Facebook and Google join DataPortability.org

This being-treated-like-a-commoner simply will not stand for you, huh?

I sure HOPE the announcement means you won’t be able to use an automated harvester to bulk download e-mail addresses. Like you did.

Robert, thanks for all the work you’ve done around this already. Your experimenting with the Plaxo scraper and then doing all that media around it to discuss the issues was great. Very controversial and I don’t think there are clear-cut answers but your work was a real service to users in terms of forcing the issue and discussing it articulately.

Robert, thanks for all the work you’ve done around this already. Your experimenting with the Plaxo scraper and then doing all that media around it to discuss the issues was great. Very controversial and I don’t think there are clear-cut answers but your work was a real service to users in terms of forcing the issue and discussing it articulately.

Robert Scoble,

What if funding was suddenly dropped in one of your friends hands to do the Open Data Social Platform idea?

Ah you got EMAIL!

I cannot state here which funding firm and etc…

Don’t belittle this, point made, model chanced, superb news. Now, contribute to their success helping us make the most of our data in the web 2.0 world.

i think you need to move on robert.

If you keep griping about something, that was after all your fault, for breaking their T&C’s, by using a script, you’ll keep looking like a child who is throwing a tantrum.

For all intense purposes you could have looked like some sort of hacker to their system.

leave it, move on, and get back to the writing we know you are all capable of!

You are our hero!!! Thank you so much.

Your incident with facebook has really shined the light on this issue and particularly on DataPortability initiative.

My post about it here http://technozzle.com/?p=28

Scoblegate was an agent of change!

Well done for keeping the spotlight on this *critical* issue, Mr Scoble – and let’s hope Facebook’s move to join the DataPortability initiative is genuine (I don’t doubt Google’s is)… and doesn’t end up like Intel’s faux flirtation with OLPC.

Absolutely stunning news. Nothing like giving Facebook a shove in the right direction!

Let’s wait until Facebook actually DOES something about their walled-garden.

Just joining a group means nothing (except maybe they are there to disrupt the group).

I second Marshall– thanks for doing this. You took a lot of heat for it, but you brought the issue out in the open.

I guess that means we’ll soon be able to import Facebook’s contacts into other systems like Gmail and Outlook?

NO – It means Facebook is joining Dataportability.org.

Nothing more!

With any luck, I’m sure you’ll be kicked off of Facebook and other sites at least once before anything is done with Data Portability. I think it’s amusing everyone considers you some sort of Data Patriot for essentially being Plaxo’s willing guinea pig (with other bloggers who you always fail to mention). If a company asked you to violate a law to test software, would you? Or have you already? If Facebook hadn’t kicked you off and given you a chance to throw a public tantrum, would you have told everyone about your experiment?

The single question you seemed to have refused to answer is: what if even a single person on Facebook, in your friends list, likes being on Facebook because they have rules against things like you did? Or do you hold those people in as much contempt because they aren’t likely to enjoy your opinion on rulebreaking?

Interesting that wanting privacy is so out of vogue…