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How Facebook Connect and Other Technologies AreWeaving the Social Graph Throughout the Web
 By Jesse Pickard, Social Media Specialist
Most of us have heard, read and experienced the phenomenon of the social graph,which Razorfish™ defines as the network of personal connections through whichpeople communicate and share information online.When used correctly, the social graph is an immensely powerful data set that canprovide significant competitive advantages for a wide range of products. Only threeyears ago, leveraging the social graph was nearly impossible because accuratesocial graphs were the domain of leading social networks; they could not beinfluenced by products and services, which made failed attempts to build out theirown. This resulted in widespread social network fatigue, as consumers andadvertisers tired of building out already existing social networks. Then, Facebook famously created its application platform in June 2007. This alloweddevelopers to build applications that could leverage the social graph on Facebook,but it was limited because these apps couldn’t live outside Facebook’s walls. Today,developers are more fortunate — through technologies like Facebook Connect,MySpace ID and Google Friend Connect, social graphs are available on any platform— Web, desktop and mobile, and more and more sites are leveraging them forbetter engagement and traffic. CNN’s collaboration with Facebook Connect for theinauguration, for instance, resulted in136 million page views and 21.3 million livevideo streamsby mid-afternoon on the day of the event. Tens of thousands
 
of other Web sites have integrated social graphs into theirinteractive experiences and the initial results are quite positive. According toCitysearch CEO Jay Herratti, in the four months the site has been testing FacebookConnect, 94 percent of reviewers have published reviews to Facebook, where anaverage of 40 people see them and 70 percent click back to Citysearch, alltranslating to a tripling of daily registrations. Gawker Media has also reportedpositive numbers; three weeks after implementing Facebook Connect, userregistrations were up 45 percent and comments were up 16 percent.Despite these successes, we still feel that most of today’s implementations arescratching the surface of what’s possible. Here are five examples that showcasesome innovative uses of Facebook Connect.
Rethinking registrations
Example:
HerHotSpot, an online community for female 20-somethings
 
How it uses Facebook Connect:
Facebook Connect is the one and onlyregistration system for HerHotSpot, allowing the site to guarantee that all membersare indeed female by checking the gender listed in their Facebook profile.Previously, HerHotSpot had difficulty convincing its users that the site was a safeplace for women to talk amongst themselves.
Promoting brand content
Example:
  Joost, an Internet TV service
How it uses Facebook Connect:
 Joost knows that content from a user’s socialgraph shouldn’t be hidden deep within the site. It aggregates the most recent Joost-related actions of user’s friends and displays them prominently on the homepage inthe familiar news feed format.
 
Providing a cross-platform gaming experience
Example:
Scrabble, the popular word game
How it uses Facebook Connect:
 The Scrabble iPhone app allows users to findtheir Facebook friends and play live Scrabble games with them — no matter howthey are connecting to the game. It offers a perfect cross-platform experience,allowing friends to participate both through the iPhone or on their computers usingtraditional Facebook applications.
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