Church). This is just really cool technology that, no matter where it came from, I thought needed to be shared!