BuddyPress.org

But seriously, I do recall an audio interview with Andy Peatling more than a year ago where I think he floated an idea of BP networks all interconnected and talking to each other, and for all I know, this is a plugin or core feature in some state of alpha or beta. Maybe somebody with more awareness of the overall project can clarify.

“1) They tried to add on to WordPress, a project which was not designed from the ground up to be a distributed network.”

This really feels like the “elephant in the room” every time I visit my wp-admin panel. My BuddyPress admin menu keeps growing and growing, disproportionate to the WP-specific admin menus.

I keep waiting for the discussions to start on how BP is “outgrowing” WP. I guess that happens when the limitations of WP start to outweigh the advantages, such as all the great WP functions we get “for free”. When you think about it, it is a little weird – for example, how blogs and forums are integrated with BP in such different ways and don’t really “talk” to each other in a meaningful way. The whole idea of “like” and “favorite” and “report” buttons that work on one content type but not another. Etc.

@andrea_r I’d say that MU isn’t distributed in the way that’s important here, because the data is all stored in the same db, on the same server (at least that’s how it works by default). In a truly distributed network, each individual/cluster of individuals would have full, sysadmin level control over his or her data. WP/BP is still largely under the control of the person who owns the particular machine where the stuff lives – if the owner decides to pull the plug, there goes the network.

Boone is correct. A distributed (sometimes also called decentralized) network is when data are kept in different places, places that each user (be that an individual, group, or company) controls. WPMU, Twitter, Facebook, etcetera control the users’ data and experience. Although the data may be spread throughout a series of servers or even distributed server clusters, the data is controlled by one authority and is often considered locked into a closed data silo–even if that data silo is hosted in the cloud.

For more details on distributed social networking (with a Semantic Web twist) see my article, A Flock of Twitters: Decentralized Semantic Microblogging.

I am game for getting involved in such a project. What frustrates me about Facebook is that they had the opportunity to link into the LOD cloud and did not take it. Their “Open” graph API pirates the concept of microformats, RDF, and schemas that have been around for years. They pretty much just took the ideas and made their own version. Bad form, I say!

What is missing from this conversation, though, is the idea that a distributed social network is not as much about where the data is and who controls it as it is about how the data is defined or “marked up.” So, yes, each person has that “virtual calling card” you define above, but it is in a standard XML file like RDF using a specific schema or “vocabulary” common to people who use a particular service. That RDF file, though, belongs to me, the user, and I can choose to add my affiliation with a specific network to that file or not.

Seems to me that what Mu (or the very excellent WordPress 3.0) needs is its own “vocabulary” within the LInked Open Data cloud to be a truly “open” distributed network.

Just my 2 cents…

@deltina-

You are correct. Please read my article I linked to in my first post in this thread.

@jackreichert-

There are a few of us “Semantic Web / Linked Data” folk who are kicking around ideas to semantify BuddyPress. As far as turning WP into a distributed platform, that is too far beyond scope and would require a major rewriting of the foundational code.

@jeffsayre @jackreichert @deltina etc.

Can I just counterpoint?

Chiming in here. I’m waiting for @apeatling to also talk more about this issue. Somebody mentioned DiSo. As I understood it, DiSo was more than just trying to systemically build distributed social networking out of WordPress or BuddyPress, but trying to do so through the establishment of more widely accepted protocols, i.e., the “social stack,” which included things like OpenID, OAuth, PortableContacts, and so forth. (“Social stack” is less of a buzz word today, but that was part of the beginning.)

I partly agree with the sentiment about WordPress needing implicit ground-up structural changes for the implementation of better social protocols, however, part of the problem @ the time actually had more to do with a lack of experience as well the protocols were still being nailed down. For example, we’re entering a second phase in all of this, as OAuth 2.0 is in the process of being released as a spec, and a 2nd iteration of OpenID will be issued as OpenID Connect — part of the problem also in the first place was these two protocols weren’t designed at the same time, so they didn’t work together conjunctively as well, but phase two here has the benefit of a foundation, so they can now build off each other. (See http://openidconnect.com/ and http://www.webmonkey.com/2010/05/new-openid-connect-proposal-could-solve-many-of-the-social-webs-woes/ )

There were also several other issues in flux, a major one being discovery. XAuth is providing a temporary solution for this going forward. Other less-known, but increasingly important protocols matured or are maturing rather rapidly: Salmon, PubSubHubbub, Activity Streams, to name a few.

That said, I think @Jeff_Sayre has been a little bit of a voice in the wilderness on all these matters. I just read this blog post of his http://jeffsayre.com/2010/05/15/repackaging-the-promise-of-the-social-semantic-web/ and it hit the nail ON THE HEAD for what’s staring everyone in the face. Sometimes things are so obvious that it’s hard to perceive them, you know?

That being said, can I just make one plea? Sometimes I hear a lot of the main BuddyPress developers intimate that they don’t really like the protocols being developed toward this end…the technology is wrong, etc., etc., and then there’s sometimes talk of how to do it right or how to do it better than the social stack.

I don’t involve myself *too much* in development here @ BuddyPress central, but I’ve been following development from the beginning, perhaps most especially with an eye toward distributing the social network beyond just one BuddyPress silo, and I do have a fairly solid view of the history of both the social stack and BuddyPress.

Can I just offer that we try and go with the flow of the protocols already being worked on in other arenas? The Internet Identity Workshop is taking place tomorrow (Mon. – Wed), it’s 10th session in just five years, and so much has happened and will continue to happen — just look at what’s on the agenda: http://iiw.idcommons.net/Proposed_Topics_IIW10 (Main site is here: http://www.internetidentityworkshop.com/ ) It’s true that these tend to be a lot of big players, i.e., Google, Facebook, MySpace, and so forth. But a lot of the people @ this particular workshop started out working small (like on DiSo), and have the interest of the open source community in mind. I sort of feel like I’m preaching to the choir, but I do think it’s really important that we all not forget the work that has already been done towards establishing solid protocols. In other words, instead of bitching about how to do things right, I think we ought to come to the IIW table, so to speak. These new internet standards have come a long way since then, and we still have a long way to go, so lets help make that happen.

@Jeff_Sayre

Finally got around to reading your article – fantastic stuff. And, yes, it does make more sense to semantify BuddyPress rather than WP. I am very interested in getting involved with these efforts. I am presently swamped with getting the second edition of my Web 2.0 book finished, but when complete, am starting on the Web 3.0 book. All of the issues you tackle are so important to get out there to laymen – I am so excited to get moving on writing about them…

It is not clear whether WP / BP can be crafted to become a fully-functioning distributed social networking platform but it is the best place to start. < or is Drupal?