Google FriendConnect enters social web fray with FaceBook’s Connect and Data Availability by Myspace
By Leslie Poston
Not one to be left out of a good thing, Google has been developing its own version of the social web over the last few months. One part data portability and one part DIY social network API, Google’s FriendConnect should go live after their big Campfire One meeting at the Google complex in Silicon Valley.
Google unveiled a limited edition preview a few hours before the meeting, creating the typical buzz that comes from Google API announcements. One question people are asking is whether it is a direct response to the recent data portability release from MySpace called Data Availability or the recent open web release from FaceBook, FaceBook Connect.
Since Google was one of the first to sign on to the Data Portability movement, and has been actively working on Open Social for months, the answer to that question is obvious: no. Add in the fact that applications take months to develop and it is reinforced that this is Google’s answer to a growing social media movement, separate from the trends of other sites.
What FriendConnect is supposed to do for the web is make the vast percentage of it that isn’t social into a social network you port with you using technology found in OpenID, OAuth and Open Social. If Google succeeds in making the first successful, DIY, completely portable social network, we could be done with the heinous assault of the glitter graphics of MySpace forever by being able to interact with those friends on other sites.
The learning curve for Google’s FriendConnect may be the thing that hampers some people. Most web users don’t follow every social media wonder site that pops up, which means that Google’s FriendConnect may only appeal to social media’s technorati at first, similar to Twitter when it first launched. I see this growing by leaps and bounds, aided by the Google brand.
Because Google has become a name people inherently trust (which doesn’t mean they should, just that they do), people may be more willing to adopt the Google FriendConnect application in everyday use at a faster rate than they might another application. It will be interesting to follow the release’s early adopters and see who sticks with it and who drops it (look how fast people leapt from SocialThing to FriendFeed when the next best shiny object launched).
Once the meeting ends Google FriendConnect will start going live. Until then you can try it out on independent musician Ingrid Michaelson’s site here. You can also visit the Google Guacamole site for a sample of how it would work.
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