TechCrunch | Facebook Launches Facebook Platform

developers.facebook.com

Facebook is going to do to the Web what the Web did to the Internet.

When the Web with its HTTP showed up, it was just one among Email, Usenet, FTP, Telnet, Gopher, and many others. Now, most people think of the other things as applications running on top of the Web.

Facebook is a social-network driven by real-life relationships. I have my real-life friends, my classmates, and my coworkers on it. At least 20% of Torontonians are on it already. When one of my contacts posts a photo, joins a group, accepts an event invitation, or changes their status, I can see it on the front page. I check it daily.

They are about to add third-party applications to the site. They’ll nest in tidy spots on our profiles or improve on Facebook’s features. More than that, whenever I choose to use a third-party app, all my contacts will be notified via their front page.

This is unobtrusive, extremely viral, and has zero distribution cost. If I add the Last.fm widget, all the Last.fmers on my contacts list will add it too within a week.

Facebook is still just one among billions of sites. Shortly, it’ll be a platform. Digg, Delicious, Last.fm, Flickr, Gmail, et al. will be reduced to applications running upon the one true site — Facebook.

Is this a good thing? It’s easy and convenient, but it’s also centralized — the bad guys will need only one subpoena to find out things they should not.

Can it be stopped? Facebook’s reached critical mass. Usenetters have tried boycotting the Web, and yet the Web has soared past Usenet’s slow oblivion. Attempts to boycott Facebook are unlikely to succeed if a plurality uses it and gets locked in by it.

I, for one, welcome our new Facebook overlords. As a trusted web guru, I could be helpful in rounding up others to toil in their underground API caves.