Social Networks, Technology, Web 2.0
Jul 6, 2007
Todd Zeigler
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Making Profiles Portable

I’m someone that is eager to try out the latest Web 2.0 tools, be it Twitter, Powcne, Jaiku, etc. One of my frustrations is that I have to essentially start over every time I create an account on one of these things. I have to enter the same profile information over and over, and, more importantly, I have to recreate my network on every one of these sites.

It gets old quick and is one of the reasons I personally haven’t embraced social networking to the extent others have. I just don’t have the energy to maintain presences on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, MySpace, etc.

Tony Macdonnell feels my pain and suggests creating a portable “friends” system using OpenID. Here is the gist of it:

I’d love to see OpenID be able to support some kind of “Friend Confirmation” system that would allow me to submit my OpenID to a social network like Pownce (which I am currently going though the “Friend Finding Headache” with), and have it automatically add all my friends that are members of that application. It would be amazing if applications could also add new friends of mine back to my OpenID as well. With this I could traverse all the brilliant applications in the Web 2.0 world taking all my friends along for the ride with me.

I’m not sure this is the exact right solution, but it is certainly on the right track. It is time for your friend’s list to be made portable.

  • Brian

    I have heard a couple services for this are in the works. One, out of Israel, is called 8Hands… but its still a few weeks/months from release.

  • http://maryspecht.com Mary Specht

    I like the idea of making friends portable, not just profile information. As social networks spring up everywhere, it’s becoming apparent that people only want to maintain one or two profiles. If there isn’t a way to consolidate profiles and friends, we’ll see a limit on how many social networks can be successful.

    Does anyone know why sites like MySpace and Facebook don’t appear to be partners of OpenID? Facebook, especially, seems like it would be open to it, now that it’s welcoming apps from just about anyone.

  • http://www.nickanstead.com/blog/?p=394 Nick Anstead » Facebook: It came, it saw, it conquered

    [...] Additional note: An interesting footnote to this post. The argument that social networking sites are naturally monopolistic is based on the argument that the costs of moving from one to another are high – not least persuading your two-hundred friends to go with you. However, there might be technical work-arounds to overcome this problem. The Biving’s Report highlights one possible development in this area. [...]

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