The Implications Of Curated Search with Dan Green And Gahlord Dewald

Before I went to bed last night, I sent this message out on Twitter.

respres Jeff Turner

New Facebook Patent: the Huge Implications of Curated Search http://bit.ly/hLGnhL (@gahlord have you seen this?)

I was hoping it would find Gahlord Dewald fresh and rested and ready to dig in. My plan worked. I got up at 4:15am to do my yoga before a long drive to the Zeek Interactive offices in Huntington Beach. I set off on my trek without really checking into Twitter. I also love it when friends have a full conversation in my Twitter stream without me. It saves me a lot of work. 🙂

Gahlord started with a bit of a monologue:

gahlord Gahlord Dewald

@respres yes. People confusing patent with image tagging were sloppy patent readers–no room in the world for that.

@respres it is simply a social overlay on search results. Imagine “x friends liked this” currently on blog posts. Add that to search results.

@respres patent necessary to protect the concept. FB still not useful as a search engine. Patent doesn’t change that.

@respres patent does give great revenue gen possibility though, license FB graph overlay on site search or google or bing etc.

@respres additional side effect worth noting: if you have lots of loose-tie friends how valuable is the FB social overlay?

@respres thanks for the heads up.

Dan Green couldn’t resist jumping in. Thankfully. His question started an interesting discussion about how the kind of social overlay Facebook is hinting at could influence “friending” in social media spaces.

mortgagereports Dan Green

@gahlord @respres – What if your “friends” aren’t similar to you? Wouldn’t FB’s results then hold less value than GOOG’s non-biased results?

@gahlord @respres – Search results like that make a case for finding a homogeneous set of friends, or at list making homogeneous lists.

gahlord Gahlord Dewald

@mortgagereports @respres patent isn’t about FB search so much as it is about providing visual FB cues overlay on algorithmic results.

@mortgagereports If anything, it’s admission that FB doesn’t do search but wants on the serps anyway. @respres

@mortgagereports all that said, it’s an interesting idea. Long term utility and side effects may be interesting. @respres

As you mention @mortgagereports will it influence our “friending” behavior to know we’ll see and show on the SERPs? @respres

mortgagereports Dan Green

@gahlord @respres – “I’m unfriending you because you’re a Mets fan. I don’t want Pelfrey in my SERPs.” #GoPhillies

gahlord Gahlord Dewald

@mortgagereports Poor @respres is probably stuck in traffic or asleep and we’re jamming up his twitter stream. 🙂

mortgagereports Dan Green

@gahlord @respres – Jeff’s getting his Downward Dog on. This conversation is light-years away from him right now. 😉

gahlord Gahlord Dewald

@mortgagereports Yeah he’s gone all hippie on us. If he starts growing his hair out we’ll know for certain @respres

They get me. They really get me.

respres Jeff Turner

@gahlord @mortgagereports thanks for that. 🙂 now to piece that convo together.

I think the question of whether this kind of social overlay could influence friending behavior is an interesting one. It might for those of us who are more “open” with how we use social networks, but I’m guessing it won’t for the mass of users who keep their connections tight.

And there is an example of this already out there. Wajam layers social on top of Google search.  For example, when I search for “Facebook Patent” on Google, Wajam adds a social element to the top of my search results. I can see that 213 of my friends have shared information related to “Facebook Patent” and I can order this findings and see who has shared and what they’ve shared. I’m finding it quite helpful.

This will be interesting to watch.