The Evolution of the Social Web

Dan Donald // BarCampBrighton3

Our identity is in splinters

We’ve created profiles for everything we use on the web with any kind of interaction or setting of preferences

It’s only natural our data is stored in data silos, there has been no other way

So until recently we’ve had no cohesive sense of identity, although many have tried

Social networking

Actually making relationships between profiles a feature is what changed the game.

It’s persuaded us to think about who we are on the web.

As sites become platforms, the field continues to evolve quickly

Where do we go from here?

Open source projects hoping to push things forward

Along with this comes more understanding of what it means to have a social web

What am I talking about?

There’s a few things we need to consider:• Identity• Relationships• Privacy & security• People!

IdentityProjects such as OpenID are enabling a

single identity

oAuth is allowing sites to grant access if authorised from an existing account (no password anti-pattern here!)

Issues?• Who do you trust?• As we use our identity host/providers more,

there’s more value in online identities• We’ll have a smaller raft or out of date

profiles!• With value comes issues of security/fraud• Import/export of identity related data

Who are you?

Social networking started off with the ‘flat-friends’ model

- Wow – I have over 1000 friends!

We’re complicate beings with elastic relationships

RelationshipsWe gain contacts and the nature of

relationships evolve (or devolve)

The depth of relationships vary over time

Those who we’re in contact with a lot in a particular medium might not be representative of the depth or relationship

What are friends?

In the beginning ‘friends’ was term for a connection to another profile

Maybe now we realise that this isn’t viable

Our concept of friends on the web has lead to an upheaval in our understanding of privacy

How can we manage this better?

PersonasWe’re a lot of things to a lot of people

Some of us like to be just ‘us’ no matter which context

In reality, we have different sides of ourselves that we choose to share in different social contexts

Maybe this is a way of easily separating aspects of our lives?

Sharing is good

What information should we not share?

We should know who we’re sharing this with!

It’s a new kind of understanding

Hitting the mainstream

For all of these ideas to work, it needs to be very straightforward

It’s not about technology, although a technological solution is needed

The web will change

Recap• Identity – OpenID• Easier and safer log-ins – oAuth• We can better represent ourselves online• We can have more control• Got to be for the non-techies

What about the developers?

What about developers?

As things mature, we have the building blocks to make every site social

Events like dConstruct to show how to do this

Build on top of existing standards & APIs

The web then has a social layer – part of an open platform to build on

Context & Community

Two changes across the socialised web

Provide context to our relationships

As sites become more social, aspects of community are implicit

Community breeds conversation!

Scenario• When creating a new site, build in methods

for people to use social data (FacebookConnect / Open Social)

• Allow people to interact with your data; to discuss and share it, make their mark on it

• Engage with your audience as a community• Use existing channels to take your content

to the people

The end.

Thanks for listening…

…any ideas or questions?