Facebook applications to check out,

Windows:
Digsby – Facebook Im on your desktop
Fonebook – sync outlook and facebook
iDeskbook – Browse facebook on the desktop
Photosaver – Friends photos as your screensaver

OSx:
Friend Photos Screensaver – Friend’s photos as your screensaver
Facebook exporter for iphoto
Adium – Chat with facebook support
Photobook – Miss your camera at an event, just steal your friends album
EventSync – Sync event calendar with iCal

Web:
WordPress fotobook – Facebook albums inside your wordpress blog

Facebook’s development platform just over a year ago seemed like a genius idea, with an almost infinite amount of potential. While it’s still a very hot topic, and most sites these days when they lauch attempt to have a facebook version of their site or service available at almost at the same time. However, I believe we are already over the peak of this, as more controls are being put in place to slow viral growth, and users are spending less time on the site and engaged in the applications.

My problem though is not with the slowing rate of engagement in applications developed on the facebook platform, but rather on what are the primary applications. Facebook seems to have done a very good job of keeping users to stay within the confines of the site, rather than simply using it as a utility. For most facebook is their personal planner for events, their personal datebook for friends/contacts, their online photo album, their email/messaging system, and more for some. And while it’s fine and dandy for some of these things, facebook is not the best endpoint to interact with when getting things to and from facebook.

Take for example the facebook chat. This is a great utility to be able to talk with friends that I may not have spoken with in years, my AIM list has around 200 users, meanwhile my facebook has over 500. No I do not wish to speak to all of these all the time, but in the rare occasion that I do it’s convenient. However IM chat within a browser just doesn’t do it for me, not on facebook, or meebo for that matter. The nice fact is that there is a solution and more being developed. Personally if I’m at home I use adium (Mac only) for my instant messaging which supports facebook. If I’m on a windows machine I use digsby to chat with my facebook friends and monitor what friends are doing. While digsby isn’t a perfect solution, I strongly prefer it to the other option of chatting within the browser.

What about pictures, that’s probably the single busiest activity outside of updating status. Here I know of multiple friends that have attempted to use the site’s interface for uploading pictures, only to have completed in double the time expected with much much more frustration than anticipated. Meanwhile, I simple select the photos I want to upload in iPhoto (there are options for mac and pc here), select export, click facebook, and off they go. This is the way it should be, I can do likewise for smugmug, flickr, etc.

Facebook has done a reasonable job at giving developers access to to facebook to allow them to build reasonable applications. While there’s a lot of junk out there, there is also some reasonable applications to really make facebook a reasonable utility. The problem lies that these seem to be hidden gems, whether its facebook or some third party, someone needs to start bringing these to the attention of others. Unless facebook transitions to themselves as strictly a utility and differentiates themselves on the quality of service the utility gives, and less on their UI and stronghold of data, they will be in for a world of hurt in a few years.

A recent conversation of someone that was offended when the were introduced to someone new, then was not greeted first since they were a female brought what follows to mind. The above is a train of thought that came from a 70 year old military wife. I do not believe this is common practice today and is quite rarely found as the common etiquette, but nonetheless I think what is proper etiquette in business is changing quite rapidly. Though I’m not sure if all of the older ideas and principles have gone away.

I take as a first example zuckerburg, whom is a notoriously difficult interview. Not because he keeps things hidden, or is sealed tight about the company, but rather that his soft skills are not his strength. His strength is building a web product that millions of people find worthwhile to divulge hours of their day into it.

Even two years ago when you were disgruntled with a company you may have gotten a few drinks in you and talked to a friend about your displeasure. But it certainly was not made fully public for anyone to see. At best you could only hope you were simply privy to things that would be brought to the publics eye from a larger misdoing either legally or that a mass-crowd found a problem with. But for simply being overworked, underpaid, or in some other odd way mistreated there was no politically correct outlet to speak through.

However in the past years it has become extremely common for those that are still employed, or were employed to voice their complaints and bring to light the details that were once hidden. I think of Zed Shaw’s rant on rails which calls out specific companies, or an older blog the diary of a mac genius, who gave detailed behind the scenes information of an apple customer support genius bar. While I’ll concede for the mass majority if it’s published it’s doesn’t mean its consumed, so it’s not a dramatic effect on any single business, I still find it hard to believe that this overall shift of users freely publishing is not going to be able to be stopped by companies. As we approach web 3.0 and have a better ability to pull in a larger base of information that’s more relevant this information may become more and more helpful to users.

Regardless of the effects, it seems the standard procedures for what is proper etiquette are changing. Whether its talking about your place of employment, or HR checking out you’re facebook profile to see if you’d be a risk for the company, the lines are being blurred from both sides and the barriers that once existed are now being torn down.