Facebook Implements 'Download Your Profile' Option 114
eldavojohn writes "Facebook is rolling out some new changes (including groups) that are supposed to liberate user control. But something that might interest Slashdot readers even more is that they now allow you to download all your information from Facebook. That's everything — all your posts, pictures, videos, friend lists, etc. A video from David of the Open Source team at Facebook explains how it will work, although I don't see that option on my profile yet (they are slowly rolling it out). There's not a lot of details yet, but they at least require you to click a link from an e-mail and reenter your password to get this (to avoid spambots harvesting everyone's data and careless use of public computers resulting in data leaks). Perhaps competitors like Diaspora would be interested in using this base information to germinate user seeds?"
Re:A nice gesture of openness (Score:3, Interesting)
Unless your account (or their servers) get hacked, it would only show up if you put it on there yourself...
Aside from being able to back up everything, it would be interesting to do this and read some early correspondence on the service.
Diaspora (Score:4, Interesting)
Perhaps competitors like Diaspora would be interested in using this base information to germinate user seeds?
Maybe, but it already looks like Diaspora development is starting to slow down. OK, there have been some commits today, but I expected to see more activity than what's currently going on.
Remember when the source to Gish was released? A lot of activity and releases for about a fortnight and then nothing...
Re:Diaspora (Score:1, Interesting)
I've got no faith in the Diaspora project. From what I hear, its a slow, buggy conglomeration that doesn't even really solve the problem at hand. It requires an obscene amount of gem dependencies, and it doesn't even run on Apache. It seems like it was more of an exercise in raising money by crowd sourcing, because this project is turning out to be bigger vaporware than DNF.
This could be a game changer for Apple (Score:3, Interesting)
...because right now, their Ping thing is utterly useless. Downloading all your FB data, in particular, contacts, might make it easier to get started with Ping.
Re:Diaspora (Score:5, Interesting)
Even if diaspora dies, Appleseed is still around
http://www.drumbeat.org/project/appleseed-social-networking [drumbeat.org]
What about messages? (Score:3, Interesting)
Also (Score:5, Interesting)
There are thousands of complaints posted about this already.
It doesn't take much imagination to see how not having this feature when one is expecting it can lead to comedy.
but.....the cloud! (Score:5, Interesting)
This is absolutely shocking. For the past few years it seems every article I have read has advocated that data be soley kept 'in the cloud' and that users will never need to download their data to a perosnal machine ever....
'The Cloud' is hype. Just like all the other hyped techs in the last 15 years (ATM will change networking, Java will be out OS, thin clients will rule the business world)
I? do think it will be interesting if real competition comes to FB how this will be used to transfer data.
Great news - groups too (Score:3, Interesting)
I can't think of any compelling reason for Facebook, as the clear market leader, to provide this service. I'm glad they did though, and it makes me feel a lot more comfortable about posting pictures, etc. there for family members without having to keep a mirror somewhere else.
I saw they're also adding some type of sub-networks or groups, so you can make a post about video games and leave out your parents, or congratulate someone about a job offer without including their coworkers. I can think of a lot of tricks to making a good implementation of this, so can't wait to see how they did it.
Those are probably the two most important features that have made me frown on facebook, so seeing both in one day is a big surprise.
Re:Wow... (Score:1, Interesting)
Your stupidity is astounding. A 2 second Google search shows that people do indeed care about hacking into Facebook accounts, so I'm guessing you just pulled that out of your ass because, well if you think it, it must be true!
Information is everything these days. It would also be easier for a spammer to break into your account and get one nice neat little download instead of scraping back years of data.
This tool is a download option for the average user. Its also a giant gaping security breach waiting to happen. Someone only needs to get into your account ONCE, and then they can browse years of data offline at their choosing. Just because you are too thick to see the security implications of this doesn't mean they aren't there.
500 million users? (Score:1, Interesting)
No, they have 500 million *user accounts*.
Many of which are fake (spammers) or empty.
Re:A nice gesture of openness (Score:3, Interesting)
Spear phishing is phishing targeted at a single individual. Since its in Wikipedia and all over the Interwebs and all those black hatted types talk about I'm guessing the poster didn't make it up. Then again maybe he is one of those black hatty, Wikipedia writing trolls making s***t up in a conspiratorial way. You never know ...