where to even begin….

On a macro note I think this is the beginning of Facebook really really coming into focus on whatever it is ultimately going to become. Attempting to tackle the semantic web is huge and they are taking a very unique and untried approach. There team is waaay smart and they obviously get the web.

On a micro note my suspicion is that the simple gesture of “liking” something will be really natural and nonchalant. I already “like” things often in Google Buzz. I haven’t looked too closely at the API but there were emails going around today on the HTML5 working group mailing list mentioning that it is based on RDFa. I superficially understand RDF (subject-object-predicate expressions. lame examples: Carlos is 29 or Carlos Cardona has the initials CC). I think I got off point..

On the flip side there are the usual privacy concerns. From what I understand the Open Graph is opt-out. So we will see what unfolds there.

Also I thought it was interesting how Bret Taylor, the engineer who came to facebook with the friendfeed acquisition, played such an important role in the keynote and afterward press session. It seemed like he was #2, which surprised me.

Finally, for a brief moment I wondered if this company wasn’t going to be as big as google in 5 years. Which of course is the cliche and meme going around the web today, but I really did ask myself that.

But I kinda forsee one problem. The link that google reverse engineered, the <a href=”">hyperlink</a>, is fundamental to the web. It’s just natural to link from one document to another, hence the web’s creation, growth, ubitquity, etc. The current web is overwhelmingly a link economy. I don’t know that “liking” things will be as natural or ubiquitous as a hyperlink. It’s not that I doubt that it can be. It’s just that I don’t know if it will have the pervasiveness of <a href=”"></a>.

Double finally, I don’t think it’s a great idea that only one company has control of the semantic web. OpenLike much?

Your thoughts?

No tags

I’ve been thinking how time is the ultimate scarcity economy. There is only so much time in a day. I only have so many years before I die. I only have so much attention to spread around and everyday there is too much new stuff to know and learn. Time is the ultimate scarcity economy That is why it is so hard to get people to try new things. They too, whether they realize it or not, at least sense that they have a finite amount of time to do things and an infinite variety of choice. You might say, “What if you could live forever or at least extend your life?” That doesn’t solve the problem because the longer you live the more stuff there is going to be to occupy your attention. It’s not as if you live long enough you will be able to see and know all things. “But what if you could slow down time and experience everything in every moment before moving on to the next moment?” That doesn’t seem to work because a crucial part of living and experiencing is flowing in time with those around us. It might just be that time really is the ultimate scarcity economy. Theres only so much time to go around. Don’t waste your time.

No tags

No tags