Facebook Connect, Now Live, May Change The Web

Originally announced in May, Facebook Connect opened itself for general availability Thursday, giving its 130 million users the ability to fuse their Facebook browsing with any desktop application, Web site and mobile device.

The Facebook Connect service is designed to allow members to use their Facebook login to access a number of partner sites that have already agreed to be a part of the service. The process of bringing Facebook Connect to the masses began on the social network's developer's blog, when company executives announced their intention to create a service similar to OpenID. But bringing single sign-on to one of the world's more popular networks hasn't been a fast process, which included months of testing.

"We opened Facebook Platform in 2007 to enable hundreds of thousands of developers to create meaningful social experiences for users on Facebook.com," Mark Zuckerberg, founder and CEO of Facebook, said in a statement. "With today's launch of Facebook Connect, we're extending that power to millions of entrepreneurs and developers, transforming the Web into a more social place where Facebook's users can engage in trusted social experiences with their friends."

The features that Facebook Connect bring to users are designed to integrate their online experience, while removing some of the small annoyances of Web browsing, such as creating numerous login IDs for different sites.

Trusted Authentication allows users to log into partner Web sites with their Facebook information. Similarly, Real Identity lets members take their personal information with them across the Web to other sites that are part of the program. Part in parcel with Trusted Authentication and Real Identity is Dynamic Privacy.

Dynamic Privacy aims to keep individual users in control of their information, securely, with the options to pick which sites they connect with and choose which social actions are shared back to the Facebook News Feed.

Social Distribution, in time, may turn into one of the more important social networking features on the Web. While logged into Facebook and being active on a partner site, Social Distribution shares the actions that users are taking on those sites back to Facebook. For example, a user watching a video on Hulu.com can indicate that and share it back to their News Feed for their friends to see.

Social networking, at its base, is about interacting with other people over the Web. Sharing videos, articles and other actions with friends in real-time may change the way people interact on the Web.

But in order to make Facebook Connect work, the social network had to offer some type of carrot to potential partners, which they've done. Most importantly is what Facebook calls Increased Engagement. That particular part of the new service shares users' personal interests with the site to which they've navigated.

Consider the Hulu.com example. If a Facebook member has, "The Daily Show With Jon Stewart" applications or notes on their page, Hulu will be given this information and, once a user logs in, can bring up the latest episode. That means the ads served on that Hulu.com video are targeted directly at a person who is already interested in "The Daily Show." At that point, the ads become more effective and Hulu.com is likely to generate leads, which makes their advertisers happy, and also kicks up their revenue stream.

Facebook Connect will also increase the exposure of its partner sites as Facebook members begin to share content with their friends. Now when someone shares an article or video back to their Facebook News Feed, that person's entire social network can see it, exponentially increasing the reach of their site among people who are likely to be similarly minded.

Facebook's gambit into creating a larger ecosystem of interaction is launched. As long as the social network doesn't allow third-party sites to become too intrusive, chances are good that users will appreciate the interconnectivity. Meanwhile, partner sites and advertisers will appreciate their expanded reach through Web traffic and advertising dollars.