One of the biggest problems with all these new social status and social content services is the delay in viewing the content via aggregators. Even Facebook’s newsfeed has its own delay. Today, Gnip, a company created by Eric Marcoullier, ex-co-founder of MyBlogLog, has officially announced their new service. For those of you that are looking to instantly speed up your social news alerts, there’s no need to sign up.

Gnip is completely limited to data producer services and data consumer services. In other words, the end consumer never gets to see GNIP in action. Instead, all this means is that when you view your newsfeed via MyBlogLog or other participating data consumer services, you will have quicker access to the activities your friends are engaged in across the web.

This service is ultimately a data interchange for the social web. Marshall Kirkpatrick has pointed out a few services that the company plan on launching in the next 90 days. According to Marshall, Gnip will provide a protocol switching service that translates things like XMPP/Jabber to RSS. This way various services can be interoperable even if they don’t speak the same language.

Additionally, Gnip will provide profile discovery services to help interlink user identities across the social web. I think this service sounds pretty sweet but it still doesn’t help me manage one of the largest problem I have on the social web: reading messages from multiple services. Currently I receive Facebook messages, wall posts and mini-feed comments as well as FriendFeed comments, Twitter and Plurk replies and direct messages from users.

It has become increasingly challenging for me to manage all my incoming messages since I don’t have a centralized location. Gnip doesn’t solve this problem though, it simply helps provide quicker message distribution. Someone else is going to need to deal with incoming message aggregation.

I’ve been on a bit of a data portability binge over the past few days. I wasn’t going to write anything more about it until I came across Andrew Chen’s post arguing that Metcalfe’s law is “a DIRECT reason why these networks want to get as big as possible, and have a social graph that’s as comprehensive as possible, and why they should ultimately be opposed to Data Portability.”

Andrew is echoing my original thoughts that I posted on Saturday but by the end of the weekend my perspective had been transformed. While I agree that social network sites want to have a social graph that’s as comprehensive as possible, I don’t think that opening up will prevent them from getting there. If each site opens up, it means that the users are free to move around as they please.

Right now they can move around freely but transferring data is typically impossible. At every event I go to I always here the statement “a rising tide lifts all boats.” If the application developers are living by this motto why not the big players? It appears as though Facebook, MySpace and other competing sites want to protect that which made their site so valuable in the first place: the users.

As I wrote this morning, it’s not just about the data stored in the system, it’s about the flow of the data. The more that Facebook lowers their walls, the more that data can easily flow through. I have finally begun to believe that Facebook’s user base will not decrease due to data portability. Instead, it will continue to thrive as it becomes a completely open marketplace.

Do you think data portability will kill social network sites?

This weekend has been a weekend of data portability discussion among a number of blogs. It has become a hot button topic for a few of us. On Saturday, I even turned against some of the data portability evangelists. I still stand by a lot of what I said including the fact that data portability evangelists cannot articulate themselves effectively. Sometimes I can’t articulate myself as well though. We aren’t perfect!

What I’ve come to realize over the past weekend is a number of things:

Data Portability is Inevitable
I am a strong believer in free market economies. They are highly efficient systems and in the end, the consumer usually gets what they want. Currently most users don’t realize that they are supporters of data portability but over the coming months they soon will be. Mike Arrington and the crew on Friday’s Gillmore Gang podcast will not suddenly stop talking about this topic. I won’t either.

Data Portability is Complex
Data portability is not a simple issue. If it was, everybody would be talking about it (well at least more people would be) and we would be further along in the process. Unfortunately the issues are not simple and once you start breaking down the nearly limitless ways that our data can interact, you finally begin to realize the scope of the project.

Data Portability Means Money
There will be an entire industry based around data portability. We have already seen some companies start to pop-up but we have only witnessed the beginning. Companies will race to acquire partnerships with large business to help them leverage their user base and embrace data portability. In turn, those companies will leverage those partnership agreements as assets during future negotiations.

There is still the whole question of how do we monetize the attention economy most effectively? This is something that Facebook is battling on a daily basis as well as other leading websites. While nobody has figured it out yet, somebody will soon figure out the answer to this billion dollar question. It’s at this point that the insane valuations being placed on attention rich websites will suddenly be justified.

Social Networks Have Value but It’s Not the Data
While there is a substantial amount of value in building up a user base, what’s more important is user attention. Creating systems that effectively drive user attention is critical in being successful on the web. The reality is that no effective monetization system has been designed so far that helps monetize attention. Social network sites are extremely efficient at driving attention.

For now though, social network sites will remain to be the emperor’s new clothes until someone can come up with the monetization solution.

There is A Lot of Work to Do
We are still in the very early stages of social networks and data portability. This is a space which continues to evolve and new thought leaders join the space everyday. What we don’t need is a small group of individuals plotting out how data portability should function. We need a group that can articulate available options effectively without getting in a mud slinging fight with each other.

I believe that this is the point of the Data Portability Workgroup. The changes won’t take place overnight but the changes can’t happen without the involvement of the people. While there are still a lot of problems to be resolved, the discussion is becoming louder and soon enough I think more people will take note.

Over the past 24 to 48 hours I have been watching the discussion manifest over the ongoing battle between Facebook, Google and MySpace over each of their new data portability initiatives. Much of the discussion climaxed on the Gilmor Gang podcast which included Mike Arrington, Robert Scoble, Marc Canter, Chris Saad and Dana Gardner. I would call the majority of the people on the show “data portability evangelists.”

Data portability evangelists have one goal: to control their own data. It makes a lot of sense when you get into the discussion but the logistics behind it are highly complex. So complex that not even the data portability evangelists were able to figure much out during their almost hour and a half long discussion (on the podcast).

Robert Scoble was left all in a tizzy and Mike Arrington proclaimed himself victorious when he was able to convince everybody that he was right without providing much substance for his argument. The podcast clearly illustrated each of the participants’ personalities but little more. After pondering the ongoing discussion for the past 48 hours, I’ve come up with the following thoughts:

True Data Portability Kills Social Network Sites
While I am a fan of data portability, the reality is that true data portability kills social network sites. If we take data portability to the extreme and I was able to export all of my data and contacts from Facebook, Facebook would be nothing more than a well designed communications platform. Perhaps in the end that’s all they will be but for now, their valuations have been based on their skyrocketing user base.

There is no way in hell that Facebook is going to shoot themselves in the foot and completely make our data exportable. It just won’t happen. At least not anytime soon. The data portability evangelists saw the largest players move one step closer to true data portability and now they are crying that Facebook should just take it all the way.

Data Portability Evangelists Can’t Speak Clearly
This is the biggest challenge facing the future of data portability. I listened to the Gillmore Gang podcast last night and read Steve Gillmore’s techcrunch post this morning and it would take at least an hour for me to decode both of them for you. The best way to get your point across is by making a clear argument that anybody can understand. None of the participants do this. Mike Arrington comes close when he says “I am right, you are wrong.”

That’s classic elementary debate tactics but unfortunately he doesn’t back up his argument aside from the fact that he is more than just passionate about owning his data.

We Are Moving Forward
While I want complete control of my data, most people don’t even know what that means. The moves being made by Facebook, MySpace and Google are a huge step forward and it’s perfectly fine to acknowledge that. At the same time the data portability evangelists should continue to ask for more because that’s what’s required of them.

While the debate over data portability is far from over, it’s a good thing that the large players are even listening and making changes. Am I a sucker for being partially satisfied? Mike Arrington would say yes but then again his argument is simply that he’s right, not much more substance there. Also, is it really that surprising that there are only 10 or 20 people that are participating in the discussion on data portability?

There has been a ton of discussion surrounding data portability in light of Facebook’s decision to bow out of Google Friend Connect and go it alone with their own service. Mike Arrington accurately argues that data portability is the new walled garden. The current race for social networks is to open up their platforms so that they become the “centralized me”; a central control panel that enables me to distribute my information to other places on the web.

What Does This Mean?
While you may look at what is currently going on with social networks and think to yourself that none of this matters to your business, the reality is that it does. It has far reaching implications once all of these details are worked out. The battle that is taking place between social networks and users is the same battle that will be taking place between businesses and consumers. Right now the users are consumers and the social networks are the businesses.

What is being played out is the future of a consumer’s interaction with that business. In the future I want to be able to walk into a store and the sales people and computers in that store to know who I am. Why do I want this? Well, I want a better sales experience. Once I leave the store though, I don’t want that store to be able to contact me or store any of my personal information.

At the least, if they have a way to contact me, I want to be able to have the control to turn off their ability to contact me in the future.

The Conflict of Interests
While some businesses may live by the motto “the consumer is always right”, traditional businesses do not want to give up what was previously ownership of consumer data in perpetuity. The old sales model was to figure out a way to incentivize you to provide as much personal data as possible. The best example I can think of is the old boxes they used to put in restaurants that tell you to “fill out this form and get a chance at a trip around the world.”

Within days somebody would contact you and try to sell you a timeshare. Depending on what you said to the sales representative, your information would go into different stacks on their desk: hot lead, warm lead, cold lead. Would they trash the lead? Definitely not! A cold lead is always better than no leads at all. This is business. This is sales.

Contrast this with data portability. Imagine those leads simply disappearing off the sales representative’s desk because the consumer simply want s their data back. That means that the consumer has control over the sales cycle, not the sales team.

Data Portability Removes the Incentive
One of the primary reasons that you enter your personal information on Facebook or any other website is because it helps to provide a more custom tailored experience that’s personal to you. What Facebook Connect, MySpace Data Availability and Google Friend Connect does is enable some of your experience to be custom tailored without having to register.

This means that the incentive for a user to register is reduced substantially because they don’t need to register for your site to have a personalized experience. This is great for Facebook and MySpace because they become the center of your identity and get to own your most personal data no matter what. Google gets access to some of this data by default through their Friend Connect service.

While these new systems are great for organization’s sake, they don’t really help out the businesses that you currently interact with. Companies now need to try harder to get your personal information. While you could argue that the businesses still win because they get page views which help them earn more advertising dollars, the reality is that not all businesses simply make money from you visiting their website.

At some point you need to register because registering helps that company build their database and get value from the user. Could you see a sales guy who’s stack of leads starts disappearing from his desk because the users “wanted their data back”? That’s what data portability provides. While it makes a lot of sense for the consumer, it doesn’t make much sense for the business and that’s why businesses don’t want it to happen.

A Counter-Argument
While walking around a mall you can always walk into a store, take a look and walk out without ever having to interact with a sales staff again. On the internet you frequently are forced into registering for a site without being able to take a walk around and check out the goods. The new services provided by Facebook, MySpace and Google all help the consumer by enabling you to have a custom experience on the website without registering.

In essence you are checking out the goods before you buy. This empowers the consumer and it’s good for both parties. The business also gets access to data that they previously wouldn’t have had access to. At least now they can know who’s visiting their site (or store) while they’re visiting.

Conclusion
All consumers will one day have the power to control what businesses get access to what data.  Right now, Facebook, MySpace and Google are battling to be the companies that enable you to control that data. While this isn’t true data portability it is a step in the right discussion and at least the debate is taking place.

While you don’t need to be part of the discussion, it is a good idea to be part of it because one day data portability will be impacting your business no matter what type of presence your business has (virtual or physical).