Facebook Connect – Is this Beacon 2.0?

Some are saying this is something like a version of openID and the current implementations for Facebook Connect are for interacting with your Facebook Friends outside of Facebook. An example is being able to see what your Facebook Friends are doing on DIGG for example.

Abandon aircraft beacon
Photo owned by saschapohflepp (cc)

What they’re saying though is that the apps that you could once run on Facebook only and which could access certain data about you and your friends can now be run on other websites. So external sites/webservices can now access your Facebook data or some of it. Now this is good, it’s almost data portability. But.

Isn’t this going to allow sites to know more about you and so sell more to you? Beacon allows external sites see that you’re a Facebooker and send “stories” (ads) back down your connection and into your news feed for your friends to see. Almost like that Candiru fish in the Amazon that swims up your urethra and feeds off you once inside. With a site using Connect and Beacon, won’t they know even more about you and your friends? Will Connect allow external sites to better display ads to you?

Should Google sign up to Connect?

3 Responses to “Facebook Connect – Is this Beacon 2.0?”

  1. roosta says:

    Facebook and any one else of its ilk is gonna see a major backlash if it keeps trying to push this kind of thing. People want to interact, but they don’t want their information pulled out of their own hands and shown for the world to see.

  2. Noel Rock says:

    Candiru fish?

    That has to be the most obscure reference you’ve ever tried to drop into a blog post casually.

  3. Andrew says:

    …..And by far the most wince-worthy reference!