Diaspora the Facebook Alternative

Posted on December 6, 2011 by Allison in Diaspora, Facebook

An Alternative to Facebook

Today I received an email inviting me to join Diaspora, which if you have not heard of it, is an open source alternative to Facebook. So I decided to sign up and see how well it works. I’m happy to report that so far, so good. While it says that Diaspora is still in alpha, it seems to work. Even better, it allows us to create our social networks on a platform that isn’t beholden to Facebook or Google.

I will post more of my thoughts about the service once I’ve had a chance to use it deeply. If you’re interested in looking at it, the main page for creating an account can be found at https://joindiaspora.com. The service is free, and doesn’t ask ten bazillion personal questions when registering for an account, so hopefully this network will work out.

Gartner, the Hype Cycle, and Second Life

Posted on July 18, 2011 by Allison in Business, Second Life

The Gartner Hype Cycle Chart August 2010

It has been nearly a year since Gartner published the 2010 Hype Cycle report. So in advance of the 2011 report, which will likely be published in the next month or so if their usual release patterns hold, I thought it would be a good time to review last years chart and see how Second Life is doing as compared to the market cycle projections put forth by Gartner.

In the photo attached to this post you’ll find the 2010 Hype Cycle chart, and I’ve highlighted three specific areas in that chart that pertain to Second Life. I realize that Second Life is an amalgam of many things (e.g. virtual worlds, collaboration, cloud, commerce, and so forth), but I’ve chosen to focus on the three main areas in the Gartner chart that are big components of the Second Life experience.

So the first thing to note are the three main areas in the report that I view as applicable specifically to Second Life:

Public Virtual Worlds
Consumer Generated Media
Internet Micropayment Systems

The second thing to note are the time frames for mainstream adoption:

Public Virtual Worlds: Five to ten years
Consumer Generated Media: Two years
Internet Micropayment Systems: Two years

The third point to note is that all of the items on this list have gone through the Trough of Disillusionment phase of the cycle, which is generally a good thing.

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Oops. Facebook Deletes SL Avatars

Posted on May 20, 2011 by Allison in Avatar, Facebook, Second Life

Oops!

Now this is funny. It is being reported here and here that Facebook appears to be doing a mass sweep and deleting the accounts of Second Life avatars. Meanwhile, Linden Lab continues to deeply integrate Facebook into the Second Life avatar profile, thus suggesting that perhaps this was not the best strategy to employ.

Daniel Voyager has this to say:

There was mention around 6am SLT this morning on Plurk then quickly followed later on Twitter of reports saying that Facebook have been cancelling SL Facebook accounts. I saw a sudden drop in my friend count and I think many others noticed that too. Just be aware that Facebook have in the past removed many avs and will probably continue to do so.

And Sadie Pippita has this to say:

Logging into Facebook today was like logging into a virtual funeral. I watched connections drop ten at a time until I lost roughly 70. Yes, Facebook deleted 70 of my connections, but sadly thousands of accounts have actually been deleted. About three and a half years ago I heard a rumor that Facebook was going to begin sifting through accounts and start deleting Second Life avatar profiles. Well over three years later they have kept that promise leaving many of my connections baffled as to where their Second Life friends have gone.

Now I have to wonder if it is worth spending any time creating a business presence on Facebook. After all, if they can wipe out all your work on a whim, why would I take the risk?

Oh, and before you think this is just limited to Second Life avatars who play SL, and thus as a content creator/business owner I need not worry, it seems that content creators who have nothing to do with SL have also found all their work gone at the whim of someone over at the big FB:

Got enemies on Facebook? Facebook is so eager to protect copyright that the mere accusation of copyright infringement is enough to get an account locked. Ars found this out the hard way Thursday morning when our own Facebook page became inaccessible, with no warning, no explanation, and no clear appeal process.

To make matters worse, Facebook is not responsive to inquiries about account lockout, and the company provides absolutely zero useful direction on how to rectify a complaint.

ARS Technica is part of Conde Nast, which is a large publishing entity. If even they can get their work deep-sixed by Facebook, then it is deeply troubling. Anyway, I’ll not get into this rant further, and I will tepidly use Facebook in all likelihood, but I certainly won’t depend on it. Nevertheless, it will be interesting to watch how Linden Lab responds to this development.