Facebook And Google Finally Share Something

Social networks think that the members’ data is what differentiates them from other social networks. The data using which they draw social graphs or find contexts for advertising is gold and there is no way that can be shared. While there was a small project called DataPortability.org aimed at making data portable and networks interoperable, social network members used unusual ways of extracting their own data. This was mainly because the giants never acknowledged it. But, as a pleasant surprise, Facebook, Google and Plaxo have joined the DataPortability.org project.

We are proud to announce the inclusion of Joseph Smarr (Plaxo), Brad Fitzpatrick (Google) and Benjamin Ling (Facebook) to the DataPortability Workgroup.

Efforts like this and the OpenSocial are steps towards relieving us of the social network fatigue.

I also hope that this will start a trend where social applications start looking at enabling the user to share as a necessary feature. I might be jumping to conclusions here, as no other details are available. However, as an optimist, I hope that by sharing responsibility in the DataPortability.org workgroup, giants like Facebook and Google will share more and empower the users more.