Stop Whining Winer!

Okay, I understand what his point is. Basically David Winer is whining about how the FaceBook API is not adequate enough in that it doesn’t allow the user to access and port their data unless it’s via a FaceBook application. Apparently it took him sometime to figure out why he hated FaceBook but when he finally did it was for this reason.

I said I don’t like Facebook, never have, and I finally figured out why. It’s another one of those user generated content things, only this time I’m building up an address book that I can look at, but can only do things with it that Facebook lets me do.
I mean, I understand why they want me to tell them everyone I know, but how about letting me download a copy to my computer, so I can back it up, use it on my iPhone or Blackberry, bequeath it to my heirs, write a book about it, or give a copy to Google or Netflix or Yahoo, or you get the idea. It’s the last thing they don’t want me to do, give a copy to a competitor of theirs. And they hope I won’t notice that I’m doing all this work and not insisting on at least being their equal when it comes to my data.

Mr. RSS of-course wants the user to have control over his/her FaceBook data and it is understandable given his background and he might have a point to boot. I mean if you really think of it in those terms yeah, you spend all the time and energy creating relationships on FaceBook and you’re not allowed to use that data outside of the Facebook platform. It is understandable why one could get a little peeved about it. However Winer makes it sound like this is some sort of breaking news and none of us FaceBookers were aware of that.

David, I think most of us who are slightly up to speed with technology realize that the FaceBook platform is not “totally” open especially when it comes to extracting our data and porting it to non-FaceBook applications. But who really cares unless you’re a geek (and I say that with respect) like yourself. Most of the members who participate in FaceBook do so for the value it provides and that is establishing and maintaining contacts and friends. Your average FaceBooker doesn’t really care if he/she can’t access information on their relationships via shall we say, a RSS reader! I think your points are valid and should be heard in the overall context of social networking. Blatantly saying that FaceBook “sucks” is weak especially since your argument has no merit other than the fact that one cannot access their data outside FaceBook. This so called online bickering is not going to help the big picture.

Totally classless IMO.

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