This assumes that people are creating content specifically to be consumed by other people. But what if people are using their accounts - as I use mine, particularly on del.icio.us - to aggregate stuff they've done for their own benefit? In other words, think about the content as being akin to your wordprocessing documents and saved files, rather than a newspaper column. Rather than audiences and rising to the top, for some usages a better metaphor is where you get to store your stuff.
Of course, this isn't likely to be true of Myspace, but frivolous applications like that are not not where social networking ends.
A common portal isn't an answer; it's a fudge that dodges the meat of the issue. However, maybe a bridging API service might be interesting? Something that can talk to the myriad APIs offered by Flickr, Facebook et al, all the while providing a consistent set of calls to application developers.
The key isn't being able to access data from a consistent visual interface - it's being able to choose where your data is stored, and change both your mind and the nature of the data itself. If you've got a file, you should be able to choose which application it's opened with and where you save it; if you've got a profile or web data, you should be able to do the same.
Slashdot Mirror
This assumes that people are creating content specifically to be consumed by other people. But what if people are using their accounts - as I use mine, particularly on del.icio.us - to aggregate stuff they've done for their own benefit? In other words, think about the content as being akin to your wordprocessing documents and saved files, rather than a newspaper column. Rather than audiences and rising to the top, for some usages a better metaphor is where you get to store your stuff.
Of course, this isn't likely to be true of Myspace, but frivolous applications like that are not not where social networking ends.
That's what Elgg is aiming for - a GPL social networking platform. OpenID is more or less working and will be released in the next few months.
A common portal isn't an answer; it's a fudge that dodges the meat of the issue. However, maybe a bridging API service might be interesting? Something that can talk to the myriad APIs offered by Flickr, Facebook et al, all the while providing a consistent set of calls to application developers.
The key isn't being able to access data from a consistent visual interface - it's being able to choose where your data is stored, and change both your mind and the nature of the data itself. If you've got a file, you should be able to choose which application it's opened with and where you save it; if you've got a profile or web data, you should be able to do the same.