Newly launched Power.com, a service that lets users aggregate their social networking experience across multiple sites (Facebook, Orkut, Hi5, MySpace, etc.), was sued by Facebook on December 30. The complaint, filed in Federal court in California, is embedded below.
The Power.com service lets users view activities on all of their social networks at once. It also marks up pages to include additional functionality in a way that Greasemonkey users are familiar with.
Facebook clearly doesn’t like it, even though users must explicitly sign up for the service and access it via the Power.com website. In the complaint Facebook alleges that Power.com violates its terms of use, copyright and trademarks. Specifically they object to the storage of user credentials on the Power.com servers, the scraping of “proprietary data” from Facebook (user data), and other issues.
In some ways this is similar to the actions Facebook took to block Google Friend Connect from accessing Facebook accounts last May. When third parties access Facebook, they want it done the way they want it done – via the API and Facebook Connect. Other methods, even if approved by the users themselves, are going to be aggressively countered.
For now Power.com has removed Facebook access from the site. If the Google Friend Connect situation is anything to go by, don’t expect to see it back any time soon. Or ever.
This was inevitable I suppose. Nice of Power.com to take the bullet as a litmus test for the rest of us.
The world needs more Power.com’s and fewer Facebooks, but with a Power.com in the mix Facebook has less power.
cant we all just get along. a little innovation should not be a crime.
ConnectLocator.com – follow dots
Everyone the same, everyone wants to keep the pie to themselves.
Well when web 2.0 baby Facebook starts acting like Big Business (1990’s,) and Banks (2000’s), it should act like a BIG SIGN saying…
the End is Near
power.com looks terribad in safari
Sign in page sucks…font is way too small, no refresh on the captica or whatever it is called. Way too much orange when you sign in…
Anything looks “terribad” in safari
you are terribad for quoting terribad
“terribad” meme jumping the shark in 3, 2, 1…
how about sinbad the terribad
how long till we get the usual post from some idiot say…”I don’t use Facebook.” “Facebook is so yesterday” Mark Z should go on a date with ijustine and do a video of it…curious totally off topic but why doesn’t apple get ijustine to do ads for them..
Facebook is so yesterday.
I think this is how facebook actually make money now days, just sue other one by one http://groups.im/
What’s ijustine?
http://tastyblogsnack.com/
She…is brilliant..a jim carey quality to her..a youtube star…whose skits are based around tech…
certainly cant be Jim Carey, the actor and comedian…I just saw two of her skits and it looked pretty stupid. Waste of time.
And what is ‘terr….’ actually I’m not going to say it.
Power.com, you had it coming.
Sorte
Her facial expressions are what I meant by the Jim Carey reference…physical comedy…
Twilight showed that the teenage girl market is a powerful one. That would be a perfect market for the iphone or future squidget or laptops. She gets a ton of views on her shows.. she also would attract the young male market because she is attractive..
32 000 twitter followers
4,738,332 views of her justin.tv channel
Top 100 in all 3 youtube cats….
And you wouldn’t want her selling your stuff..
I haven’t even played a video yet and I’m already a fan
Gebadia Smith, Luke, — thank you for your kind words..
I don’t use Facebook.
god save u
I don’t use Facebook. And who the hell is iJustine?
Does your market use Facebook?
That is why I created by personal aggregator with the iMacros Firefox extension – a good companion to Greasemonkey
Too bad, sounds like an interesting idea for your social graph.
Your readers predicted this in the comments of your rather shortsighted initial review of Power.com – scrape based aggregators are a clear violation of TOS. API based aggregators take way more sophistication on the backend but work within the TOS.
TC reviewers don’t seem to understand this difference!
@Raskin techcrunch or mashable don’t seem to understand this or want to mention it. They both just write an article about this, as if scraping should not be mentioned. To me, when I read an article about this, the first thing I want to hear about is scraping. It’s a big deal–not because I particularly care about a TOS that says we can’t scrape them, but has very few precedents to make it punishable by law, but rather because–in disagreement with one thing you wrote–it’s actually way way harder to scrape that site than it is to use an API.
So basically, I’m saying 2 things:
1) Raskin, you’re absolutely wrong about API based aggregators (or 2 way communicators, in the case of Power.com) requiring “way more sophistication on the backend” if you’re defining “sophistication” as the amount of work that needs to be done to make it happen. Simply put, it’s a lot harder to scrape it than it is to use the API. They have to have a massive auto-proxy switcher and probably a million of their own IP addresses that they purchased. Otherwise, Facebook can easily block them out.
2) The TOPIC AT HAND here is whether scraping is really illegal. Michael, this is perhaps one of the biggest legal suits for scraping in a non-spam related way ever. How come you didn’t even mention that point in your article. I PERSONALLY FINALLY WANT TO KNOW IF IT’S AGAINST THE LAW TO DO THIS STUFF. I think power.com should stop being a pussy and fight facebook. Just because Facebook puts it in their TOS, does it really mean it is against the law?!?!?!
I think if this would be ruled against the law, the law system is fucked. Period. Are you telling me that I cannot go access my friend’s facebook account when he asks me to go in and get something from it (e.g. a phone number from a message, while he’s away from his computer–and can’t access facebook from a phone)? HELL NO! So what’s the difference between a company doing it on en masse for its users???
NOTHING…It’s understandable why Facebook is doing what they’re doing. I’d do it too. I’m a mercenary so I can relate. But it doesn’t mean that they should be able to win that suit.
So IF I’M WRONG, PLEASE SOMEONE TELL ME. I’m dying to know the answer to this from someone who knows more about this matter.
James
from
FaceySpacey.com – “The Startup Incubator”
STUPID! shame on FB! Maybe they are not into brazilians. Should someone tell them that Brazilians lead the world rank of social networking? come on, there is potencial in amazon land!
Why shame of Facebook? Facebook has at least 3 API’s that Power could have used legally. Facebook App, Facebook Desktop and Facebook Connect.
Instead Power decided to scrape data, probably thinking that because they are in Rio they can do whatever they want.
Oh by the way, how is Brazilians leading the world rank of social networking?
Mikd D, the fact of the matter is you don’t know the APIs whatsoever. What Power.com has done is release the functionality people really really want. Most of that stuff you can’t do with the Facebook API.
The Facebook API is about splashing the “message” of your application throughout facebook to get other people to go check it out. Facebook Connect–although something you could pretty much always do–is a proclamation from Facebook to the world that you can use facebook login info to login members to your site, and get them to make use of their social graph to invite other facebook members to your site or to link their facebook account to an account on your site if they already have an account. + Profile Portability…Again, you could always do that stuff even before Facebook Connect. The fact that it’s been do so little points to the unoriginality and inside the box thinking of most people in the Web 2.0 space.
Anyway, the data you get from the Facebook API sucks anyway. I’m not saying the new API sucks. I’m saying it’s not about getting data out, as all you’d get is a portable profile and a friends list.
What the new API has that is good is tons of ways for users of your apps or sites enabled with the apps to push data out and become little user-generated marketers. EXAMPLES: the new tab on your facebook profile where you can feature advanced functionality including ajax for your app. The ability to post to your wall and to your friends’ walls 100% of the time via any action the developer chooses, pending approval in a popup dialog by the user. Facebook wall commenting with advanced functionality to pretty much do whatever you need. ETC.
So there are a lot of good things. THE MOST IMPORTANT ONE: MESSAGING IS NOT ONE OF THEM. The closest API method Facebook has is the ability to attach stuff to messages within Facebook. They certainly don’t have the ability to be within Power.com and send a message to your myspace friends, to your facebook friends, to your gmail contacts, etc. Power.com, if they wanted could help you make a group of your friends, and then let you spam them all at once, regardless of what network they’re on.
Basically, what Power.com is doing is accessing facebook.com a million times a day, probably through thousands of IP addresses they purchased. They probably have a complex setup to know if a particular IP address gets blocked from Facebook, and then they stop performing actions on Facebook with that particular IP address (and probably let it spam Myspace until Myspace does the same), etc.
Power.com draws all sorts of other functionality out of Facebook that is just too juicy for Facebook to open up: instant messaging, feeds besides just your status feed, etc.
Facebook aint givin much out, Mike. And the stuff they do give out is actually quite complex to figure out. Their API is poorly organized and redundant. To make use of their best viral features takes hours and hours of research.
Kudos to Power.com for scraping all the functionality they did…Wish they would just stand up for themselves against Facebook.
Wow. There are a lot of ignorant blowhards in tech but “James from FaceySpacey.com” you probably take the cake. Every post you make on this site you insult other people and then you make a long post attempting to sound like you know what you are talking about.
Somebody posting that Facebook has 3 APIs and then you coming back with a reply stating that “you don’t know the APIs whatsoever” without even knowing anything about this person is very 1st grade.
You seem to have a strong opinion that Power.com is doing something right but insulting others because they don’t agree with your opinion is ignorant, childish and self-centered. The funny thing is that you come across extremely rude and yet you post from an account linking back to your own website. I’m going to spare you the business 101 lesson but in short saying insulting comments and linking those comments back to a product, website, etc. is a sure fire way nobody will ever use your website that reads these comments.
Also, I’m not going to challenge your apparent lack of dev skills but how many screen scraping applications have you written? How many APIs have you written? And when I ask about APIs I’m asking about APIs that you’ve actually built not APIs you’ve accessed. Building an API and USING an API are two very different things. I’ve written many of both. Which was harder to develop or which required more “sophistication”? If you say screen scraping you’re not even a developer just some kid with an opinion on things he’s never even worked with.
Wow. Really? What the hell are they so afraid of? Facebook acts like AOL. Always trying to protect their users from the services of other companies. It is the web. This is how it works. Facebook needs to get used to the idea of independent authentication and data portability.
Yes, walled gardens are nothing new. Facebook is not a revolution and this is the same kind of anticompetitive action companies have been taking for years, if not centuries.
I understand wanting to hold on to your business and fearing others may overtake you, but come on! Technology won’t be stunted, and let’s face it, Facebook basically ripped off the concept MySpace started, so they really don’t have room to complain. Keep a tight reign on people who utilize social media, and you will lose customers. The whole point of the internet is the freedom it gives you to get the information you want, they way you want it.
Reminds me of the dispute ebay had with biddersedge.com back in 1999 or 2000. Same issues and principles at stake. (eBay obviously won).
California law applies to Rio de Janeiro ?
No, but although power.com operation is based in Brazil, they also have a company registed in the USA, with owns power Brazil. Anyway would be funny to watch fb sueing power in Brazil hehe, court decision would take ages.
Trying to sneek one past us, eh?
Fudido in Portuguese means ‘fu**ed’…oh well, I suppose the company is fudido if FB is after them.
F*&k Facebook HARD, they’re complete loosers for doing that, so much for playing fair, and while I’m at it F&*k Google for their Don’t Do Evil BULL S&*T
Wow. Well, I totally understand that they want to maintain control of user behavior and how data is used. After all, there is so much competition out there. You can give any potential competitor an inch. lol.
I’m curious how you see Power to be a competitor to FB. Your writing is third-grade level so I’m not sure I want to read the answer, but you tap into the undercurrent here and I just don’t see what could possibly be getting affected on FB by Power except ad views.
EH, Your just plain amazing. Your analysis is just so breathtaking and your knowledge of business is inspiring. Maybe not. However, you are right about about Power affecting Facebook’s ad views which as I remember from business school is how websites without a clue how to use their assets make money. It’s really simple: Ad Views=Bloated Revenue. That in turn equals more funding rounds because god knows Facebook does everything possible not to turn a profit. This money pays bills (e.g. staff, labor, stuff … because if I remember people don’t work for free). At least that how it works in the valley, unlike the rest of the world. By the way: For future reference please note that there is always someone who knows more or can do more than you. Simply put if you care to insult someone be prepared to be insulted even by those you have nothing to do with the situation. Basic manners should not disappear online because no one can see you.
Good Day.
When is MySpace going to sue Facebook?
While I can understand Facebook being hesitant to let other services access user data in unapproved ways, isn’t this pretty similar to how they use your webmail login to download your contacts?
By the way, theres more info about the lawsuit here http://bits.blo...-sues-powercom/ . In the end, looks like power.com is getting some free media.
Doesnt facebook scrape gmail and other services to find friends you know that are on facebook or to invite them?
I’d be more worried about Meebo than Power.com. Both services collect login data and siphon traffic away from Facebook; however, Meebo has much more traffic, has more funding, and isn’t operated internationally. Regardless, this is very interesting especially since Meebo has been offering it’s FB integration for longer.
Huh, think it has anything to do with “has more funding?”
Since when is suing someone not partially influenced by money?
Remember when web 2.0 was all about openness and free information exchange. Ah, those were the days.
No, but I remember when it was about shadowbox overlay ads.
Interesting news story on the eve of the anniversary of what came to be known as “Scoblegate”.
The LATimes says they’ve settled and will agree to use FB connect.
“Power.com founder Steve Vachani tells us the dispute has been resolved and that Power.com will use Facebook Connect starting in late January.”
http://latimesb...it-shows-h.html
great marketing campaign… wait for FB to sue, then settle & use it for customer acquisition.
serious, not a bad approach as long as no monetary damages.
lol. power.com are idiots. i am not much of facebook fan but this right here deserves a lawsuit. they can use api and they chose not too.
Sounds to me like they *wanted* to get sued… After all, they probably got more publicity (free or otherwise) out of the lawsuit than they could have dreamed of!!! They might even have the Facebook Connect functionality ready and tested already, even though they claim it will be up by the end of the month. Looks to me that the only thing FB accomplished by the suit telling a few million people about Power.com.
The user is initiated the scraping of his/her own data from facebook.
I still believe the user still has ownership over his data … unless facebook is assuming the user’s identity is theirs?!?
While power.com and facebook tries to figure this out, here is a nice website that lets you create fun avatars with your own face for facebook http://www.trutoon.com
Why do you use a swastika as a watermark?
Any company that depends on a piece of s**t business model that is FB deserves this and worst.
If you are like me and are sick and tired of reading about BS dot com startups, you’d be looking for real business opportunities. I’m currently looking to start a new hot dog stand right by Ramona and University, or possibly right by the Facebook’s new offices.
We are looking for hot dog stand managers. Previous directors/VPs at software startups are preferred as management competencies required coincide.
You are not that smart, are you? If you are sick and tired of reading about BS dot com startups, what the hell are you doing over here?
Why don’t you go to a website that talks about your hot dog stand instead.
I’m just scouting for hot dog stand talent. This is a great place to do that.
Cheers.
Bob, I would think about it twice before entrusting a single precious hot dog to some of them. They can:
1. Just eat it up and say that it was your ‘venture investment’ and some businesses fail.
2. Give it away as an ‘incentive’ to the first tramp passing buy and say to you that this was a future paying customer and he will provide a viral marketing…
…many things can happen to your hot dogs if you hand them over to the people who know the proper language, you know.
If you can compare the Internet to Digital TV, then Facebook and Power.com are just two channels within your TV Guide.
But where the Internet fails to compare with Digital TV, is that unlike on Digital TV, where you can plan and record whatever programme you like on your Recordable TV Hard Drive, the Internet does not follow suit.
This move by Facebook to sue Power.com, means that the dream of setting up and aggregating your favourite Websites for your perfect Digital Homepage or Dashboard, will never bear fruit.
Shame on you Facebook for keeping out aggregators from your ‘walled garden’ turf.
I cannot agree with such this policy, but it’s clearly a TOS violation. That said, TC is giving credence to these companies when they write entire pieces on their business models – that frequently violate TOS
I cannot agree with this policy, but it’s clearly a TOS violation. That said, TC is giving credence to these companies when they write entire pieces on their business models – that frequently violate TOS
Facebook has turned a blind eye to people scraping its chat system. Adium and other clients have reversed engineered the facebook chat protocol and are using this.
When Power first came up public a lot individual sign-up with this great idea unfortunately not all of them are happy . one member complaint after they sign-up with power most of his friend received a advertising email from a 3rd party and they are angry about it. here is the link http://www.tech...ng-power-users/
Nat
http://www.halflet.com
Just another example of how FB sees it’s future as a very unstable and somewhat unknown path. It’s always going to be difficult for them to ‘play nicely’ while they are still trying to figure out how to leverage their database to make money – and in the meantime they act like scared little kids (which by the sounds of it they probably are).
back to the old argument of who owns “my” data.
Maybe Yahoo, Hotmail, AOL and Gmail should sue Facebook for scraping their emails even if user gives them permission….
Please see our terms [http://legal.facebook.com/terms.php] of service to get a better understanding of the situation.
I believe that personal data should be owned by the user, and not by any company. Each person should have the right to access and control the use of his or her own data.
I believe that this is a fundamental right which which we must vigilently protect, lest we lose such a right forever.
That is why I keep my data on my own server, if you think other people will let you keep your sh*t in their garage for free forever your wacky.
Unfortunately, too many companies try to use, sell, barter, trade, and otherwise exploit individuals’ private information for short term financial gain …
When facebook runs out of money and the servers get turned off, we will really find out that anything on facebook’s server is facebooks to do with. Scraping fb takes a lot of bandwidth(=money) keep it up, until they block you, might help them run into financial troubles sooner. Hopefully you have a backup copy of everything you have ever put there.
Forget the Facebook thing when is Scribd going to go after docstoc (what you embeded in your post) for similar doc type thingy’s LOL.
Wow, I like the new TC layout. Congrats!
Facebook has become crap with its new Web 2.0 features. I would prefer power.com over facebook, anytime.
That’s what happens when you start calling websites – ‘platforms’, tiny bits of programming – ‘revolutions’ etc.etc. At some point they start believing all this hype and reigning as if they are gods or something…
The incident is simple and obvious, the guys who were grabbing the data are just lazy and perhaps too incompetent to use the API. That’s the cause. They invoked the God-complex in the Facelift owners and they would strike a pose. Very funny.
Oh! Gosh! Can somebody come up with something less childish?
this is a stab at core Principles of a Free and Open Social ID. lawsuit garden? pwr.com is a better domain name.
OpenLocator – no walls foundation
I continue to tell people that Facebook is simply the re-evolution of AOL. AOL fought to keep everyone in its walls – seemed to work for them, huh?
In an environment trending towards openness and transparency, Facebook really stands out. Mark Z is tyrannical in his methods! I call for a new leader.
Facebook is greedy. Great site but greedy. Needs more competition. Facebook= Monopoly. Myspace is out of the picture
Haha, what does Facebook expect? It’s only delaying the inevitable.
I guess its a way for if it wasnt for the trial i wouldnt have heard about power.com
so they got free advertisement at least for now 
Bu the idea is very smart a way to Make money by using already known websites!
The way alot of the popular social networks handle there data reminds me of how AOL use to be. At some point the best thing for all of them is to open up even more and allow seamless access . I like Facebook but I dont like the user experience. If someone came up with a site that had a better user experience but worked seemlessly with Facebook I would be more inclined to use it, and Facebook would be better off for it as it would reach an even broader demographic. Needless to say I think that in the future they will need to drop some of the walls in their garden even more to be successful long term.
I like how information about me and my friends is “proprietary data” for Facebook. It provides a scary indication of what the future will look like if Facebook maintains its dominance (which it won’t).
Interesting… I wonder if the suit is just a gimmick at publicity?
Well you cant fault facebook. After all Power.com is trying to build their base through other’s websites.
This’ll play out soon, cause Facebook already knows Power.com doesn’t have $ like that.
Facebook, what a bunch of ****suckers. When will people wake up and see that facebook is AOL all over again and worse! Of course they have to block everyone because the minute facebook opens up is the minute it closes down…why… Because facebook has no business model. It just suckered people into joining so you can gossip about old friends who you probably did not give a crap about to begin with.
Facebook is a con..a site started by the king of jerk offs- Mark Z – who ripped off the idea from his buddies in college (what a rat) and hen ripped off everything else form MySpace and Multiply.
Hey Facebook, What’s the difference between storing your login information in a browser or storing it on power.com. Maybe you should sue Firefox and Microsoft for their ‘remember password’ technology…..
I don’t believe the ’storage and use of Facebook login information’ complaint has merit[period]
It may never happen, but I believe Facebook users [and other social network users] should have 110% full rights to their data and access it any way they choose.
Why does anyone care about power.com anyway? It is so meaningless.