Jan08
09
A Mountain Or A Molehill?
One of the disadvantages to the competition between the most popular Web 2.0 tech blogs, i.e. TechCrunch, Mashable, Read/Write Web, GigaOm and in other respects Engadget and Gizmodo, is that sometimes sensationalism sells blog posts too. It’s not just newspapers that need catchy headlines to grab our attention anymore.
Also, the scoop has become a powerful competitive differentiator, as Afrigator discovered when TechCrunch were pissed that we gave Read/Write Web our Beta story first.
This morning I fired up TechMeme to see what the global blogosphere is talking about and the first headline was this - Bombshell: Google and Facebook join DataPortability.org. Bombshells, according to me, are big things. As I gather it (and forgive me slash correct me if I’m wrong) the DataPortability workgroup - a group of representatives “actively working to create the ‘DataPortability Reference Design’ to document the best practices for integrating existing open standards and protocols for maximum interoperability” - announced this morning that high-level representatives from Plaxo, Google and Facebook were going to be “(contributing) to their conversation”.
Now I get the importance and huge potential of data portability and I understand why in the long term this may be critical to the value of our experience of the Web’s leading social platforms as they grow in size and functionality, but it doesn’t feel like a bombshell. I don’t want to blow the wind out of Marshall Kilpatrick’s sails ‘cos he’s a good guy who has been particularly nice to us in the past, but is it possible that the leading tech news sites on the Web are becoming more and more reliant on a degree of sensationalism, combined with the power of the scoop, to compete for our attention?
More to the point, what do you think of the announcement itself?
This is a big thing Mike, mostly because it was unexpected. One of the biggest crticisms of Facebook was its “walled garden” approach. By joining the data portability group Google and Facebook (probably two of the biggest stores of user data) are signalling a move towards open platforms where you can easily take your data and social graph with you.
Remember our “You are the social network” conversation yesterday? This is what it is all about.
*Please delete the half typed comment above. My cat jumped on my keyboard. Stealthy cat is stealthy.*
I understand that Jaxon but this is simply an announcement that representatives from each will join the discussion. Not that Google and Facebook have agreed to be open?
Yes, but up until now there was very little indication that Facebook was open to data portability. The fact that Google and Facebook are joining the working group means that this is now inevitable in some form or another.
I’m skeptical. I’m pretty sure they’re both “joining” simply to keep their options open, and possibly even to defend their interests in future should the DataPortability Reference Design turn out to be some sort of real standard. It’s simply insurance - without representation one of these companies could be easily caught with their pants down. They all want to know what the others are up to with their user data.
The real ‘bombshell’ is the the subtle, ‘friendly’, slipping off of the gloves in the fight to control user data.
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