Google friend connect widgets allows any web master, within an hour or so, enhance his site with state of the art social features. The widget allows his current site Visitors or members, join the site, introduce* them self invite* their friends and engage* with each other.
I’m using “*” because it is done in a most interesting and innovative way:
Introduce yourself:
Google has an holistic concept, which in my opinion that is where they are better than all the other. As far as they concern all the roads lead to Rome, which in that case Rome is YOU. Web 3 is about YOU and your friends. It is about small communities with same interests, same understanding, same vision.
From that little widget in your site, familiar with Google or not, Google allows your visitor to create a Google profile: It would look something like that: [http://google.com/profiles/your_google_user_name].
This profile page allows you to add links to your “sites” like Facebook, Twitter, Myspace, EzineArticles, etc”.
It allows you tell about your self and allows people to contact you, not without saving your privacy.
Invite friends:
The widget allows you to invite your friends from all over the net: Your gmail contacts, your Orkut friends, your Facebook friends, plaxo etc” etc”.
Engage:
There are a few “social gadgets” you can use with your Google friend connect widget like adding a comment, adding a link to a video, rating an article or a game, site wall, polls, invite to events and ilike. The list of gadgets you may use is growing from day to day. If I’m not wrong, the day you will be able to add 1000’s of gadgets to your site is very close. When Google thought of the open social platform, I’m quite sure, (now at least), that “Google Friend Connect” was on their mind.
That is not all:
Sharing/syndication: Any activity on the site is syndicated through plaxo, orkut and most important through your profile:
let us say that you have joined 15 sites using gfc. Now your activities will appear in your profile all over those sites, as well as you links, interests and so on.
Summary
As a web applications developer who is following the “open social” evolution for about more than a year and a half, has an I Google gadget developer who has an Igoogle sand box account, for that period of time as well and as web master/admin who has his own site/blog, I can say for sure that Google friend connect is the future. I didn’t even mention “Google Reader” which is part of it as well, but I’ll keep this for the next article.
Here is a link to a Google friend connect featured video, with a marketing orientation.