Friendfeed Should Become Facebook Labs

The big news today is that Facebook acquired Friendfeed. There's a lot of nuances to this story - and people will likely talk a ton about what it means for Twitter. Don't miss the bigger story. Here's my quick take on the news.

Facebook just got bought...

the best social search platform on the web, hands down
a site that has captured the heart and soul of many (not all) geeks, something they need to do to stay in the vanguard
an incredibly smart, talented team that will bring rapid innovation to Facebook and make it even stronger

So what then for Friendfeed? My hope is that it becomes "Facebook Labs." I would love to see it remain a free-standing site and a place where they rapidly pilot new innovations with the early adopters and then bring in the most promising ones back into the mother ship.

Another more profound thought that I want to chew on some more is this: lifestreaming is going mainstream!

15 comments

Aug 10, 2009

Torsten Eckert said...

Maybe this is a great opportunity for FriendFeed as a standalone service too.
FF can attract new users via FB.
And FB just got lots of APIs and a team which knows Google from their own past.

The FB-Google-war is about to heaten up...

Aug 10, 2009

Mark Ivey said...

Good points.I agree too it'll rachet up the Google-FB war, giving FB a valuable weapon in social search and the brainpower from FF. The key is whether they can continue to nourish the FF innovation or it gets lost during the shuffle. Look for more consolidation, and the big question remains: who will buy Twitter? (Google, Murdoch, etc)? The game just got a lot more interesting.

Aug 10, 2009

Kemeny_x said...

Completely right, life stream will finally be mainstream.

Aug 10, 2009

micronauta said...

Judging from the amount of functionality we have seen on Friendfeed first and Facebook second, Facebook Labs is what Friendfeed already was, except for free. If I knew there were some lawsuit involved then it would make perfect sense, as some kind of settlement.

As an intense user of Friendfeed for pushing personalized RSS streams to Twitter, I can't help but worry that I will have to take that somewhere else. It is not the Facebook tradition to allow content to flow through it's systems and be used elsewhere, so unless there is a big change inside Facebook, Friendfeed might have to be switched off eventually. I guess I'll just chug along and expect for the best but plan for the worst.

Aug 10, 2009

Mark Krynsky said...

I really like your Labs thought Steve. That would really make sense to allow the team and innovation continue in their own isolated environment. I truly hope the site remains running post acquisition, but I'm not holding my breath.

It is exciting to continue watching the penetration of Lifestreaming into the mainstream as well. Now with the goliath of Lifestreaming services being swallowed it's time to rally behind the adoption of Activity Streams which is the most promising Lifestreaming open standard.

Aug 10, 2009

Matthew Lang said...

The purchase itself is great news for Facebook, but I would love to see FriendFeed stay as a seperate service left running long term. It offers something so different from anything that's on the net at the moment.

Aug 10, 2009

Keith Trivitt said...

Great post, Steve. Good to see that someone isn't predicting the demise of FriendFeed just yet (even though I earlier commented that I thought the acquisition could bring down FriendFeed). I would love to see Facebook turn FriendFeed into its own lab site, keeping a lot of the great FriendFeed tools alive and well, and using it is a platform to build even better applications for Facebook.

Here is a novel thought: What if Facebook opened FriendFeed up to developers and made it an open-source site where developers create really cool and innovative apps and platforms to help social media evolve? That, to me, would a) get a lot of people off Facebook's back, who say the company is too closed off and closed-minded; and b) help to expand Facebook's reach, as well as its innovation. After all, with the acquisition of FriendFeed, Facebook has taken what was essentially a minor competitor off the market, so one has to wonder if the innovation will be trumped.

Like you said, a Facebook Labs iteration would be great for FriendFeed, and would help to keep the great innovations coming for a long time.

Keith Trivitt (@KeithTrivitt)

Aug 10, 2009

Amani Roberts said...

Very good ideas about Facebook labs. That could be a win-win for both platforms as well as developers.

Aug 10, 2009

frankiecarl said...

What about the walled garden issue?

Aug 10, 2009

Benjamin Karam said...

Good thoughts on the acquisition. I have enjoyed using FriendFeed for its simplicity and good search. If integrated right (I hope) this could finally give Facebook a strong public streaming platform.

Also, I am closely following your insights/thoughts into lifestreaming

Aug 11, 2009

Dennis Jernberg said...

"Facebook Labs" is an excellent idea. However, we don't know if Facebook will take the suggestion. Me, I'm in "wait and see" mode...

Aug 11, 2009

Mikael Pittam said...

Lifestreaming is about to go mainstream in a big way. Facebook is now the norm for news updates, trending and other 'hip' stuff. Niche markets are able to access information not necessarily found in their forums, email threads and online discussions.

Aug 11, 2009

Bill Guthrie said...

Steve,
Do you seen FB taking our subscribed feed from FF and bringing them into the broader FB stream? I DO NOT consider FB currently as a quality source of information, unless you call seeing pictures of my former classmates' kids "news."

But incorporating the "content I want"--FriendFeed--into the "content I tolerate"--Facebook--sounds appealing.

Have you commented yet on Facebook's real-time search launch? Again, when Facebook is populated with navel-gazing posts, how much do I care to search that landscape?

Thanks!

Aug 11, 2009

Harsh Agrawal said...

This is an important move and good news for Friendfeed, because despite of great effort in past few days , friendfeed could not come any where close to Twitter. With facebook we can expect to see friendfeed creating lots of difference. I hope facebook will not change its name to facefeed ;)

Dec 11, 2009

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