What next on Facebook status? Tracking, openness and social media

Facebook's just opened up its API. In laymans terms, that means anyone can programme a new piece of software, an application, a widget, whatever, that makes Facebook statuses do new and exciting stuff.

What can this be compared to, and why is it important to digital PR and online communities?

Because here's the kind of stuff that could concievably happen new that the API is open (this is what happened after Twitter opened its API, like two years ago)....

- You could post your status to your blog
- You could search statuses and track for consumer trends
- A status could be open, not closed, whereas your photos are still private
- Yous status could plug into other social networks and social media, like Flickr photos, Delicious tags, Evernote pictures or Upcoming events
- More to come... I'm just having a think :-)

Comments

[Jeff Harmon]

I wonder how long it will take a crowd of facebookers to turn facebook status updates into microblogs.

For example: My brothers and I created a facebook app Status King. It is based completely around clever Status Updates and we are the first facebook app to turn facebook status updates into t-shirts. If Facebook gives us the ability to create a Status Update microblog for our app, I would use it in a heartbeat—just don’t make it so my friends have to see it without following.

I hope they give us the ability to create status update microblogs for customer service and communication for apps, groups, fan pages, and even any website hooked to facebook connect. That would be AWESOME.

[Chris Norton]

This is interesting Drew. Facebook finally opens up the garden walls to make itself more shareable. This is good to see and will make it much easier for us to track trends for our clients.

I wondered when this was going to happen. I know you can use widgets to connect your FB Status to your Twitter status. I did this more than a year ago although amusingly I kept getting messages from people asking me what 'Twittering' was. They have now removed the 'is Twittering' feature just when the wider public has started to all talk about Twitter.

I will certainly be watching this area closely, although I know a lot of people use their FB status very differently to their Twitter one. Maybe this will change that – who knows?

[Jasmine]

Hi Drew,

Do you think Twitter will be affected by Facebook opening up its API?

Personally, I use Twitter much differently than I use Facebook. For me, like many of my fellow PR student friends, Facebook is a place for social relationships whereas Twitter is more of a professional space.

Twitter membership grows daily but now that Facebook status updates have the potential to perform more like Tweets do you think my new favourite social messaging locale will become redundant?

Thanks,
Jasmine

[Drew]

Hi Jasmine. I think there are people who would use Twitter and Facebook for similar things, so maybe the open api, over time, would pull you to one or the other.

If, for example, your entire social circle is on Facebook, then why would you use Twitter? Previously it's been because Twitter did a different thing, but in the future it *might* become more blurred.