Anyone else ever thought to themselves that The Terminator movie has a hint of truth to it? Clearly technology is becoming more advanced by the month, if not week! From websites that know what movies you want to watch before you do, to using satellites to zoom into right where you are standing at any given time. Scary stuff.
I just finished watching the F8 Conference at Facebook, and to be honest I'm actually impressed, which is unusual for me when it comes to Facebook developments. I'm starting to think, maybe this time they got it right? If they can support what they say they can, then the entire internet is going to evolve faster than anyone could ever anticipate. This is good and bad, for many reasons.
The good reasons being full integration wherever you go. The internet will be yours, something many companies have been trying to grasp for a while but none seem to pull it off quite right. Imagine going to any website, anywhere, and it knowing who you are and what you like? I can't wait for the days when I can walk into a high street store, it will scan my mobile device, get my social media data advise me what to buy from their store depending on my preferences. That would be some amazing technology, and by the looks of the way Facebook is handing out public data this could soon become a reality in my eyes.
On the other side of that point is the fact Facebook are going to share your data with "trusted" sites without you even verifying, or knowing about it can be quite worrying, even if they do claim the website has no access to this public data what so ever from the social widgets. Privacy is a major concern in the modern world, and many companies these days don't seem to respect that enough. We happily hand over our emails, phone numbers, addresses and who knows what else to the corporate giants, but do we ever stop to think; "What are they doing with all of this data?"
Personally I am for this move, as I think the internet needs a good social boost, as that's the reason most of us log on everyday, right? To see content we want, without having to surf through loads of nonsense we don't want. I think Facebook has finally realised, whilst it's one of the biggest communities in the world, it isn't the only community, and the entire internet could benefit from it's new Open Graph infrastructure.