On The Eve Of One Facebook Event, The Spartans Prepare For Another

Tomorrow morning at their headquarters in Palo Alto, Facebook is holding an event to show off an “awesome” new product. Our sources tell us that product with be the long-rumoredSkype integration within Facebook for full-on video chat goodness — just a week after arch nemesis Google unveiled Hangouts as a part of Google+. Given that news has already leaked out, it’s certainly possible that Facebook could surprise with talk of their iPad app or new Photos experience as well. But one thing not on the agenda is Project Spartan.

You’ll recall that Project Spartan is the HTML5-driven mobile application platform that Facebook has been quietly building for months with the help of a group of third-party app developers. While some of those very developers believe Facebook’s intentions here is to break up the control Apple (and Google) have over the mobile app space, Facebook started freaking out when we reported that. The spin began almost immediately. And it has continued, even with the group of third-party developers working on the project — they’re affectionately known as “Spartans”.

We previously reported that after our initial story, Facebook began reaching out to the Spartans, reminding them that the information of the project was confidential (while telling the press this stuff was really “nothing new”). Since then, Facebook has stepped up their game as well. We now hear that there’s been a lot of stern talks with the Spartans, telling them that the project is not about going after Apple. But it’s not really working. “I look at these apps and how content rich they are and how they have nothing to do with Apple and everything to do with Facebook and assume that they think we are retarded,” is how one put it.

One developer says that the quality of the apps on the platform is really surprising — in a good way, naturally. Apparently, there are going to be a ton of games that will be a part of the Spartan launch. This shouldn’t be too surprising, HTML5 gaming has been something Facebook has been pushing. And Zynga is believed to be heavily involved in the project.

So when will Spartan launch? Facebook is pushing to have everyone ready by July 15. One source expects a formal unveiling to be sometime between then and August 1.

While we’ve been hesitant to provide many screenshots of what the project looks like since it could give away sources, we have secured the one below which has been slightly altered. You’ll note that it looks like a modified version of the current Facebook mobile site. Of course, two things you won’t find on the current mobile site are right there staring you in the face: Games and Apps — with notifications too!

The blue bar along the top is referred to as “chrome” (yes, it shares a name with a Google product). Developers say it’s the glue that binds all the different mobile sites together. That’s one key — these HTML5 apps are said to reside elsewhere, not on Facebook’s own servers (at least right now). So instead they have to make external calls to pull in the Facebook “chrome” to make the apps look like proper Facebook apps.

For a better idea of how this may work, check out this “Getting Started” site set up by Matt Kelly, a Facebook engineer who works with developers. Undoubtedly, this site will be pulled, but it essentially shows how HTML-based navigation is set up on a third-party site. It looks good, and is fast. And it contains talk about things such as to use remote calls to send action alerts inside of a mobile web app — “This can be used for re-engagement, like telling a friend it’s their turn in a board game.”

Also worth noting is a separate tip we got pointing to this page. Apparently, the Facebook Javascript SDK underwent some big changes in the past week, including a lot of references to FB.Native, iOS, and Android. One developer notes that the native code mentions seem largely related to orientation, and wonders if that’s tied in to the iPad app. There is also a bunch of code for “mweb” (mobile web), which apparently is a new parameter that allows apps to auto-login when coming from Facebook’s Platform (yes, Spartan apps).

Previously, we speculated that Project Spartan and the iPad app release could be related. In fact, we had heard that Facebook and Apple were even working together on some things, at least loosely. While the ultimate goal of Spartan is clearly for HTML5 prevail, it is possible that Apple simply doesn’t believe it will anytime soon and is happy to help Facebook try their hand, while also helping the web in general move beyond Flash (think of the position Flash would be in without all those games requiring it).

Notes one developer:

Facebook wants a cut of the Apple’s mobile app market, that’s been clear this entire time. Perhaps it’s not war against Apple — maybe Apple is just going to ‘gift’ Facebook the share of their market (the HTML5 share) in exchange an alliance being formed whereby Apple get’s some exclusive access to Facebook’s 600 million-plus users and thereby cutting out Google (exclusive to some degree, Facebook is too open for it to be fully exclusive). In this theory, it’s not Facebook Spartans vs. Apple, it’s Facebook/Apple Spartans Vs Google.

The Spartans have been told to code specifically for the iOS flavors of Safari — both iPhone and iPad.

The truth is that it’s hard to know Facebook’s exact intentions at this point — too much seems in flux right now and Facebook is holding their cards pretty close to their chest after a series of leaks. Certainly, the HTML5 angle will be played up as “open” rather than being against either Apple or Google. But the larger reality remains: Facebook wants this HTML5 app platform to succeed so the mobile world is not fully controlled by those two companies. And they want their own Credits platform to dominate mobile. Facebook has to play nice and say the right things for now since they do not have their own phone — yet.

Speaking of that, there’s not much here, but we have heard that the work on Facebook phone project continues. One whisper has them working closely with Samsung. Another has them working with Pivotal Labs as well. Facebook will disavow all knowledge of this of course. But it takes nothing more than a quick rational thought to realize that for the future Facebook needs to be in control of two things to maintain power: a web browser and a mobile phone. The thought that they wouldn’t be working on both is what’s really crazy.

And none of this speaks to the other big projects Facebook has going on, like their music launch. Which will probably be at their next f8 which the last we heard will be at the end of August. And yes, it will involve a lot of partners.

This summer is shaping up to be a very exciting one for Facebook. It begins tomorrow.

[thanks Tom — to be clear, not a Spartan source, a tipster of some other info above]

For More News Visit : http://techcrunch.com/

The Only Backdoor Left To Sneak Your Facebook Friends Into Google+ Is Yahoo

• Schonfeld16 hours ago

Mark Zuckerberg may be themost followed user on Google+, but good luck trying to find any of your Facebook friends on Google’s new social service. Facebook is making it difficult for anyone to import their friend contact information into Google+. There is no direct contact import feature such as there is for Yahoo or Hotmail, and Facebook is clamping down on third-party services that made it easy to bring your Facebook friends into Google+.

Over the weekend, Facebook blocked a Google Chrome extension called the Facebook Friend Exporter. And in fact, Facebook changed its OAuth 2.0 API in such a way that it “suddenly removed email addresses from the queries without warning,” says Owen Mundy, creator of Give Me My Data. Other data can still be exported, just not your friends’ email addresses.

There still might be one back door open to sneak your Facebook friends into Google+. And that’s Yahoo. You can import your Facebook friends’ contact information, including emails, just fine into Yahoo. (First, you link your Facebook and Yahoo accounts, and then you import your contacts from Yahoo Mail).

I say “might” because I just tried it, and the Yahoo importer in Google+ didn’t even work for me in Chrome. But it did seem to work in Firefox (irony alert). Still, I couldn’t tell if it had actually imported my Facebook friends who are also on Google+ because most of those are also duplicated in my Gmail contacts. Other Facebook friends do not show up in Google+ (although their email addresses imported just fine into Yahoo).

While we’ve seen Facebook play these tricks before because they don’t want to help jumpstart competing services, I don’t really think it’s that big a deal. In this case, your email contacts alone (Gmail, Yahoo Mail, or Hotmail) should be enough to get anyone going on Google+. Your real friends are in both Facebook and Gmail, not to mention your other more occasional contacts, which you can start placing in different circles.

Although Facebook’s shenanigans aren’t good from the point of view of data portability, on the whole I think this is actually a good thing for Google+. If it were too easy to import your Facebook friends, then Google+ would simply become a Facebook clone, replicating your Facebook experience. By forcing you to create a new social graph from the ground up, Google+ has a greater chance of becoming distinct.

For More News Visit:  http://techcrunch.com/2011/07/05/google-facebook-friends-yahoo/

Mark Zuckerberg Is The Most Followed User On Google+

In what has to be somewhat embarrassing for Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is the most followed user on Google+, according to the Google+ Statisticscounter.

The Facebook CEO has 21,213 followers, compared to the Google CEO at 14,798, Google social czar Vic Gundotra at 13,783, Google co-founder Sergey Brin at 11,629, blogger Robert Scoble at 11,389, Google spam avenger Matt Cutts at 9,153, TWIT founder Leo Laporte at 7,566, Google’s Bradley Horowitz at 7,187, TechCrunch’s MG Siegler at 6,579 and blogger Gina Trapani at 5,649.

Google+ Statistics creator Boris Veldhuijzen van Zanten explains the CEO’s unlikely popularity thus, “He has the most friends in the world, they made a movie about him, and he is more handsome than the Larry and Sergey.” I think the answer goes more like this; The more media coverage someone receives related to Google+, the more followers they get, hence MG Siegler at #9.

For More News Visit:  http://techcrunch.com/2011/07/04/mark-zuckerberg-is-the-most-followed-user-on-google/

If Google Buzz Is A Black Hole For Sharing Traffic, Google+ Is The Big Bang

Back in March of last year, we noted that Google Buzz, Google’s shiny new social network at the time, was getting smoked in terms of referral traffic sent our way, by a dead man, FriendFeed. It turns out, Google’s own Analytics service was undercounting Buzz because it resides in Gmail, which uses HTTPS and strips out referral information. In other words, most Buzz trafficcould only be inferred, not seen. Still, after months of looking over the data, I’m not convinced that Buzz actually sends any amount of meaningful traffic whatsoever. The same is not true of the newly launched Google+ so far.

Yes, it has only been out for a week at this point (and is still only available to a very limited number of users), but based on what we’re seeing, the social network is already sending a largeamount of traffic our way.

How large? Well, since its launch last Tuesday, Google+ has already cracked our top ten referring sites. It currently resides just behind Digg in that timespan. If you narrow that down to just count July so far (a few days after launch, so more users had time to sign up), the numbers are even better. It would already be the number seven referrer, just behind Hacker News. And it’s already a fifth as large as the leading social referrer, facebook.com.

But wait, Google+ also uses HTTPS, so isn’t it being incorrectly counted as well? No — Google has learned from the previous Buzz mistake (and taken a page from Facebook), and now redirects all outbound links through a non-secure google.com address to capture the traffic.As Louis Gray pointed out a couple days ago, the URL you should look for in your logs is “http://www.google.com/url?sa=z” followed by a unique content code. If you click on any external from G+ and look quickly, you’ll see these URLs flash in the address bar.

The amount of inbound traffic we’re seeing from Google+ is pretty crazy considering that we’re not even officially using it to share links yet. On both Facebook and Twitter we send out links to our followers and this leads to most of the click-backs (either directly or by re-sharing). On Google+, we’re not doing anything yet, it’s all happening from others sharing our links organically.

Other publications must be noticing the same thing, as they’ve set up official accounts for Google+, as Zach Seward notes here. We reached out to Google in order to do the same last week, but they told us that “it’s not quite ready for businesses”. They also pointed us to their policy wording, stating that anyone who signs up for Google+ must do so with a real name. It would seem that Google is still exploring the best way to handle this type of mass sharing for now.

After we pointed out a these others signing up with business names, they confirmed that they’re not banning anyone for doing it right now, but warning that if we do set one up, we’ll have to make a new profile once Google+ for Businesses is ready. But who knows when that will be? It seems that this early opportunity for publishers is one that you can’t sit on the sidelines for. While G+ may have been conceived as much more than a link-sharing service, so many people are using it for just that now. And the re-sharing going on is massive.

Google Buzz was and continues to be a black hole for publishers. But Google+ is a big bang.

For More News Visit: http://techcrunch.com/2011/07/05/google-plus-sharing/

4 Reasons Google+ Beats Facebook

Analysis: After putting it through its paces, I feel that Google+ is superior to Facebook.

By Preston Gralla, Computerworld    Jul 2, 2011 9:00 pm

Google+, now available to a limited number of people, won't likely ever overtake Facebook as the Web's premier social networking service. That's a shame, because after putting it through it's paces, I've found that it's superior to Facebook. Here are four reasons Google+ beats Facebook.

1.It abandons Facebook's 'one-message-fits-all' approach to social networking

Facebook treats all of your "friends" alike. With it, you essentially have the same online relationship with someone you've absent-mindedly accepted as a friend, but never met, as you do with your spouse or friend of 15 years.

Not so with Google+. With Google+, you create separate "circles" for your online acquaintances, and then post separate messages to each circle. Want to make plans the July 4 weekend with your five best friends? Then post a message just for them. Phony Facebook "friends" won't see them.

2.It sparks conversations

One of Google+'s niftier features is Sparks, which combines the power of Google search with social networking. Powered by Google search, Sparks delivers a stream of blog posts, news, and videos about any topic in which you're interested. When you want to share any of that with others, click the Share link, and you can share it with your circles.

3.It integrates with other Google services

If you use multiple Google services, you'll especially welcome Google+. Conversations in it show up in Gmail. You can share photos from Picasa using it. It has direct links to Google Talk. Expect more links as well.

4.It's better for mobile

Unlike Facebook, Google+ was built from the ground up with mobile in mind. So it works far better with your smartphone. (There's an Android app for it now, soon to be followed by one for iOS, according to Google.) You can do group texting via the "Huddle" feature, for example. Uploading photos and geotagging is a snap. You can get text messages whenever there's new activity on Google+. While it's true that Facebook can do some of these things, it simply doesn't do them as well as does Google+.

For More News Visit: http://www.pcworld.com/article/234963/4_reasons_google_beats_facebook.html#tk.hp_new 

9Reasons to Switch from Facebook to Google+

Can Google+ steal users from Facebook? Yep. There are good reasons to switch from Facebook to Google+, ranging from ease-of-use to respect for data privacy.

By Mark Sullivan, PCWorld    Jul 1, 2011 1:20 am

When people ask “can Google+ beat Facebook?” they’re misstating the question. It’s not about one site versus another site. Google+ is bigger than that. The reason Google calls it the “Google+ Project” is that Google+ will become a central part of Google’s whole identity. It will reshape the company. So the real question is “can Google beat Facebook?” Put that way, the contest seems a lot more even.

Facebook, of course, has a huge head start, but there are good reasons for people to seriously consider dumping Facebook for Google+. [See our Hands-on Review]

1. Integration with Google Services

The biggest wedge Google has for driving people toward using Google+ is integration. That is, Google will build Google+ social networking features and tools into almost all of its existing online services from Search to Documents to Video. Google+ is already integrated into the navigation bar at the top right of almost all Google products; this lets you monitor all Google+ events (updates, messages, etc.) as well as share content with friends without ever leaving the Google service you happen to be using. Millions and millions of people use Google's free services (Gmail, Docs, Search, etc.), and with Google+ bound so tightly to them it may start to seem silly to jump out to some other site (Facebook) to do your social networking.

2. Better Friend Management

Google is right that the “Circles” concept is more in line with the way we make friends in real life. We have many different kinds of friends, and we interact with them and communicate with them in very different ways. Facebook’s Groups feature lets you form ad hoc groups of friends, but compared to the way its done in Google+ it seems cumbersome. After all, Facebook’s Groups feature is pretty new; it was “built on”, while friend "circles" are the bedrock of the Google+ platform.

3. Better Mobile App

If you're an Android user, you may find that getting content from your phone to your social platform is easier, cleaner more functional with the Google+ mobile app. The app is already great, but Google will seek more and more ways to make your Android phone a seemless appendage of your Google+ social platform. Google hopes to use its huge Android user base as a wedge against Facebook, whose mobile app, while nice-looking, is a little clunky to use.

4. Easier to Find Stuff to Share

Google+'s Sparks feature is another important differentiator from Facebook. Spark is Google leveraging its search engine to do something Facebook can’t do—give users an instant wellspring of relevant information to share with friends. Because Facebook has no search engine, its users must leave the site to find shareable data or wait for their friends the share it with them. The question "how do I find stuff to share" is immediately answered with Sparks.

Related Slideshow: Google+ vs. Facebook: See How They Compare

5. You Can Get Your Data Back

Facebook is notorious for its poor stewardship of personal data. You are forced to make certain parts of your personal data "public" for example, and It is very hard to permanently delete your Facebook profile. Google, on the other hand, makes it possible for you to pick up all the data you’ve banked at Google+ and walk away. This is done through a Google+ tool called “Data Liberation.” With just a few clicks you can download data from your Picasa Web Albums, Google profile, Google+ stream, Buzz and contacts.

6. Better Photo Tagging

When viewing photos in Google+ you can “tag” the people in them similar to the way you do in Facebook. You draw a little square around a person's face, then type in their name in the box below it (or choose one of the names Google+ guesses). But there’s a big difference in the way Google handles the privacy aspect of photo tagging. When you tag someone, you see this note: “Adding this tag will notify the person you have tagged. They will be able to view the photo and the related album.”Facebook, on the other hand, does not make an effort to warn people the they’ve been tagged (possibly in an unflattering or compromising photo) and give them an immediate chance to remove the tag.

Also, Google has wisely decided to shy away from using facial recognition software, which Facebook now uses to automatically identify people in photos uploaded to user albums.

7. Strong Group Chat Features

Google+ has Facebook beat out of the gate in the area of chat. Forming ad hoc group video chats using the Hangouts feature in Google+ is easy, and forming ad hoc groups for a little chat seems like a natural and fun thing to do in a social networking setting. Similarly, the new Huddle mobile app makes it easy for mobile (Android) users to start up group text chats. Facebook simply doesn't offer these tools.

8. Safer Content Sharing

Privacy advocates have long called for social networking sites to let users assign a privacy level to each piece of content they share, instead of using a pre-set list privacy settings to govern all shares. Google obviously heard those calls, and built the capability into Google+. For instance, when I share an article or upload a camera image, Google+ gives me choices of which friend circles I’d like to share that content with. Advantage Google+.

9. Google Is a Better Steward of Your Personal Data

Running a social network is all about responsible stewardship of users' personal informatino. Facebook is a young, fast moving company that has proved itself to be cavalier in its movements, lacking in respect for user data privacy, and accident prone. Google on the other hand, is a far more mature company that is, I would argue, seen as more trustworthy than Facebook. For the most part, Google has lived up to its “Don’t Be Evil” slogan. Which company would you rather have as the steward of your personally identifiable information?

For More News Visit: http://www.pcworld.com/article/234825/9_reasons_to_switch_from_facebook_to_google.html

Google targets Facebook with new social service

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Google Inc is making its boldest move to take on Facebook in the fast-growing social networking market and to maintain its dominance on the Web.

Google, which has been frustrated by a string of failed attempts to crack the social networking market, introduced a full-fledged social network on Tuesday dubbed Google+. It is the company's biggest foray into social networking since co-founder Larry Page took over as chief executive in April.

Page has made social networking a top priority at the world's No. 1Internet search engine, whose position as the main gateway to online information could be at risk as people spend more time on sites like Facebook and Twitter.

"They had the luxury of making mistakes in the past with their social initiatives. They don't really have that luxury now," said Ray Valdes, an analyst at research firm Gartner, referring to Google.

"Companies that are successful with the social web will get the page views, they'll get the engagement and they'll eventually get the advertising dollars that are so important to Google," he said.

Google+, now available for testing, is structured in remarkably similar fashion to Facebook, with profile pictures and newsfeeds forming a central core. However, a user's friends or contacts are grouped into very specific circles of their choosing, versus the common pool of friends typical on Facebook. ( http://blogs.reuters.com/mediafile/2011/06/28/first-look-at-the-google-plus-social-network-the-top-secret-demo/ )

Enticing consumers to join another social networking service will not be easy, said Rory Maher, an analyst with Hudson Square Research.

"They're going to have an uphill battle due to Facebook's network effects," said Maher, citing the 700 million users that some research firms say are currently on Facebook's service.

"The more users they (Facebook) get, the harder it gets for Google to steal those," he said. But he added that Google's popularity in Web search and email could help it gain a following.

To set its service apart from Facebook, Google is betting on what it says is a better approach to privacy -- a hot-button issue that has burned Facebook, as well as Google, in the past.

Central to Google+ are the "circles" of friends and acquaintances. Users can organize contacts into different customized circles -- family members, coworkers, college friends -- and share photos, videos or other information only within those groups.

"In the online world there's this 'share box' and you type into it and you have no idea who is going to get that, or where it's going to land, or how it's going to embarrass you six months from now," said Google Vice President of Product Management Bradley Horowitz.

"For us, privacy isn't buried six panels deep," he added.

Facebook, which has been criticized for its confusing privacy controls, introduced a feature last year that lets users create smaller groups of friends. Google, without mentioning Facebook by name, said other social networking services' attempts to create groups have been "bolt-on" efforts that do not work as well.

Facebook, in an emailed statement, said "we're in the early days of making the Web more social, and there are opportunities for innovation everywhere."

Google+ started rolling out to a limited number of users on Tuesday in what the company is calling a field trial. Only those invited to join will initially be able to use the service. Google did not say when it would be more widely available.

Google, which generated roughly $29 billion in revenue in 2010, said the new service does not currently feature advertising.

LEARNING FROM BUZZ

Google's stock has been pressured by concerns about rising spending within the company and increasing regulatory scrutiny -- not to mention its struggles with social networking. The U.S. Federal Trade Commission, among others, is currently reviewing its business practices.

Its shares are down almost 20 percent this year after underperforming the market in 2010.

To create Google+, the company went back to the drawing board in the wake of several notable failures, including Google Wave and Google Buzz, a microblogging service whose launch was marred by privacy snafus.

"We learned a lot in Buzz, and one of the things we learned is that there's a real market opportunity for a product that addresses people's concerns around privacy and how their information is shared," said Horowitz.

Google drew more than 1 billion visitors worldwide to its websites in May, more than any other company, according to Web analytics firm comScore. But people are spending more time on Facebook: The average U.S. visitor spent 375 minutes per month on Facebook in May, compared with 231 minutes for Google.

Google+ seems designed to make its online properties a pervasive part of the daily online experience, rather than being spots where Web surfers occasionally check in to search for a website or check email.

As with Facebook's service, Google Plus has a central Web page that displays an ever-updating stream of the comments, photos and links being shared by friends and contacts.

A toolbar across the top of most of Google's sites -- such as its main search page, its Gmail site and its Maps site -- allows users to access their personalized data feed. They can then contribute their own information to the stream.

The company has combined the Facebook and Twitter models of social networking in Google+: A person can have friends in their network with whom they share information and they can also follow certain people, say a movie critic, as occurs on Twitter.

Google+ will also offer a special video chat feature, in which up to 10 people can jump on a conference call. And Google will automatically store photos taken on cell phones on its Internet servers, allowing a Google+ user to access the photos from any computer and share them.

When asked whether he expected people to switch from Facebook to Google+, Google Senior Vice President of Engineering Vic Gundotra said people may decide to use both.

"People today use multiple tools. I think what we're offering here offers some very distinct advantages around some basic needs," he said.

(Reporting by Alexei Oreskovic; Editing by John Wallace, Gerald E. McCormick and Phil Berlowitz)

For more News Visit : http://news.yahoo.com/google-targets-facebook-social-171542338.html