One of the biggest questions floating around social media circles (aside from “How in the world is Twitter going to make money?“) is “Who is going to own our data?” Right now there are two likely answers, and I’m guessing you’ve heard of the companies behind each. Yes, big shocker, Google and Facebook both think they have the answer, and those answers are surprisingly similar.
Not only do Friend Connect and Facebook Connect have nearly identical names, but our benevolent overlords at Google and their mini-mes at Facebook actually released the competing platforms within an hour of each other back on Dec. 4. And while it’s never wise to count out the Big G, with two months of hindsight, Facebook is clearly in the lead.
The problem both platforms ostensibly solve is the glut of login information we all gather online (A username and password for every site? Come on! How am I supposed to keep track of all that?), but that seems to be where Google draws the line. Facebook Connect on the other has two killer features: access to the Facebook News Feed and the benefit of actually knowing who our friends are. (To be fair, Friend Connect offers some free widgets you can put on your site, but it’s a lame effort.)
Let’s start with the News Feed. Anytime you do anything with Facebook Connect, you have the option of letting your friends know by publishing the activity to your Facebook News Feed. Commenting on a blog post? Let your friends know. Buying a tchotcke? Let your friends know. Web publishers love this as it gives them add-on traffic when your friends see what you’re up to and think to themselves “Hey, I should be doing that too!”
Then there’s Facebook’s massive network of users. This is a great benefit to you and me, the users. Because Facebook knows who my friends are, if I want them to know that I left a comment on Lifehacker, I can be pretty sure they will get the job done. Contrast that with Google, which apparently thinks I have only two friends (granted I can tell you where they are at any time with Latitude). I’m not likely to trust them with the task of spreading my news when they clearly don’t know who’s in my social circle.
But never one to rest on its laurels, on Wednesday Google added a new way to display Friend Connect features. What’s the verdict? How about you just see my last comment about “lame effort.”
Sorry, Google, if another toolbar taking up my screen real estate doesn’t get me fired up. What does get me going though? Off the top of my head? I’d say the ability to sync my mobile phone’s address book with Facebook. Oh, they’re working on that? Those sly devils.