I read an article this morning that CitySearch launched Facebook connect in beta. Facebook connect allows users to connect their Facebook identity to third party sites. Essentially, any site becomes a Facebook app.
I have never used Facebook connect, so I tried it today using CitySearch.
1: Click “Sign in Using Facebook”
This way of presenting the option feels very OpenID-like. I assume that it’s going to be easy to create a profile and login. Because I was already signed into Facebook, all I had to do was choose a CitySearch user name, and I instantly had a profile.
I’m in.
It pulled in my name and Facebook picture at the top of the page.
What does it know about me?
I go to my profile and am slightly disappointed. I’m not sure what I expected – it would have creeped me out to see my favorite music and movies displayed exactly as they are on facebook… but CitySearch really doesn’t pull anything in other than my picture and name. I even had to tell it I am in Dallas when clearly the Dallas network is the only geo network I’m a part of.
I think it’s most disconcerting because I assume they have access to all my information, but it’s like they don’t want me to know how much they know about me. Well I want them to know… that I know… that they know… more about me than they’re letting on! (You know?)
Viewing Content
I start browsing some restaurants in Dallas and using some of the features on the site when I see a few more disappointments. There are two viral features on every CitySearch listing – “Send to” and “Share.” Neither one incorporate anything from my Facebook.
“Send to” only has a field for e-mail or phone. In a facebook app on facebook I would have a list of all my friends and I could check which ones I wanted to send the information to.
The “Share” feature is even more disappointing. Even if CitySearch doesn’t have access to my friend list because they are a third party, I have opted in to publishing stories about the application on my own wall, right? And even without using Facebook connect, I can post stories to my wall OR send a facebook message to a friend on sites like CNN.com, YouTube, and others. What gives with the lame share options? I told you I wanted to integrate this with my Facebook… why aren’t you letting me?
Posting a Review
Now I’m posting a review of one of my favorite Dallas restaurants. A really clean light box appears with a simple form I can use to post. While the box at the bottom is defaulted checked, I really like that I have the option to not publish the review to Facebook if I choose. I click “publish.”
I am once again prompted to publish my review to Facebook. Again, I appreciate that I am able to opt out of pieces of the integration if I want. I choose which size story I would like published in my feed, and hit publish again.
Integration!
So it’s taken a lot of work, but my friends on Facebook can see some proof that I use CitySearch. Maybe it was the Lighthouse debacle (where Facebook integrated Facebook accounts with third party sites without telling users first) that has CitySearch too scared to integrate any further (bad idea)… or maybe they’re holding all my personal data on the backend to learn more about me without my knowing (worse idea)… but whatever the reason, CitySearch should at least allow me to use Facebook to make my life easier as a user.
Users may talk about you to their friends on Facebook, but more users will talk about you on Facebook if it’s easy. And I mean really, really easy. Don’t make them hunt for ways to share your content with their friends. Hand them cool ways to share your content and let them choose whether or not to take advantage. They will!
