thanks,
Dave

What about sites that are bringing all your social graphs together? Here is a blog about one start-up that is doing just that http://www.gruvie.blogspot.com. aren’t these sites positioned even better?

For some reason your comment just came through now, so I didn’t see it before. You have a good point that the guide/article should have been more clear that at the moment, FB’s formal documentation says that there are no “Exportable Properties”, as they define them (or…er…don’t define them) on the wiki. I am adding a note about this to the PDFs on the site to identify the ambiguities there and to stress that developers are operating at their own risk.

Actually FriendCSV encountered no storms of any kind…and neither did our importer when we launched it six months ago. The main thing is that there are a good number of ambiguities here that FB doesn’t seem eager to try to clarify, and probably with good reason.

For instance, I could easily take the argument that we’re not even touching what they call Exportable Properties, both because they are undefined and because we’re actually not exporting any raw user data. We codify most all user data the instant we touch it inside FB and then we integrate it back in to bigsight.

So again, lots of gray here, but I continue to believe that developers who provide positive opt-ins and offer users services that they want should have no problem. They all know that they are operating their apps at their own risk

I think there may be some ambiguity here. The FriendsCSV app may be perceived by FB as a tool for a single user to export the data for personal consumption on their PC and not really an export app for use importing elsewhere. They may be a little lenient on it with the data portability initiatives over the last several months. However, you are still in violation as far as I can tell. Also, didn’t FriendCSV get in a shitstorm a handful of months ago or was that someone else?

Finally, FTA, the author states “…legal documents are like amusement parks for me, so I’m now fairly well acquainted…” This was irresponsible to set the tone like you are some legal guru who knows his shit.

Harry “and I thought I was ballsy at times” Wang

I use Facebook extensively and the one feature I wish it had above all others is the ability to sync just the information listed above with Outlook. Frankly, I’d pay good money just to get one solid sync of my 150-ish friends contact info, most of which are people I’ve lost touch with over the years and would love to reconnect with a little more easily.

For the record, you can sync pictures and contacts with Outlook using the fields provided… you just won’t get any contact info.

So if I read your comment #54 correctly, it sounds like your position is:

“Yes it is technically a violation of the FB docs to export user information and store it for longer than 24 hours. However, right now, FB isn’t enforcing that provision too carefully or maybe even at all. And, so, as long as you’re not a dick about how you use the data, you should be able to get away with it.”

I know these are not your exact words, but it’s how I interpreted your comment.

If that’s your point, I can understand it, and you may even be right. And any FB app developer who wants to proceed that way and assume any associated risk is free to do so.

The problem, however, is that is NOT what your article says and it is NOT what your website says at: http://bigsight.org/hfb/

Your “guide” essentially says that the FB documents PERMIT you to export and store this info beyond the 24 hour period — and that just simply isn’t the case at all. That is factually wrong. The docs say the very opposite.

And so, rather than helping app developers by providing them useful information, you are providing them misinformation, and by doing so, exposing them to a potential risk, without even telling them about it.

Every FB app developer should be aware that the FB documentation clearly prohibits the storage of user information beyond the 24 hour period, even with an opt-in, except for the 8 pieces of data listed here: http://develope....0&doc=misc.
If a developer chooses to ignore these provisions, they should do so with full knowledge that they are violating the terms of their Developer Agreement with Facebook.

Now, I am not in a position to speak authoritatively regarding Dan’s point as to whether or not FB is, or is not, enforcing these provisions. That is a risk decision that each developer will ultimately have to make for themselves. However, even if FB is not enforcing them now – there is no guarantee that they won’t start tomorrow. And, personally, I take no comfort from the line of reasoning that goes: “It’s ok, I know it’s wrong, but a bunch of people are doing it, and Facebook isn’t doing anything about it…”

So here’s the thing: Both Sanjay and this VCReader guy are correct about what the documentation on the wiki states. It expressly says that there are currently no properties that FB deems exportable. It says that plain as day. However, a few pages after that, it then identifies eight properties that actually can be exported. Ok. Quite often much of the information on the documentation wiki doesn’t line up with the more formal TOS, Privacy Policies, and Developer Guidelines. Furthermore (and perhaps more importantly) it doesn’t line up with how FB is actually operating with developers out in the wild.

For instance, we launched FriendCSV back in October. The entire application is SOLELY about exporting massive quantities of information. When this application launched, ~50 users sent in TOS complaints; however, when we discussed this with the FB employee handling these complaints, we received affirmation that we were well within the current policies. Furthermore, the application was approved into the directory w/o any hitch. Next, our importer to bigsight has been out there for six months and has even been used by a few fb employees. Of course, these facts aren’t enough to go on to say that we’re 100% in the right and that FB won’t enforce this Exportable Properties tidbit at some point. But they aren’t now and with good reason.

The current environment seems to be that FB sticks primarily to what is outlined in the core policy documents and then adhering to the following principle: “Just don’t be a dick.” So as long as developers handle user data with care and offer them services in which they have an active interest (while not violating their privacy settings or that of their friends), then that’s what matters most and developers are in the clear to experiment with and build off of user data portability.

It could turn out that FB decides to start actively enforcing that one definition and our entire exporting/importing operation could be shut down tomorrow. This would take a couple thousand other applications with it. But I just don’t see that happening. So if you are a developer, yes, know that you are operating at your own risk when you build data portability mechanisms, but that’s no less the case with many other applications. It’s still the wide open frontier out there and as developers on the Platform, it’s largely up to us to a) understand users’ interests and then b) build appropriate services that meet them. If we do this well, then that will shape (or re-shape) any policy elements that are currently ambiguous.

Read comment #6 by Sanjay Vakil. He is 100% correct.

“Exportable Facebook Properties” is a DEFINED TERM in the documentation, and Facebook has currently defined this term as an empty set:
http://wiki.dev...bleFBProperties

Further, Facebook has specifically identified the particular types of data that can be stored beyond the 24 hour period. That list is provided here:
http://develope....0&doc=misc

Facebook specifically prohibits all other data from being stored beyond 24 hours.

So, this guide is essentially completely wrong in it’s basic thesis. The author has made a serious error in his reading of the legal documents. He is so wrong, in fact, that I would recommend Techcrunch consider retracting the article. Because, currently, all this article is doing is spreading information about how to breach your contract with Facebook and illicitly gain access to people’s private FB information.

http://zooie.wordpress.com/