One of the really interesting things was not about the format of the page – but what it can do now.  For the first time a page can now act more like a profile – in that it can “like” other pages and have a news feed of it’s own.  For example if you look at the sample screen shot I provided you can see how I “liked” 2 other pages -and this shows prominently on this Facebook page.  So this opens up a potential marketing tool – as you can like and interact with others pages.  For example you could “like” a fan page where your customers live – posting content directly on that page – but as your FAN page.  I know that’s a little confusing – but it’s closer to what some people have asked of me.  You still can’t directly interact with other profiles – which is what some people I’ve talked wanted to do (that’s why some businesses have used a profile instead of a page).

Overall I liked the change – I just had to come up with some photos quickly (and will need to do for another FAN page) for it to make sense.  I do think many business owners will really like the ability to like (that came out strange).  I also think a more consistent UI to the screens is a good thing – to make it easier for users.

About a year later (maybe less – I’m horrible with time) a friend of my wife’s (of course younger just to again remind me) invited me to Facebook And I decided to try it.  I didn’t do much with it first – mainly re-connecting with old friends who moved away (that’s when I realized they have another kid).  I found it was interesting and incredibly time efficient to communicate what’s going on and learn about their lives.  I’m now pretty well addicted to it – checking it multiple times a day and helping businesses use it.
After using it for a while I really wanted to read the ‘Facebook Effect’ – to learn more about how the company came to be.  I’m glad I read it – as I learned some fascinating details of how it came to be – mainly just how well Mark Zuckerburg managed it’s growth.

Again I don’t like to re- hash the book – but talk about what I learned. One of the fascinating things is the network effect - how growth is nearly exponential – as well as the value it provides grows as well.  Facebook grew faster than they hoped – as it was useful to their users – and they wanted their friends to be a part of it – their real friends in lfe.

That was the other part of it – on Facebook you are you – not some persona or alias.  This changed how we interacted and how we behaved (unlike the comments on newspapers where you can anonymously be a total jerk).  So it makes sense that I want my friends online – to be involved in their lives.

Now that’s why it’s also addictive – as all your friends are on it.  It would be hard to go to a competiitor as your friends aren’t on it.  So they’re in a great position in that sense.  And frankly we also find it incredibly useful – it meets a strong need and want in our lives.

So in a way Facebook is our story – as we are a part of it.  What I find interesting is that this company grew because it worked for us – we made it grow.  So many companies spend money promoting their idea of what we want and fail.  I think finding what we want and meeting that is a much better way to go.  So what affect has Facebook had on you and your business?

k to have to keep checking this stuff – as I fear they are on a path from private to public – as they can make more money that way.  Of course this is quite annoying to some of us – as it feels like a breach of trust. To see your settings hover over “Account” (on the upper-right part of the screen) then “Privacy Settings”.

One thing Facebook just recently did was publish a summary of your privacy settings – which is good.  On the right I’m showing my settings – which are pretty conservative.  I basically set most of my stuff to be private – i.e. only my friends can see it – as I use Facebook in a private manner (For public items I have a website, Facebook FAN Pages,  Twitter, etc.) – for me it’s me – only for my friends.  I would highly recommend that everyone review these settings very carefully to know what you are sharing – your posts, photos, bio, who can comment on posts, contact information, etc.

What’s disturbing is if you look at the recommended settings how much they recommend to be public.  Do you know that if you use their recommended settings anything you post is visible to EVERYONE?  That the pictures of your kids you posted are also visible to EVERYONE?  Maybe my mom is onto something when she’s concerned about posting pictures of my kids online – and Facebook was supposed to be a safer place.   They’re explanation of this is here –  which I find somewhat weak – as their theory is that anytime you do anything you can choose to make it more private.  Again – it’s what I believe their push to make everyone public by default – so they make more money with your data and expand their reach.

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The next thing to look at is “applications” area – which is a very dangerous area in Facebook – in that what your friends do can expose information about you without you explicitly giving permission. On the lower left of the previous screen is a link under “Applications and Websites” labeled “Edit your Settings”.   This

page has some interesting information – as it shows all the applications that you have associated with your profile (and a link to delete them).  On this screen you can also set who can see your activity in these applications (mostly games).  Where the real meat is is under the subsequent settings – “Info Accessible through your friends” and “Instant Personalization”.  I would highly recommend you look at the first item: “Info Accessible through your friends” – as it might surprise you.

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What is not commonly know is that an application – those games you play – can access your friends information – not just your information.  In one sense it makes sense that the application, to be personal, needs to access your personal information in order for it to work.  That said it still disturbs me what they might be doing with your information – as I ‘m not sure that everyone creating apps for Facebook respects privacy.  But the critical part is that you think about what you want to share with applications used by your friends.  Do you want the application your friend is using (not you) to have access to your photos, your posts, your notes, your bios – if your online, etc.?  My settings are on the right – I only allow my birthday (for friends to help remember mine) and my website (which is public anyway).

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The next thing I recommend is that you look at your “directory” settings (at the top of your main privacy settings – which is under “Account”, then “Privacy Settings”).  This is largely about who can see and contact you – so I have mixed feelings about this page.  In one sense it would make sense to make everything set to “Friends” – as would be safest. However that might limit the ability of someone who is not your friend (or a friend of a friend) from finding or contacting you – so it’s a balancing act.  I would recommend you read the paragraph at the top of this settings page – as it indicates what you have no choice in being public.  The one I question now is whether anyone should be able to send me a friend request – as I’ve recently received some odd requests on that one.

So for now I’m keeping my facebook profile with the concept of it being private. This may turn out to be a dangerous choice – but for now it’s where I choose to be.  I will be vigilant with my privacy settings – and I encourage you to do the same.  I do, however, have Facebook “FAN” pages (Andrew Help, Me! and God Loves Andrew)  - which is where I choose to be public.  So for me I have this concept of private and public separated.  The other thing though you have to keep in mind is that your friends can always share something with people you don’t expect – so be careful with what you post.  Just like someone can forward an e-mail that you meant to be private they can share what you post on Facebook.

If you’re still concerned here are some alternatives:

• Consider everything, and I mean everything you do to be public – regardless of you settings.  Treat it like a public blog – and not a private space.  Don’t put anything out there you don’t want the whole world to know.
• Create a profile under a fake name – so that only your friends know it’s you – so that colleges, employers, etc. can’t research you on Facebook.
• Create a new bare bones Facebook Account
• Delete your Facebook Account (you might not miss it)

I plan on looking more into this “personalization” (social graph) concept for Facebook – as I just tried it on Pandora.  For now I’m completely undecided on it -more concerned about Facebook than about the other sites right now…

Here’s the article I found that details how to do it: http://www.askdavetaylor.com/how_to_block_facebook_apps_posting_status_wall.html The short version is you click on the app name in your news feed and then on the subsequent feed you “block” the application”.  So much better…

Overall it’s a book worth reading – but it’s a little dry.  There is a lot of research that the author references to make his points – a lot of sociological research.  While I’m not fully on board with the author – I think it’s worth considering how the world is changing how to market to customers.

Like in some of my other Book Reviews – I will talk less about the book and more about some observations about it.  I see some of what the author sees – as the growth of online communities is large and growing.  I’m on Facebook a lot, read Twitter posts a lot and support a number of online forums (from a technical perspective).  I see trends in TV watching – that people are using the DVR, watching things online – that old days of everyone watching the same thing are over.

One of the fascinating things the book points out is the human need to form groups – to find a sense of community.  One of the things I find fascinating is how much money (hundreds, even thousands of dollars) people will spend on their hobbies.  I can’t imagine spending that much money (probably because I don’t have it) on a hobby – but I see it over and over across many hobbies.  I’ve often wondered why that much money is spent – is it just because they enjoy the hobby that much – or is it about a sense of community?  About how by joining other in that hobby – of that shared passion – they find identify and comfort in that shared community.

Another area that’s interesting is how the business environment has changed – in that the cost of doing business in many ways is drastically lower.  The Internet allows cheap and pervasive advertising – technology allows customization (print on demand), small one-person shops to compete, etc.  You can “broadcast” cheaply, sell stuff on eBay or Amazon, create a “FAN” page on Facebook for free, advertise on Twitter,  craigslist (also all for free!).

If you’re a large established company with a large cost structure your new competitors (especially those overseas) can be a definite challenge.  Look at traditional media companies – especially newspapers – and you have an example in the making.  The future will likely require companies to be more nimble to adapt to the marketplace – to engage with their customers – not just talk at them.  For those companies that adapt and engage- the future will be fascinating - for those that don’t it will be frightening.

For me Facebook was frankly a very efficient way to get the word out – to interact with people.  One of the reasons I like Facebook is that it allows you to connect with people in an easy way.   I can post one item about my life that’s share with so many people.  And it’s better than just a broadcast e-mail – as you can interact with each other.  I don’t want it to replace all relationships in my life – but it’s very useful for people who live far away.  This may make feasible to keep up easily with those friends that move away.

It may also appeal to the geek in me – which I got from my Father.  Writing something online seems so natural – so second nature now (isn’t that strange how quickly that’s changed).  Facebook also fills that asynchronous nature of communication – in that you can communicate with many people – just not at the same time.  That’s also why texting has become so popular – as you can better time manage your communication.

In some ways this makes the world so much more impersonal – but in others more personal.  I can understand the smaller items of your life by what you share – in ways we probably wouldn’t do otherwise.

This was pretty much a rambling – but that’s about the energy and intelligence I have this week…

What would Facebook be like without these – more usable or something?  Of course, I wonder then if I’ll ever hear from some people – as it seems that’s all I see is app notifications (those I haven’t blocked yet…).  I know Facebook apps are money makers – but they’re kind of annoying.  If I see one more Fishville notification….

1. I needed access to the following.
   • 2 Twitter Accounts
   • Personal Facebook Account
   • Multiple Facebook FAN pages
2. I wanted the ability to have a combined view of all these accounts – so I don’t have to switch panes, etc.
3. I wanted the ability to view comments/add comments in the client.
4. I would have liked to have my LinkedIn account also tied in – but I noticed all I got was this person connected to this person – which wasn’t very meaningful to me.
5. I would like to have Google Buzz tied in – but I don’t think any of the clients support this yet.

So here’s my personal strategy:

1. I will have Seesmic client open – which consolidates all of my feeds into one timeline panel.  It won’t display the updates like Tweetdeck (which I liked) but I can scroll down the list to where I left off – or if I’m logged in does provide a discreet notification.
2. I post most of my content via this blog – which takes care of my main twitter account and Facebook FAN page. I use ping.fm to do the push and LinkedIn is connected based on a tag in the post.
3. For my secondary Twitter/Facebook FAN page I’m creating a “page” on this site and manually posting it to Facebook – which pushes it to Twitter.
4. For my groups on LinkedIn I think the weekly notifications are a prompt to login and interact with others.
5. For the Google Buzz experiment I’m just manually posting a link to these – I’m still not sure about Google Buzz as the default view of all comments expanded is driving me crazy.

Comments about Tweetdeck:

1. I was actually using Tweetdeck for some time and quite happy with it.  I liked the pop-up notifications and the overall GUI.
2. Unfortunately when I built a 2nd Twitter account it didn’t flow well as I couldn’t configure it well.
3. I think I also noticed that the “tweet” notification sound was occurring on my wife’s login – which was kind of annoying

Comments about Hootsuite:

1. I don’t have as much experience with this one as the others.
2. One of the key differences of this tool is that it exists totally in the browser – as opposed to a desktop client

So that may influence my evaluation of Buzz – as it’s integrated into Gmail.  Frankly I’m pretty confused by Buzz – as it’s a bit overwhelming.  Right now I don’t think I can get past the expanded comments  - the long, long string of comments.  I’m used to seeing status updates with comments not taking over the screen.  Also I can’t seem to find any settings to control this – so it’s hard for me to use.  I haven’t researched how to use Buzz yet – but I’m wondering if I should have to.  I can still see how the key feature is that it’s integrated into gmail – a kind of one stop shop…

Lately I’ve been trying to figure out the best client to keep up with my social networks – as I now have 2 twitter accounts, personal facebook account, linked in account, multiple facebook fan pages.  I’ve been using Tweetdeck- but it doesn’t seem to easily support a 2nd twitter account.  I’m also trying Hootsuite and Seismic – which seemed to have unique features in each one.  My goal would be to have a client that easily supports all my different accounts – easily showing me updates from all the accounts – and letting me reply/retweet/comment on the posts (and see the comments).  I’m not concerned so much about posting – as I usually do that from another place (usually this site via ping.fm).

So to conclude I don’t totally get it – I’m a bit lost in the tool.  In fairness this is a brand new tool – has it even been out a week?  It may change soon for the better – Google tools will improve over time.  If you’re already in the Google stack (gmail, docs, calendar) then this could be a nice add-on.

1. Google announced today they’re planning on testing out a new 1 gigabit internet service (http://www.google.com/appserve/fiberrfi) – so they could be in the neighborhood soon.
2. Google has a DNS service (http://code.google.com/speed/public-dns/) – the magic thingy that translates the names we type in into the numbers that define the internet.
3. Google has Gmail – it’s free web-based e-mail service.  It has a corresponding calendar, contacts, etc. service.  One concept of calendars is you can share them – have group calendars, etc.
4. Google has it’s Google Docs – word, processing, spreadsheets, presentation, etc. – so you can do those basics online.
5. Google has it’s own “Groups” concept – for communicating information, sharing documents, etc.
6. They have their “apps” concept – which can be used by organizations, businesses, etc  to put much of their company online – e-mail, calendaring, collaboration, documents, etc.
7. Google has Picasa – a photo sharing site  - with face recognition.
8. Google has YouTube – which means they are the leader in video on the web – of which some of that technology seems to be migrating into the “app” concept.
9. Google has it’s powerful Google Maps – which brings location to the web.
10. Google has Google Voice – which is communication on web – integrated communication.
11. Google has Wave – a collaboration tool.
12. Google even now has it’s own social network – Buzz (http://www.google.com/buzz)
13. Google has a 411 service (which it apparently used to improve voice recognition).
14. Google has Android – it’s mobile phone operating system.
15. Google has it’s own browser (I’m using it now) – to speed up our web experience.
16. Google is designing a new kind of computer – one where the browser is the computer (Chrome OS)

I’m sure I’ve missed quite a few items – as they keep adding them all the time.  What was interesting to me was not just a few interesting tools here and here – but how they seem to be covering the scope of how we interact with computers – pushing us toward their view of the future.  This can be a little disturbing – due to the power they wield.  Ultimately my hope is that by creating more competition they will make for better products and services for us.

• This 1 gigabyte Internet Service – will this help drive down Broadband Prices and bring up speeds?
• Does anyone else think that having Android Phones compete with the iPhone will be better for consumers?
• Does the existence of Picasa potentially force Yahoo to make Flickr better?
• Does the existence of Buzz in Gmail push Facebook to make their messaging concept even better?
• Is the threat of Google making Apple and especially Microsoft improve their “cloud” services?

So I don’t know if we can trust Google – but we can be vigilant in keeping them honest.  Fortunately for us now their business model works in our favor – as when they make the Internet better for their sake – it becomes better for us…