After being sued by Facebook in December for violating its terms of use, social-networking aggregator Power.com is now close to settling the dispute, we have been able to confirm. The final settlement terms are still being ironed out, but are being reviewed by both sides.
Power.com lets you sign into multiple social networks and manage them from one place, but it did not use Facebook’s API or Facebook Connect. As part of the settlement, Power will access this data via Facebook Connect. Power was scraping the data from Facebook and caching it, which it won’t be allowed to do with Facebook Connect.
Facebook is very particular about how it wants other Websites to access its user data. Facebook had similar problems with Google’s Friend Connect, although it simply banned Google from using its API rather than bring a lawsuit.
For Websites and services that want to tap into Facebook’s rich trove of user data (it now has 150 million active users worldwide), it has to do so by Facebook’s rules. But one of those rules, in particular, many partners are finding restrictive. They are not allowed to cache any data, so they cannot build their own user profiles or make their services smarter over time. There are good privacy reasons for not allowing other (possibly unscrupulous) sites to cache the data, but it also serves to limit innovation.
Is anyone keeping count of how many companies facebook is suing? It seems like they’re on pace to equal yahoo and msn soon!
Fadbook needs to mature and get ready for the open social niche market location based landrush.
fadboook does not have a strategic natural language location based niche market open social offering. maybe if they did they could be considered a serious “lets get something accomplised” website.
LandrushLocator.com – position yourself
I do not understand Facebook’s anxiety with Power.com’s emergence.
For starters, Power.com is such a horrible experience: pop-ups have a field day on their site.
Power.com was definitely launched to counter Facebook’s fast rise, but I very much doubt if Power.com is such a big threat.
Merely attracting big investors is not enough: Power.com will need to keep them
Facebook, in addition to its flawless user experience, combines a host of functions that pull crowds: inmail, FriendsFinder (I have found over 50!!), that is before you talk about photos.
Let the debate go on
Cheers,
Mutimba
Data is power.
Knowledge is power.
I predicted this when it started, and of course, it will be settled. A long, protracted lawsuit with something like this wouldn’t happen. Being anxious about competition isn’t sustainable for a lawsuit, from a legal standpoint.
if by settled you mean “power.com found the money to hire a rails coder for under $40/hr,” I’m right there with ya.
Well, power and facebook has pretty much settled it. Now go ahead and create an cool avatar with your own face for facebook from http://www.trutoon.com
Steve Vachani is a smart guy, and I think he’ll be able to build something of value here; specially when “networks collide”, such as orkut/facebook in Brazil, or MySpace/Facebook in the US.
The problem is that network effects tend to create a winner-take-all market consolidation, and facebook seems headed to win the global game. But, you know, shift happens. Look at skype, a dying company: suppose everyone in skype had been dead for 3 years now, would anyone have noticed?
Alexandre Linhares,
You are stupid. Social networking is a fad. It will go away. Like any club. Good for about 2-5 years, then it will slowly disappear and never heard of again. People get tired of their old friends. Make enemies from their old friends, etc.
How can stupid person like Alexandre be allowed to comment?
Phoe Sue,
you seem so frightened.
I respect that, cause I meet lots of people thinking like you do. Let it be said; Facebook is not like “shoes”, never will everybody use it.
But social networks are child of their time. Now people have ALWAYS loved looking passed the hedge at what neighbors, friends, colleagues are doing. Yet quite new is that Generation Y (our youngsters 1980-2000) are very interested in showing everybody who “they” are. They are much more high profile then older people. Now these two human needs (one old and one new) are being satisfied by these social networks.
So Yes, Facebook sucks when you are not interested in your old friends (or enemies like you call them). And it sucks even harder when you are not interested in letting people know who you are.
But hey, HERE you are on TechCrunch reading people’s thoughts, ventilating your opinion and networking with people you don’t know. Could it be that you in fact really really like social networks?
If Power.com lets Orkuters add more than 999 friends to a single profile, then success is to be had, lol. If Power dumps its main idea and works on being an add-on or improvement to Orkut, perhaps their popularity will rise. Nonetheless, the same problem arises, TOS. Here’s an idea, create neighborhoods like Oglobo’s Bairros.com, sort of like FB’s old Networks function, only build it up to where its actually useful.
Thus far, I don’t know anybody on Orkut who prefers Power, much less knows about it. Brazilians aren’t creatures of habit(ually switching networks). They found Fotolog, they stayed. They found Orkut, they stayed. They found MSN, they stayed.
I fear my wordplay failed. Better to just say they are creatures of habit. (period)
Anyways, perhaps Power.com will be popular in a time when unemployment is reaching 2.5 mil in the US. Lets all get on multiple networks.
Facebook needs to stop acting like Microsoft and focus on acquiring Twitter before they eat their breakfast lunch and dinner! Now go to sweetr.net and check out my humble but growing empire…*wakes from dream*
In order for anyone to take you seriously, you may want to consider updating your copyright year at the bottom of your website from 2008 to 2009. Just a thought. All the best with your empire.
Facebook, in addition to its flawless user experience, combines a host of functions that pull crowds: inmail, FriendsFinder (I have found over 50!!), that is before you talk about photos.
http://www.jugargame.com/
Will FB able to stop anyone from wanting to cache their OWN data for their own personal use…i.e. non-commercial?