Month: December 2008

FriendConnect

I hadn’t really had a chance to have a proper play with FriendConnect before today. It’s basically a Google service that lets you add social functionality to your website, based on the OpenSocial framework. This means that if you have an account with Google, AOL, Yahoo! or OpenID you can interact with the various services.

What does this actually mean? Well, it enables you to add (sort-of) social networking capabilities to your site, whether it is a blog or a traditional static site, by simply pasting in a bit of code. I’ve added two bits so far: one is the (rather pointless but kind of nice) ability to become a ‘member’ of this blog:

Which a marvellous four people had done at the time of typing (one of whom, er, is me). I suppose this is a little like MyBlogLog territory.

The second is hidden away on the Community page – it’s like a comment wall that you might find on a Facebook profile. I have been umming and ahing over adding a forum to DavePress to enable a bit of interaction between folk here. They do have a habit of looking a little empty, though, and this might just keep the barriers to entry low enough to make it work rather well.

I’ve never had a proper look at KickApps, who seem to offer a similar service. Can anyone share experiences on them?

Bookmarks for December 28th through December 30th

Stuff I have bookmarked for December 28th through December 30th:

Community facilitators

From Rich Millington:

A moderator keeps things normal. A moderator removes the extremes from the community. Moderating isn’t as hard as moderators would have you believe. You can typically find community members to do it.

A facilitator makes it easier for the community to communicate. A facilitator takes the community through a process, and does it well. A facilitator points out common objectives. A facilitator draws out opinions from less-vocal members. A facilitator helps the community tackle any stumbling blocks.

I think you should be a facilitator.

(I love Rich’s blog, by the way. It’s a recent find for me, but his short, pithy, confident posts containing an idea and very little flannel just work for me. Wish I could write this way…)

Bookmarks for December 21st through December 28th

Stuff I have bookmarked for December 21st through December 28th:

Tom Watson’s Christmas Message

Our Minister for Digital Engagement’s blog has a stark message:

Globalisation in a connected world did for Woolies. When my son is a teenager, his friends will arrange to meet online and share their music tastes before pressing the ‘buy’ button. They’ll discover the world from their shared trust in favourite web sites.

We are entering an era of profound and irreversible change to the way people choose to live their lives and organise the world around them.

And there isn’t a politician on the planet who is going to stop this.

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