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Contributor forteller

"Social from the start" must not strengthen the burgeoning online monopolies  
Written by forteller the 11 Feb 10 at 12:16. Global category: Internet & Networking. New
The next Ubuntu version 10.04 (Lucid) is going to be "Social from the start", that's to say that it's going to integrate Gwibber and the MeMenu to make it easy for all Ubuntu users to connect to online social networks. This is a good thing, but it's also dangerous. Let me explain:

As it is now, Gwibber only supports connecting to Twitter, Identi.ca, Facebook, and Flickr. All except one of these services are the most popular in their field in the US and parts of Europe (microblogging, social network, photo sharing).

Only supporting the most popular services out of the box is a terrible idea. It helps perpetuate the semi-monopoly that these services holds in the market. The huge market share that some services has is a Bad Thing, and the more 3rd party apps that only work with these services out of the box, the harder it is to switch to something else. If your whole OS is designed to work with only one online service, then the chance of you switching away is even slimmer.

The web is slowly taking over for the OS as the place where you run your apps. Lets compare it with the OS scene a few years ago. Lets say you had a lot of apps that only worked in Windows. Maybe you had to use them for work, or maybe you just enjoyed them. The chance of you switching to Linux would be pretty slim. And the more Windows only apps you got, the slimmer the chances became.

Today it's kinda the other way around: You have online apps you want to use, and the more third party apps that only works with the online apps you use today, the slimmer the chance is you're going to switch to something else. Just as Windows had a virtual monopoly in OSs then, Flickr and Twitter has virtual monopolies in their spaces today.

In a way third party apps works like DRM for online services. Can't play your music on anything else than an iPod? Next time you need an mp3-player you're going to buy an iPod. Can't use an online service with the third party apps that are built into you OS? You're not going to switch to another service.

But OS's wasn't social back then, there was no immediate benefit for you if you used the same OS as most others (except for more working apps, just like with online services today), so it was (and still is) easier to switch OS than it is to switch social networks, microblogs, etc. This is why the online services that's competing with the most popular services, needs all the help they can get. Linux shows how important it is to have real competition. Now you need to be the ones fostering competition, trough supporting as many services as possible out of the box, not only StatusNet and other Free/Open Source project like it, but especially those.

[....]
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Solution #1: Support as many online services and protocolls as possible
Written by forteller the 11 Feb 10 at 12:16.
Twitter and Identi.ca are only two of many different microblogging services. Facebook is only one of many social networks, and Flickr is only one of many photosharing sites.

Gwibber and the MeMenu must support as many services as possible, both in these three categories, and in others (like video sharing, lifestreams etc.)

A few examples:

Microblogging: Google Buzz, Plurk, Emote.in, Squeelr, Beeing (Tumblr?)

Social networks: Bebo, hi5, My Opera, Plaxo, LinkedIn

Photo sharing: Redbubble, Ipernity, Zooomr, Shutterfly, SmugMug, Zoto

See many more here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_social_networking_websites

As many open protocolls that can be used by online services must also be supported. Examples are OMB, PubSubHubbub, OneSocialWeb, (RSSCloud?)
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Solution #2: Gwibber/MeMenu must be constantly updated with support for more online services
Written by forteller the 11 Feb 10 at 12:23.
New online services pops up every week, and there's already too many for Gwibber to support them all in time for Ubuntu 10.04. Therefore it is important that we don't have to wait another six months for more services to be in place in Gwibber. When the suppport of new services has been baked into the code and tested, this new functionality should be sent out to the end users along with security updates, and not sit and wait until the next version of Ubuntu.
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Solution #3: Give preference not to popular services, but to open source services
Written by Menti the 13 Feb 10 at 16:07.
For example: Twitter is more popular, but Identi.ca server software is open source. So, if support is provided to both services, display Identi.ca more prominently or "recommend" Identi.ca.
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Solution #4: Make each and every ubuntu machine social! - skip the need for websites!
Written by Blinky the 16 Feb 10 at 12:03.
There is no reason why our own machines can't BE the social networking site. Stop connecting to other social sites and make one that is where social sites might develope... the net will in the future decentralise... everything does. From political systems to android operating systems.

We can either have our social networks centralised or decentralised. Centralised is everything on facebook's server. If facebook's servers go down then no one can communicate. Or decentralised, i am my own host and just send messages/packets to you. this means I have to be online all the time and the computer shares my status or information is swarmed (if i send out my status to the internet its partially hosted on others computers or web servers). If my computer goes down then no one else is affected and other can still share there information i.e. there is no centralised server that can go down.

We need computers that talk to each other... not log onto a website.

We can do it a number of ways. I see two big ones 1) I have a home server that is online all the time and my info is there i.e. my home server is the social networking site and connects direct to other computers to shares info. I then connect directly to my home server directly when i log onto my computer. With this idea there is room to start serously integrating the Ubuntu server with the desktop version - not a bad idea. Even before I open my web browser i am sending and receiving social networking info via my personal server etc. Add notifications to ubuntu inbuilt etc or 2) my computer is the server and shares information to tother computer (negates the need for internet servers at home).

In both cases the apps on facebook are parts of the computers operating system (facebook's message app is essentially our mail app just hosted by a home server or my own computer). Start making the look of ubuntu based on how we interact and how we want to interact. Send messages, status updates, photos, video, social bookmarking etc... make the ubuntu optimal for doing this not in the web browser but the operating system.

Make the computers background a live back ground with updates etc.

Of course there are security issues but these can be overcome I'm sure. I mean how many times is my email compromised at google!!!
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Solution #5: gNewBook support
Written by Aljullu the 20 Feb 10 at 22:16.
gNewBook (www.gnewbook.org) is a small social network in Spanish. It's based in elgg software and it's similar to Facebook in features. It's open-source and it's provided by GNU Chile. Ubuntu should give them support because it's the only free (libre) alternative to Facebook.

(excuse me for my bad English)
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Solution #6: Don't be "social from the start", in that way
Written by cladelpino the 8 Mar 10 at 01:36.
Allow the user to install the different applications that support different social networks, or none, if he will not use that feature.

This could be implemented as a final instance of the installation process.

Attempting to have a one(or two)-fits-all application for social networks is not only against modularity, but installing them by default (I'm thinking there's a lot of people that install ubuntu that don't even think about social networks) points in the exact direction I don't want Ubuntu to go.
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Solution #7: Ask user in a friendly first login configuration dialog
Written by kpk187 the 4 Apr 10 at 04:31.
Many users want to be tightly integrated into their favorite social networking services. However, just as many want nothing to do with social networking.

Make it an easy option and choice. If users want nothing to do with it, they choose so and never be bothered again. If users want to use the integration features, ask them what services they would like to use and set it up for them.

If the service is not listed, let them request support for it.

Give them an easy option for privacy settings. Maximum privacy by default, ask users how much they are willing to share about themselves and configure it for them.

Users should not have to feel like the settings are a chore.

Keep local copies of all social networking data sent or received, unless user says otherwise. Use this local data for easy migration to other services.

Make it a utility, "Move me to another service" "Sync to both services" "Close my account at X" "Open a new account at Y"

Put the user in control, make sure they don't need to know a thing about tech or software.

Users should not feel overwhelmed with these tools. It should be simple, and not do anything unexpected.
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Solution #8: decentralize and secure our social existance
Written by riondluz the 7 Dec 10 at 00:06.
Another vote in support of Blinky, make social sites irrelevant. But considering that this crowd downmodded him into oblivion while upmodding just the opposite makes me suspect little traction for what I propose.

Though still 1/2-baked, what he (and I) recommend would be totally different and only really capable (IMO) through a major distro and custom, signed, secure, packages.

My suggestion is firstly to decentralize our social 'footprint' from all websites like FB; the second is to promote Linux generally and Ubuntu in particular as the OS/distro whose awesome app encourages users to migrate away from Windows.

The first purpose is to operate in a secure medium (GPG/SSH/SSL) and have full control over OUR content OUR data; as it would reside on localhost AOT someone else's server. No more data-mining, ads, etc..

Please note that this is just off the top of my head, but I believe that the next big thing (NBT) can be decentralization of the social web; somewhat like P2P; when average computer users can run both clients AND servers (just not public-facing servers) from their boxen.

In addition to have releases scoped to "workstation" or "server" how about a 'Social Edition' that enhances the workstation with special server packages designed to do everything FB does, only on localhost.

There is no reason why a non-tech user (a noob) could not run servers on their localhost, provided its easy to setup, use and is secure.

This distro I envision would include something similar to TOR, or Freenet, .... but contain components/modules that
permit users to connect with each other and share info just like FB. (I like to think of it as flocking)

Sort of analog to P2P (or RSS), but for sharing our individual information with those who are mutually white-listed.

These server packages would include AMP plus
web applications which would permit users to connect to
a localhost interface. This interface would control configuration (vhost), firewall, buddy-lists, etc..

Thus all data among users would be transported via port 443, store the info in DB/XML or other; and from which native apps could be used to render the data and interact with http://localhost/ as the 'proxy' for the native apps.

The idea that ISP's disallow servers is moot now that settop appliances are commonplace. Is all the userspace needs now is to move into server-space, with some good apps backed by the reputation of a great distribution.

Making this possible would also be incentive to abandon windows as it sucks in server space.

See the 13 comments or propose a solution (latest comment the 27 Aug 10 at 01:30) >>