It was a well-kept secret, by social media standards, but everyone who guessed "search" was right. At a press conference held at its Menlo Park, Calif., headquarters today, Mark Zuckerberg -- along with director of product Tom Stocky, and head of search Lars Rasmussen -- walked the audience through something called Graph Search.
This new functionality is currently in beta, and will be rolled out gradually -- although you're welcome to try a search jump or the waiting list.
Essentially, Graph Search seems to be a plain English search tool -- remember "Ask Jeeves"? -- which allows you to put specific queries to Facebook, deriving results from information that members, deliberately or by default, have made available to you. Anticipating outrage, Zuckerberg was quick to emphasize that Graph Search is "privacy-aware." It will only deliver search results based on content you are entitled to view.
Apparently, that was one of the main challenges facing developers. Ambitiously, it will return not just text-based results, but photos too. Results will automatically be tailored to individuals, because each member's "social graph" is distinct. (Graph Search will not exclude sponsored results.)
Whether this will prove more useful than web search remains to be seen. Subtract "personal results" from Google Search, for example, and the links returned in response to a query are blind to interests and preferences.
Arguably, this makes web search results more objective. Facebook would doubtless claim that personalizing results makes them more relevant and useful.
We need to see in more detail how Graph Search works in the wild, but it's likely to be of immediate interest to socially savvy businesses. Facebook instantly touted it as a new way to help people "discover your business." If members can search for a restaurant, or dentist, or dry cleaners their friends "Like," all the more reason to get your Facebook business page Liked by as many people as possible.
Will this give Google any sleepless nights? My first reaction is that when I search for something, I usually want to search well beyond the limits of my social circle's taste and knowledge. But it's too early to come to judgment: Let us know what you think.
If i search i need to get as much information as i possible can from as diverse sources.
@kicheko, I totally agree with your opinion. Searching in limited circle is not a good idea because we are restricting our search criteria. I wonder how people will respond to the Facebook graph search.
We don't necessary like everything about Facebook - and still we don't want to unscribe and leave the social media platform. The search feature will be "imposed" to users as are many other features. Users are not "given much" voice about Facebook design decision.
I echo your concern @stotheco. It may be private now, but Facebook frequently changes its TOS, often quietly until someone kicks up a social media fuss. By that time, these search results will be widely dispersed no doubt.
What Facebook is doing with graph search is interesting. But I'm not sure how I feel about it. First of all, their privacy options leave a lot to be desired. Zuckerberg explains that the results only parse data that is already 'public' in the first place. But these were made public only due to the many, many Facebook policy changes in privacy that no longer lets you set things to private.
I agree with Kim. When my Internet goes a little nutty and turns up errors when I try to access Google, I make do with other search engines like Yahoo and Bing. It usually takes me a longer time to find what I need compared to when I was using Google, and it's not just bias. It's really just based on experience. Thank goodness my ISP fixed things and this rarely happens.
Well, as a test, try doing another kind of search.
Ask Google (and other engines) the types of questions you ask a Magic 8 Ball...I mean not those exactly, but similar in nature.
So, how about Hey, you know what I like...which movie should I see tonight?
Or how about, I'd like to make some more money, but I don't want to a job where I have to go into the office, and I don't want to make minimum. Can you hook me up with someone who can give me exactly what I want?
Or how about this. Where should I go for my next vacation?
For each of these you might get redirected to an article which contains some of the elements of these in the title (Planning a vacation -- Tips and Tricks), but these certainly are the specific types of answers you would expect from a true expert, or even a friend who understands and knows you!
The ThinkerNet does not reflect the views of TechWeb. The ThinkerNet is an informal means of communication to members and visitors of the Internet Evolution site. Individual authors are chosen by Internet Evolution to blog. Neither Internet Evolution nor TechWeb assume responsibility for comments, claims, or opinions made by authors and ThinkerNet bloggers. They are no substitute for your own research and should not be relied upon for trading or any other purpose.
Brands looking to measure public opinion by reading Twitter tea leaves should take heed of a Pew Research report, which finds that Twitter sentiment is often very different from public opinion as measured by surveys.
When Michael Bepko, global online community manager for Whole Foods, describes the company's social media strategy, it sounds like herding cats -- 350 cats to be precise.
Facebook's Graph Search may face some profound challenges and risks, first, because Facebook users haven't been thinking of their posts as product reviews; and second, because Facebook will now have to contend with the social-network equivalent of SEO "gaming" of results.
A recent release of the popular TweetDeck app for Twitter power-users gives new life to software that had previously taken a wrong turn. Here's a quick walk-through of the new TweetDeck, to show you why it should be at the top of your Twitter toolkit.
Michael Brutsch, a.k.a. Reddit's Violentacrez, is a creep who posted borderline kiddie porn to the Internet anonymously, and got fired when outed by a media outlet. It's a cautionary tale even for people who aren't jerks and predators.
What can users today do to protect their online privacy? The simplest and most obvious option is to not use the Internet – at all. However, once all digital information is consolidated over the Internet, trying to protect digital identity by simply unplugging from the Internet becomes impossible – a fact that has manifest implications for civil liberties, Saunders says.
By 2011 the number of Internet-connected sensors will exceed 1 trillion, making your chances of doing anything or going anywhere unnoticed pretty much zero. Saunders talks about how the 'sensortization' of the Internet is eliminating the traditional divide between online and offline populations.
The 20th Century Internet was characterized by the ability to interact with other people and information on the Internet largely without anyone knowing who you were. The Internet of this century, conversely, will be defined by identity. Saunders explains how Internet users are unwittingly contributing to the demise of the anonymous Internet.
Steve Saunders talks about the risks inherent in uncontrolled, widespread profiling of Internet users, and how one day this practice could form the basis of a new industry, the Outernet, which in economic terms will have outgrown the commercial value of the Internet itself.
Search companies and social networks are collecting incredibly detailed information about their users, says Steve Saunders, who predicts that these 'profiles' could one day become commodities to be bought and sold by companies on 'profile markets' or 'identity exchanges’ – the digital DNA equivalents of the financial and commodities exchanges on which stocks, oil, and gold are traded.
One of the most important Internet issues of all time is being ignored by the media. In this three-part video series Steve Saunders explains how search companies are turning the tables on their users by creating user profiles for financial gain, and how soon this trend will explode into full scale profiling.
New York's Metropolitan Transit Authority is conducting a pilot test of digital kiosks to guide subway users to where they want to go more efficiently and at lower cost.
The whole Amazon.reader debate is a double-stupid. It's stupid to think that there's any e-book buyer who doesn't know Amazon's URL, and it was stupider to let ICANN launch the whole free-form TLD initiative to start with.
While NFC's original goal was to enhance mobile commerce applications, it is finding its way into a number of other uses, which is creating both opportunity as well as challenges for IT departments.
Enterprises would like to move to cloud computing but are hesitant because they are concerned about providers’ ability to secure company data. Here are some tips that help to ensure that if breaches occur, the business is not left holding the bag.
Edmunds separates customers into segments based on the info it collects on its site and from partners, and uses that to push out custom content, said Brian Baron, director of business analytics for Edmunds.com, at Predictive Analytics Innovation Summit.
The automotive website uses propensity modeling to target ads and customer registration forms, said Brian Baron, director of business analytics for Edmunds.com, at Predictive Analytics Innovation Summit.
Expert Integrated Systems: Changing the Experience & Economics of IT In this e-book, we take an in-depth look at these expert integrated systems -- what they are, how they work, and how they have the potential to help CIOs achieve dramatic savings while restoring IT's role as business innovator. READ THIS eBOOK
your weekly update of news, analysis, and
opinion from Internet Evolution - FREE! REGISTER HERE
Wanted! Site Moderators Internet Evolution is looking for a handful of readers to help moderate the message boards on our site – as well as engaging in high-IQ conversation with the industry mavens on our thinkerNet blogosphere. The job comes with various perks, bags of kudos, and GIANT bragging rights. Interested?
To save this item to your list of favorite Internet Evolution content so you can find it later in your Profile page, click the "Save It" button next to the item.
Email This
