guid: 241

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time_created: 1228726657

time_updated: 1228726657

title: Not ready for prime time?

description:

UnionBook may not feel as polished or complete as sites like FaceBook.  There are a couple of reasons for that.

First of all, as we like to say, UnionBook is beta-testing at the moment.  In other words, by signing up here, you're helping us find all the bugs and work out all the kinks -- and we appreciate your help and your patience.

Second, we're never going to feel as polished as FaceBook because we're never going to have its 300 employees or $700 million in revenue (most recent estimates).

Everyone's going to find little things they don't like here, or things that could work a little bit better, and we aim to respond to all these issues.  But it's also important that we prioritize, and fix the most important things first.  We're counting on your help and hope that working together, we'll be able to announce in early 2009 the launch of a UnionBook which is no longer calling itself 'beta'.

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UnionBook may not feel as polished or complete as sites like FaceBook.  There are a couple of reasons for that.

First of all, as we like to say, UnionBook is beta-testing at the moment.  In other words, by signing up here, you're helping us find all the bugs and work out all the kinks -- and we appreciate your help and your patience.

Second, we're never going to feel as polished as FaceBook because we're never going to have its 300 employees or $700 million in revenue (most recent estimates).

Everyone's going to find little things they don't like here, or things that could work a little bit better, and we aim to respond to all these issues.  But it's also important that we prioritize, and fix the most important things first.  We're counting on your help and hope that working together, we'll be able to announce in early 2009 the launch of a UnionBook which is no longer calling itself 'beta'.

generic_comment:

Feedback:

I want live links at the bottom of the page. I want to be able to list more than one website in my profile. I want one main settings page with access to all the controls (details, profile photo etc.)

If it is possible to integrate the actnow campaigns with this service, that would be great.

generic_comment:

I don't use facebook so I'm not really well qualified to post on this, but I think it would be good if those users who do use facebook could talk about which apps on facebook they find most useful.

generic_comment:

It's important that we put together a list like that - keeping in mind that we will never be able to do everything that Facebook does and we're not in direct competition with it.

generic_comment:

Hi, Eric:
It's interesting to see what's happening here, for sure.
Some quick feedback, trying to think about this from the perspective of
explaining it to our members:  the thing that struck me the most is
that when you set up an account and log in, it takes you to a completely
empty dashboard page.  While this may give maximum flexilibility, it
increases the learning curve and time to get involved in the conversations
-- is there an easy way to have a default set of widgets, so that people
don't have to customize if they don't want to?
I also found it interesting that, unlike Facebook or many other sites,
people don't seem to need to confirm for you to be able to "friend"
them.  A lot of this comes down to the horrible mis-use of the term
"friend" in social networking - but I've actually seen more than one
bizarre political battle within unions as a result of having the wrong
people friended on FaceBook already, and I can horribly see that actually
being a real (and valid) matter of concern for trade unionists that they
can't control who lists them as a friend.   Not having played
with ELGG, I don't know if that's intrinsic to the system, or an
implementation choice on your end.  On the topic of "friends," too, it
looks like there's no way to lock blog posts to friends only - although I'm
not strictly sure that's a bad thing in a system like this one.
I'll also echo Gisela's comments on the wire -- if it's supposed to be a
current status, then people need to be able to set it easily from their
dashboard. 
Finally, in the wacky but interesting ideas to throw out there, in case
it's already written as an ELGG plugin, one of the most useful features of
some of these social network tools for me is Jabber Instant Messenger
integration - being able to log in to an XMPP server and automatically see
on my IM clients any UnionBook "friends" who are also logged in, without
having to go through the whole ritual of exchanging IM addresses. 
Heck, I might even be talked into seeing what'd be involved in implementing
that, if there was interest.

Ian Clysdale

generic_comment:

Oh, there would be interest all right, Ian. I'm already constantly signed in to the LiveJournal Jabber server when I'm awake and home. As for friending the wrong people? Screwit, sez I. I have Facebook friends who would probably sooner shoot at each other. (Heh. I'm already a friend of Marna's on LJ ...  this feels almost incestuous.)

generic_comment:

By the way, howcum Ian's post I just replied to is attributed to Eric?

generic_comment:

Ian's post is attributed to Eric (me) because I needed to repost it -- it got lost as we moved servers.

generic_comment:

Can I add this site as a gadget on my google account?

generic_comment:

Signed up -- I'm now getting literally dozens of repeat email confirmations and they won't stop. Help!