How Does Facebook Plan To Maintain Its Social Network Dominance?

5 Comments 23 September 2011

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At the F8 2011 developer conference Facebook made its boldest move yet to secure the second most valuable resource a social network needs to stay relevant. The first thing being actual users and the second you ask, developers. In order to maintain its dominance as the industry leading social network Facebook needs to have the best third party developers creating apps for it and not rivals like Twitter and Google Plus.

Having 800 million users isn’t enough to guarantee an unassailable lead, to stay ahead Facebook needs constant innovation via outside partners. The carrot that Facebook plans to use to win over developers is access to users social graph connections coupled with data collected via Open Graph partner sites. With access to this data it will be possible to build apps that take into consideration your interests, friends, location, the music your listening to or movie your watching etc. From today forward all Facebook apps will be able to tailor themselves to you.

Facebook Open Graph Partner Sites

In particular one such developer partner ‘Color’ has taken new found access to users location data, friends lists and photos to rebuild their mobile app from the ground up. They’ve revamped their photo sharing app to be 100% built on top of Facebook’s Open Graph data. In fact it would be safe to call Color for Facebook an all new 3rd party client.

What happens when all of a sudden applications and user profiles can start talking to each other? -Bill Nguyen, founder/CEO, Color

Color for Facebook

Color will allow you to take a photo, share it to Facebook and instantly create a location based video streaming hangout. Here is a scenario for you to consider.

A bunch of friends are at a concert and you’re home on Facebook, they post a photo from the concert, the photo then prompts you to ‘visit‘ the location. Once you click visit and your friend accepts the request a ‘Facetime‘ like video broadcast is initiated and you can now watch a live video broadcast of the party from the comfort of your home. This takes sharing your life to a whole new level.

Robert Scoble interviews Bill Nguyen founder/CEO of Color.com

Color is just one example of the new types of apps that will be leveraging the Open Graph. If it is any indication to go by, Facebook will now serve as the back bone for real time location apps.

Color is currently in private beta and will be available for both iPhone and Android.

What do you think, will giving developers access to the Open Graph keep Facebook one step ahead of its social network rivals?

You can follow me here: @KevinMinott

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http://www.brucesallan.com Bruce Sallan

I know I’m dating myself, but I have a fantasy. It’s very simple. No, it doesn’t involve Angelina so get your mind out of the gutter. Mine relates to technology. Would they please leave me alone for just a little while? Just when I’ve FINALLY “got” a particular thing, they go and “Improve” it! Can’t something be left GOOD for more than a couple/three months?
- http://komverse.com/ KevinMinott
  
  My wife is the same way. She can’t stand the constant change to websites. But that is the price of progress.
  
  Thanks for stopping by Bruce.
  - http://www.brucesallan.com Bruce Sallan
    
    Well, I like your wife already! Lol…the irony is once I “do it” I’m usually in love! Like with Triberr, Twitter, and having my own Tweet Chat (#DadChat). Now it’s the timeline for Facebook. Thankfully, I have a great guide from Pam Moore! The thing is…I like to have someone show me…THAT always makes it so much easier!
http://twitter.com/imstrategies imstrategies

Great write up Kevin. I personally hate Facebook, it is so UN user friendly and I am a webmaster! I am very curious to see how Facebook will fare with Google + in the mix.
- http://komverse.com/ KevinMinott
  
  They should be working on de-cluttering their interface instead of adding more panels and features on top. It remains to be see how people will react when the new timeline goes live this week.