Google starts linking social networks
Let’s see. I’m on Twitter, Facebook, WordPress, Upcoming, Pownce, Plaxo, Yelp, MySpace, Flickr, Dopplr, and a few others.
The problem? They don’t know about each other.
Google, today, with its new Social Graph API, is trying to hook all of those together.
Another problem? If you’re a developer and build a “foograph” your new application doesn’t have anyone on it. There’s nothing lamer than a new social network that has no one on it.
Google’s new effort lets you import friends from other social networks into your new application.
The details are on the new Google Social API site (the sample apps should be turned on shortly but weren’t working when published this blog post) with more background from Brad Fitzgerald on the Google Code blog.
The problem is that for apps to be able to sense all your connections you’ll need to add (rel=”me”) tags.
Mike Arrington at TechCrunch has a few more details on this announcement.
In the test that they ran for me it showed about half of my social networks. I expect that will increase pretty rapidly as more social networking systems support the “rel=”me”" system.
UPDATE: Plaxo just shipped the first app (they claim) using this new API.
Powered By 
February 1st, 2008 at 12:38 pm
The sample applications are up and running now:
http://code.google.com/apis/socialgraph/docs/examples.html
February 1st, 2008 at 3:48 pm
This is HUGE news, overshadowed by MSFT/YHOO for the time being. I don’t think it an exaggeration to say:
“This changes everything.”
February 1st, 2008 at 9:04 pm
[...] on the Social Graph API — Danny Sullivan, Josh Catone, Philipp Lenssen, Jordan McCollum, Robert Scoble, Michael Arrington, . Share This If you enjoyed this post, make sure you subscribe to my RSS feed! [...]
February 1st, 2008 at 11:19 pm
<3 Web 3.0!!!
February 1st, 2008 at 11:53 pm
[...] the process of adding contacts to this new network from previous social networks? Well some of the A-list bloggers [...]
February 2nd, 2008 at 12:27 am
I love the sound of this, certainly - I have at least one friend with five or six connections between us (LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter and her blog’s RSS feed, as well as friend status on a few forum sites) and being able to copy relationships around would be very welcome.
(Rant from European about how evil Google is and how this breaks EU law in 3, 2…)
February 2nd, 2008 at 2:20 am
[...] API TechCrunch - Google Gathers Social Graph Information From The Web, Launches API Scobelizer - Google Starts Linking Social Networks Read/Write Web - Plaxo Pulse First to Use Google’s Social [...]
February 2nd, 2008 at 1:32 pm
Robert,
As always, top notch insight. I wonder at what we might call “the cart before the horse” syndrome.” In integrating all these services Google has done something fantastico, but should these services not be focused on the quality of data involved rather than how to “migrate” a beer to someone from Facebook to Twitter?
I think that if we begin a discourse on this issue, then perhaps we will have some data to traverse the web with. Not to seem to critical, but should we not focus some on taking this Web to the next level?
Always,
Phil
February 2nd, 2008 at 8:20 pm
Have you heard of Austin based Minggl http://www.minggl.com? From their site: Minggl is a toolbar that brings your social sites together in one place, feeding you the latest activities of friends, no matter where you are on the web.
February 3rd, 2008 at 11:15 am
If Microsoft would have done this we would up in arms….
Google does not control the relationships or the api……Just like they dont control any of the content that they spider that does not belong to them…..and turn this content that they dont own into billons of dollars for Google and very little for the original creators of the content….If goog is so good….why don’t they open source the entire project and create a non profit to run “Open” Social….They will not do this because they want to corner the market on the indexing of relationships that should be owned and controlled by the end users and not Google…Will Google ask me for permission to crawl my relationships ?
Can I delete my relationships from the Google servers…The data is on Google’s servers….and they are a company…so they do own the data…
….How is this better than facebook ?
Did Google contact any of the other companies that have social networks to ask them for their input ?
No….
Will there be a standards committee that allows end users and companies other than Google to have some input into “Open” Social..Dont hold your breath….its not going to happen…
Any initiative to deal with a “Social” Graph should not be run by anyone company…Google is a company and we should stop fooling ourselves that they are in business for the public “Good”.
Google is in Business to make money and this means that by their nature they will try to dominate with little to no regard to any notion of an open standard that would even the playing field for their competitors.
February 3rd, 2008 at 1:16 pm
Interesting stuff as I, a digital immigrant, subscribe to more social networks and struggle to internalize the value. But, it also will influence our corporate decisions about how best to integrated and apply exrternal social networks — or at least their functionality — to the enterprise collaboration software we develop.
February 3rd, 2008 at 1:53 pm
[...] Facebook et sa platform reposent sur une technologie propriétaire. Propriétaire ? Voilà un mot qui appartient au passé, surtout avec des initiatives comme OpenSocial ou la Social Graph API que Google vient de sortir (cf. Google starts linking social networks). [...]
February 3rd, 2008 at 7:42 pm
Hi Robert, it’s actually Brad Fitzpatrick, not Brad Fitzgerald.
February 4th, 2008 at 7:46 am
I guess this is kind of like the google reader for social networks.
Be even cooler if you could pull in the data from your relationships.
Eric
February 4th, 2008 at 3:29 pm
[...] Facebook et sa platform reposent sur une technologie propriétaire. Propriétaire ? Voilà un mot qui appartient au passé, surtout avec des initiatives comme OpenSocial ou la Social Graph API que Google vient de sortir (cf. Google starts linking social networks). [...]
February 9th, 2008 at 12:35 am
Where do these people get the time to join and read the stuff on these social networks. Methinks some of it must get outsourced to lower wage countries.