Defending Facebook's API cyber-curtain

This post by Nick O'Neill interested me not so much because its his standard Facebook Fanboi fare, but because it is launched in his blog Social Times, not his usual All Facebook fanzine where he does his Facebook stuff - and I wondered if that means that zines that were All Facebook were not quite the force they once were? I look forward to All Twitter with eager anticipation .

Anyway, on with the show - he was talking about the Gilmore Gang initially:

Data portability evangelists have one goal: to control their own data. It makes a lot of sense when you get into the discussion but the logistics behind it are highly complex. So complex that not even the data portability evangelists were able to figure much out during their almost hour and a half long discussion (on the podcast).

Um - the Gilmore Gang, which granted can go in for some long and winding rambles at times, is not the sole group of people very interested in Data Portability - and some of les autres are pretty sharp coders. Anyway...his arguments are, shall we say, interesting

True Data Portability Kills Social Network Sites
While I am a fan of data portability, the reality is that true data portability kills social network sites. If we take data portability to the extreme and I was able to export all of my data and contacts from Facebook, Facebook would be nothing more than a well designed communications platform.Perhaps in the end that’s all they will be but for now, their valuations have been based on their skyrocketing user base.

K, I see why that is Facebook's problem, but darned if I see why its mine - its not my job to prop up their valuation. Nearly all ICT technologies move from proprietary to interfaced to standardised - its a well known commoditisation process, and I can't see why Social Networking will differ.Facebook joins AOL and IBM et al in this.

Data Portability Evangelists Can’t Speak Clearly
This is the biggest challenge facing the future of data portability. I listened to the Gillmore Gang podcast last night and read Steve Gillmore’s techcrunch post this morning and it would take at least an hour for me to decode both of them for you

I think I noted my point re the Gillmore Gang above - there are other, far more - er - structured? - thinkers in this space. You may want to look at the work the VRM crowd are doing for example.

We Are Moving Forward
While I want complete control of my data, most people don’t even know what that means. The moves being made by Facebook, MySpace and Google are a huge step forward and it’s perfectly fine to acknowledge that. At the same time the data portability evangelists should continue to ask for more because that’s what’s required of them.

While the debate over data portability is far from over, it’s a good thing that the large players are even listening and making changes. Am I a sucker for being partially satisfied?

No, but defending Facebook will-he nill-he when you are looking at (i) a fairly standard industry playout and (ii) a pretty clear Canute like attempt by Facebook to prevent the tide coming in, makes Nick look like someone who has been suckered in by the Facebook story a tad too much....

(Update - I've just realised that if this post were for posterity, no one would have a clue what I was on about - its about the attempt by Google to build a Portable Social Network (ie Portable to them ) and Facebook shutting the API door so their user data doesn't bolt. Standard walled garden operator fare which the above author was attempting to defend. Dare Obasanjo summarises it all very well here, with his first blog post for a while. Marc Canter also has a decent summary.)