by Brian Solis, sourced from PR 2.0

I recently discussed the viability of Twitter evolving beyond a micro community into a standardized platform for macro conversations. It’s certainly the path Facebook is traversing. And, both are making significant progress in the race to syndicate and aggregate the discussions that are important to us within our respective social networks.

There is another emerging platform worth discussing as it is quietly growing into an alternative solution to the disparate communities that are pervasive throughout the social web.

Ladies and gentlemen, add FriendFeed to your radar for listening, participation, and relationship building.

Defining FriendFeed is easier said than done. In fact, it’s less of a competitor to Twitter and more of a vertical threat to Facebook’s prized News Feed. The News Feed feature in Facebook is considered the central nervous system to the social graph. It powers conversations, connections, and collaboration. As Facebook Connect “connects” you and your social graph across the Web, it will increase in value as it aggregates all outside activity into one centralized stream for your friends, and friends of friends, to review, interpret, and respond. Also, don’t rule out an acquisition of Twitter either.

FriendFeed is one of the most prominent examples of a dedicated lifestream (brandstream). It channels your social activity and also that of your social graph into one simplified river of relevance. As new items appear in the stream, it invites bookmarking and threaded conversations that promote dialog. For example, you can import activity from flickr, youtube, twitter, backtype, blogs, Last.fm, Seesmic, Upcoming, LinkedIn, Yelp, Amazon, Picasa, Delicious, StumbleUpon, Digg, Reddit, Disqus, and 12 seconds. The growing list of services currently sits at 60, but technically you can integrate any service that generates an RSS feed. Most important is FriendFeed’s ability to port your Facebook status into your stream. Technically, you can now host, contribute to and participate in a more comprehensive “news feed” with the potential of reaching a far greater, or perhaps focused and dedicated audience of people who either aren’t on Facebook or prefer something different.

FriendFeed is also unique in that it offers custom rooms to host and join dedicated conversations related to any given topic. Your stream can also export to websites, outside communities, blogs and social profiles.

We celebrated Twitter’s rise to 4.5 million uniques in just over two years, which was enough to surpass Digg’s highly regarded traffic milestone. In less than a year, FriendFeed is nearing one million unique visitors, representing a 3,170% increase.

When compared to other social aggregation and lifestream services, FriendFeed’s trajectory is incredibly promising. You’ll also note that the category represented through the following services is also on the rise, with Tumblr at 1.4 million unique visitors, AOL’s SocialThing realizing 186% annual growth and Google’s Jaiku open micro community platform is still on the rise with a 33% increase over the last year..

If you compare FriendFeed to other micro communities, it appears to be the only platform that is not only growing, but also cultivating an active and significant user base. Plurk is the largest alternative micro community with 256,000 unique visitors and Yammer places a distant third at 86,000.

FriendFeed will only continue to increase in significance, broadening its reach, expanding its user base, and diversifying its user base from early adopters to mainstream market catalysts over the next year. This momentum will continue to be fueled by the addition of new and popular services combined with the dedicated evangelism and amplified awareness generated by influential (and passionate) users such as Robert Scoble, Louis Gray, Chris Brogan, Laura Fitton, Michael Arrington, Dan Farber, Chris Messina, Brian Oberkirch, Loic Le Meur, and Dave Winer. And, it’s not just the usual voices who will propel FriendFeed as a viable conversation platform, it extends to the many, many others who are authoritative and trusted within their dedicated spheres of influence and reach.

Connect with me on:
Twitter, FriendFeed, LinkedIn, Tumblr, Pownce, Plaxo, Plurk, Identi.ca, BackType, Jaiku or Facebook

by Brian Solis, deeper analysis and review available at PR 2.0

Conversations continue to splinter throughout every new blog post, micromedia community, network, lifestream and aggregated community across the Social Web. While some services are attempting to aggregate and host these conversations through a personal, customizable dashboard supported by yet another complementary social network, the truth is that they only continue to fragment our attention as well as our ability to consistently participate in every community where our contribution may be beneficial.

Through participation, we earn relationships and hopefully build authority by contributing helpful advice, information and insight. We also learn more about the subjects in which we’re interested, creating a deeper understanding of the dynamics associated with not only the subject matter, but also the community view and reaction to it. In the process, we establish and cultivate our online brand, reputation, and associated expertise that is only fortified through every new piece of content we publish and every comment we share.

Social platform services such as SezWho (which is running on PR 2.0 and bub.blicio.us) are formally packaging our expertise through the aggregation of our comments and the ratings our insight as defined by other members of each community. Through SezWho, for example, we can build our own online dossier that presents a comprehensive list of our thoughts and ideas as contributed in blog posts, comments, forums, and other related Web sites.

The process of listening isn’t only relegated to the research and analysis of individual reputations. Listening is also instrumental in the creation of new communications and service initiatives as well unearthing the specific conversations that matter to your brand – for gathering data and also discovering opportunities to respond.

Introducing BackType, a service that I believe, is navigating conversations back to the blogosphere.

BackType is a new service that brings blog post comments back into the spotlight. Whether you’re managing an online reputation management (ORM) or an online monitoring system (OMS), BackType allows you to search keywords across the blogosphere to uncover important conversations that may require our participation, or at the very least, provide you with insight into critical community perspective. You can also search all comments by a particular person and date range to create a snapshot of someone’s area of focus, bias, or expertise.

The new service is built upon a social framework that is also, yes, a social network. We can create a profile that, as usual, portrays our persona in a way that hopefully contributes to our strategically crafted online brand.

BackType connects us not only to the comments that are important to us, but also to like-minded thought leaders and the posts that compel them to share their thoughts, in addition to extending the conversation thread by publishing related content on their own blogs.

When you log on to BackType, you can search comments or find and follow people that are worth tracking. Each time you hit your dashboard, BackType provides an aggregated view of the comments made by your peers to stay connected to and learn from their activity.

Perhaps most notably, you can bookmark, share, and also reply to comments from the dashboard to immediately add your views to each and every related conversation and also incrementally contribute to your personal and professional credibility.

Connect with me on:
Twitter, Jaiku, LinkedIn, Tumblr, Pownce, Plaxo, FriendFeed, Plurk, Identi.ca, BackType, or Facebook

by Brian Solis

It’s no secret. I’m a huge fan of FriendFeed. It’s the most comprehensive aggregated stream (lifestream or brandstream) application available today and it’s supported by an incredibly active community.

Today the FriendFeed team introduced badges and widgets to spotlight the conversations taking place inside FriendFeed in any blog, social network profile or web page that accepts HTML.

The team also released “share this” on FriendFeed to link your community to your FriendFeed Stream.

Share on FriendFeed

Bret and the FF team, please add the ability to submit messages back to the same services, selectively, from which we can also import.

Connect with me on Twitter, Jaiku, LinkedIn, Tumblr, Pownce, Plaxo, FriendFeed, Plurk or Facebook

words and pictures by Brian Solis

I attended the Facebook f8 developer conference yesterday in San Francisco and I’m still recovering from the overwhelming experience.

Thousands of developers flocked to the San Francisco Design Center to see their Social Sherpa in person and calibrate with his vision for the next year of propagating the social graph. It’s indeed a movement and his influence can not be underestimated. Comparisons to Steve Jobs were broadcast as freely as the ideas that were exchanged in almost every conversation.

I was lucky enough to get a front row view for Zuckerberg’s state of the social network and his plans for making Facebook more pervasive in the socialization of online content.

Facebook is aiming to become our dashboard for relationships and everything we do online, creating a cohesive and simplified connection between us to change and improve how we communicate.

Their mission is no small task, “Give people the power to share and make the world more open and connected.”

One of the many announcements that was made at the company’s second annual developer conference was Facebook Connect, and it just may well be the epicenter of our social activity.

With just a bit of code, Facebook Connect enables seamless integration between Web sites, pages, communities, and networks and the Facebook identity system. For example, if you’re commenting on a blog hosted on the Moveable Type platform, you can now login with your Facebook details and not only will your comment and link to your Facebook profile appear on the blog, the activity of commenting is also linked back into your activity feed for your friends and colleagues to see. Digg, another example that was shared on stage, also supports FB Connect, making it possible for Diggers to log on using their centralized Facebook ID and for each story they digg, the activity is documented back on their profile.

Not only is it an aggregated system for personal identity across social networks, it is also laying the foundation for Beacon 2.0, which will more accurately assess who you are and what you like. As Om Malik points out at GigaOM, “Each service adds a few more data points about you inside the Facebook brain, which is quite aware of your activities inside the Facebook ecosystem. The brain can then crunch all that information and build a fairly accurate image of who you are, what you like and what might interest you. With all that information at its disposal, Facebook can build a fairly large cash register.”

Moveable Type

DIGG

Facebook Connect partners include Amiando, CBS.com, CitySearch, CNET, CollegeHumor, Disney-ABC, Evite, Flock, Hulu, Kongregate, Loopt, Plaxo, Radar, Red Bull, Seesmic, Socialthing!, StumbleUpon, The Insider, Twitter, Uber, Vimeo and Xobni.

Yes, it’s practically a direct competitor to the important OpenID system that has invested over the years in the education and development of unifying the social web and personal identities – with one login. FB Connect however, assumes that you want a profile in its proprietary social network, which may or may not be a bad thing. It’s ambitious to say the least. And, unlike OpenID, Facebook is not only the keeper of your online identity, but as I’ve written about for two years, it is also the hub for your online brand. If Facebook is listening, I’m not alone in suggesting that the company should also integrate OpenID. It would be the right, and most promising, thing to do.

FB Connect transforms the social network into a portable profile that travels with you across the Web, placing you and your brand at the center of the experience.

This announcement is significant in my opinion, not just for the opportunity it represents today, but for the implementations and opportunities next month, next quarter, next year, and beyond.

The ongoing integration of support for social services in the Facebook NewsFeed is aggregating and expediting personal lifestreams and quickly becoming representative of our true online activity, painting a vivid picture of who we are and what we represent online and in the real world. With FB Connect the previously isolated silo distributes your identity and creates a direct link back to your profile, which ultimately, is a bright, powerful, and distributed beacon for your personal brand.

Facebook Connect also further socializes and unites the Web.

Now, for example, static Websites can socialize, creating a dynamic link between content and people. Businesses and communities can now directly connect corporate brands with personal brands, and more notable, the people behind them. Social networks can build and leverage expertise and reputation and carry thought leadership, preferences, causes, and relationships from community to community. Facebook Connect is a powerful catalyst for investing in and increasing Social Capital.

Remember, Facebook “public” profiles are indexed in online search engines and can be among the top results when your name is searched.

In the real world, your online reputation proceeds you.

More pictures from f8:

Mark Zuckberg Press Conference

Michael Arrington of TechCrunch

Nik Cubrilovic of TechCrunchIT

Justin Smith of InsideFacebook

Robert Scoble

Kristen Nicole of Mashable and Dave Morin of Facebook

Rafe Needleman

Randi Zuckberg

Eddie Codel

Sarah Lacy

iLike founders

Brian Solis

For more pictures from Facebook, please visit the following albums on flickr:

Mark Zuckerberg Keynote

f8

Mark Zuckerberg Press Conference

Connect with me on Twitter, Jaiku, LinkedIn, Tumblr, Pownce, Plaxo, FriendFeed, or Facebook

by Brian Solis

I was alerted to a new list via Steve Rubel on Twitter that tracks the top 30 FriendFeed users based on Google ranking. Lifestream Blog‘s Mark Krynsky assembled the list based on a post by Glenn Slaven (the author of the great FriendFeed Comments WordPress Plugin). Slavenhad discovered that two FriendFeed users (Deepak & Kevin,) appeared in Google’s search results.

Krynsky decided to take Glenn’s lead and take the formula to the next level by listing the top 30 FriendFeed users based on those results.

Top 30 FriendFeed Users Based on Google Ranking

1. Robert Scoble
2. Louis Gray
3. Paul Bucheit
4. Steve Rubel
5. Chris Baskind
6. Mr. News Junk
7. MG Siegler
8. Frederic
9. Muhammad Saleem
10. Scott Beale
11. Fred Wilson
12. Dobromir Hadzhiev
13. Michael Arrington
14. Grant Bierman
15. Corvida
16. Leo Laporte
17. Morton Fox
18. Chris Pirillo
19. Dave Winer
20. Johannes Kleske
21. Ryne Nelson
22. Brian Solis
23. Chris Dibona
24. Veronica Belmont
25. Tuaw
26. Elliot Ng
27. Mark Krynsky
28. Brian Daniel Eisenberg
29. Thomas Ho
30. Bob Lee

Connect with me on Twitter, Jaiku, LinkedIn, Tumblr, Pownce, Plaxo, FriendFeed, or Facebook.

by Brian Solis

Facebook continues to compete for your online lifestream and it’s doing an impressive job of positioning itself as the hub for your online brand.

Today Facebook is rolling out the ability to comment on updates within individual MiniFeeds, providing FriendFeed-like functionality.

Basically, as you update Facebook or outside social media services (that you’ve included in your MiniFeed such as Flickr, Last.fm, blogs, etc.) each instance aggregates into one, channeled and palatable data stream. If you’re checking on the recent feeds from friends and contacts, you can see everything that they’ve updated within Facebook and across the social Web in one easy-to-read feed. Now, like in FriendFeed, you have the ability to comment on each relevant entry directly in the feed.

As I predicted last year, aggregated services and the ability to comment within the feed represents the future of lifestreaming and activity streaming. It is also demonstrating the portability and distribution of conversations as people are flocking to aggregated streams to discuss thoughts, ideas, and the information shared within them without having to run to each point of origin to comment and followup. Everything is neatly packaged in one place and it’s only going to continue to fragment the conversation and force content creators to scour the Web in order to participate in the discussion they started.

Tools such as MiniFeed and FriendFeed only help focus the dialog and our attention.

Connect with me on Twitter, Jaiku, LinkedIn, Tumblr, Pownce, Plaxo, FriendFeed, or Facebook.