Some language probably NSFW or kids.

Thanks for contributing. I suppose that the issue comes down to one of stats and hard facts versus beliefs - and as we all know stats dont always win.

I think you are giving Facebook way too little credit.

I'm not, its a wonderful website and tool that i use often.
But these exact arguements were heard during the rise of MySpace, Okurt, LiveSpaces, MSNmessenger, AoL, Bebo etc etc etc.

Nothing lasts forever, and in the internet world, becoming the most popular and staying the most popular are two different things.

The question remains though, and no-ones given me any data otherwise to come up with a case we could debate, how benefitial would spending the time on an FBconnect plugin be for BBpress?

When it comes to instant messenger, MSN has been top dog for ever, contradicting your philosophy about topdogs

Except, that isn't true!

AoL was top dog for a very very long time. Infact, MSN piggybacked onto AoL's AIM service for its first 2 years, because by that time, AoL had been top dog for 5 years.

Then Yahoo and MSN were tied for years, infact Yahoo prospered greatly during Microsoft's failed Hailstorm/myPassport/MSN-messenger-is-tied-into-outlook-express failed rollout.
Its easy to say with hindsight that MSN has always been top dog, but if you were there, you'd know its simply not true.

MSNmessenger really took off with WindowsXP, and as a Microsoft developer at the time, i can tell you that before then its market share of IM chat was alot lower than its percentage of possible users.

Everyone in my country uses MSN, and has for the last 10-12 years

Awesome. Its only been out 9 years though (unless you had Windows ME where this could be in your 10th by 7 weeks), but i'll not quibble. The problem with these sort of statements is that "Everyone" is a statistical statement that means 100%. I'm confident not 100% of people (that use internet or even instant messaging) in your country use MSN messenger for the last X years.

The same is my issue with these generalisations about Facebook (or any website) once it become incumbant in its field. "everyone" uses facebook, like "everyone" or "most" use MSN simply isnt true.

Facebook has redefined the whole genre of social communication on the internet

I fail to see how it has redefined it actually. Simplified? Unified? Sped-up? I'll grant you all those.
But publishing data to a group of people who've you've preselected to be allowed to see said data is not new; Neither is the instant messaging, sharing of photos, emailing each other etc.

It has become so widely used, that it's incorporated in Playstation 3, Xbox 360, several cellphones, and in many countries - Facebook has been the platform for actual change

Thats a massive leap there mate, loads of things are on PS3, Xbox360, Cellphones etc.
Heck they all have an API so people can develop applications for them.
Bebo is on all of those platforms, are we now suggesting that Bebo is the platform for change? (and btw, Bebo is the # 1 social network in my country - not facebook).

My phone in 2004, and as i recall to some degree my xBox in 2005 - at least in signing in, had MSNmessenger on it. Sharing status updates, chatting, emailling and sending photos. Surely, given that this was on game consoles and cell phones over 5 years ago, this would be far more likely to be the platform for actual change than Facebook (was wasn't even built then).

I think Facebook is pretty much gonna be the number one social website for a very long time

Again, its based on "i think" and not stats. For the record, I also think the same as you, but when it comes to committing resources, i base them off facts and not randoms hunches. Plus, i'm sure there were countless people who said the same about AoL, MSN, MySpace etc etc.

=====================================================

I'm real happy for these conversations, but i'm worried that we're getting away from teh original point. I am not being disparaging of Facebook the website, platform, nor movie (is it still going to be Aaron Sorkin writing??).

But with so many people posting so often about how Facebook Connect should be the top priority/feature in BBpress, i am asking for your data so we can see if its worthwhile :)

I don't think Facebook is going away any time soon. When it comes to instant messenger, MSN has been top dog for ever, contradicting your philosophy about topdogs. Everyone in my country uses MSN, and has for the last 10-12 years. I dont even remember anymore. So I think Facebook is pretty much gonna be the number one social website for a very long time.

I belief that they would login if they could login with their facebook login.

The thing is, all the data we've seen from 18 months of Facebook Connect, not to mention people believing that they could pull people away from AoL/MSN/MySpace onto their own site in the past 10 years, all suggestes otherwise.

Thats not to say that it wont happen, it could and if it did i'd be very happy for you, but we have alot of data that says Facebook Connect will not be overly benefitial, and no-data to say otherwise.

Maybe it works, maybe not. It's try and error. What's wrong with that?

We don't have the development resources. Right now we have 0 developers from automattic working on BBpress, though Matt is now taking an interest. If there was a huge desire or need for FBconnect someone would have build a plugin in the last 18 months. Sadly no-one has, and i think that on the whole, is the most damning thing. There has been a plugin for almost ever other feature mentioned on this thread - apart from FBconnect.

Again, the only thing wrong is that there are finite resources and there needs to be a good case made to devoting resources to adding new features to bbPress. There's nothing preventing anyone from developing FB Connect as a plugin for bbPress. If there's an itch, someone will scratch it.

Maybe it works, maybe not. It's try and error. What's wrong with that?

Merry Christmas

People on the internet go where other people are. Aol > MSN > MySpace > Facebook. Yahoo > Hotmail > Gmail. wtc.

For people that use Facebook, and facebook connect, there is the belief that not having it is somehow stopping people from using your forums. The thing is, we have no way of knowing how correct that is, we have no stats.

What we do have is stats for people that did implement Facebook Connect on their websites, and those stats tell us that people who want to join in the discussion will do so regardless of FBconnect or not.

The largest success story of FBconnect has been the HufingtonPost, which has seen a spike in the number of people using FBconnect to use its website. Thats a positive for FBconnect for sure, but when you look at their stats they get 1 new person signing up via FBconnect for every 3000 people (*this is the published average) that see their "news story" on someone's Facebook page/link. Almost all (over 95%) of people that use FBconnect on their site come directly from Facebook itself.

There is no data to suggest that FBconnect helps people sign-up or join-in discussions on websites. Infact, there's alot of data to suggest that people will only use FBconnect if they come directly from facebook to your forum post, and that in the best case scenario, you'll get 1 sign-up for every 3000 people that see what you've written on facebook.

I dont know about you, but nothing i write on Facebook gets seen by more than 100,000 people (for a charity news), which would result in 33 new people on that charities forums. Thats not worth the development time, nor the hassle of constantly updating.

As always, good talking to you :)

Merry Christmas

If it is a community facebook connect could be a way to enlarge it.

Do you think that the time for forums is over?

I just want to use the facebook network to promote my blog and my forums thats all.

You raise an excellent point, but i feel you've made a large presumption. Why would your 600 friends all or mostly move to your forum (which undoubtedly will not work as well or as slick/fast as facebook) when they already have a discussion forum that works for them?

How many of these people have you asked if they would leave Facebook to comment on your own blog if someone else spent time writing this plugin for you?

For me, its these lack of stats that really show that this would be far from worthwhile.

Open-ID is something for developpers but not for simple facebook users.

Thats funny, because OpenID is MySpace, AoL, Bebo etc. and has more accounts signed up to it than facebook.

When I could offer them an easy login with facebook connect the chance that they would visit my forum more often would be higher. Thats why I need facebook connect.

Open-ID is something for developpers but not for simple facebook users.

I'm using WPMU+Buddypress and integrated with bbpress --- since there are facebookconnect plugins for WPMU, and now facebook plugin specific for WPMU+BP, my installation of bbpress on WPMU+BP becomes the odd one. While BP is now with its own forum system, I have more reasons to abandon bbpress; yet I do hope facebook-enabled bbpress would make me continue to use this.

Not really. Occasionally someone will email me and tell me they never received their password reset email, but that's easily handled manually. The 3 forums are small, so management is not a problem. If they were larger with more users, I'd be looking for better ways of automating the management of them, but right now they are just fine. I have _ck_'s human test installed on all 3, and don't use akismet. Occasionally I get a spam post, but it's just a minor nuisance. At least I don't have any trouble with false positives with Akismet. Again, if they were larger volume, I'd be looking for other ways of managing the forums.

In my opinion, a goodly portion of the reason you run your OWN forum, rather than pay some other site to host, code etc one for you, is that YOU remain responsible and accountable for YOUR code and your visitors. Any SLA/Terms of Use you come up with are yours, and you can make the final decisions on what is and isn't okay.

Why would you remove that, just for FaceBook?

OpenID is ... a little different, though I'm still not sold on the efficacy of it. I have LJ, WordPress and a myriad of other sites I can choose to log in through. I'm still relying on them... I don't know how I feel a out that in the long run.

The one thing I like about email verification, (or FB verification) is it goes a little farther in holding people accountable.

Not really. If someone logs into your forum and spams you then all you can do is remove their posts and ban them from your site. Thats the only level of accountability that anyone has on their forum.

There is no evidence whatsoever that using FacebookConnect makes you more accountable than any other single-signon-service. So given that FBconnect is the 4thlargest, why should we focus on that one?

I suppose my issue with all of this is that those of us who aren't wanting to plough development time into a feature like this (one that goes against the philosophy of the software) are providing numbers and links to back up their comments; while those who are for FBconnect are giving anacdotqal evidence usually involving the word "cool".

If FBconnect is something we should plough development time into, then where's the evidence?

Have a good day all, and stay warm!!

More recently, I installed Nightgunner5's fantastic Moderation Suite:
http://bbpress.org/plugins/topic/bbpress-moderation-suite/

This allowed me to create a Moderator team of people I trusted, who can spam and delete posts... the plugin logs every moderation action too, so I can always reverse something if a volunteer Moderator makes a decision I disagree with.

The one thing I like about email verification, (or FB verification) is it goes a little farther in holding people accountable. Any war stories to share?!?

Since users now pick their own passwords, it doesn't matter as much if that email makes it through or not...

I must confess, this was initially a bit of a headache for this server newbie. (People complain that the registration doesn't work, others don't say anything and give up on the site at that point thinking the software doesn't work) This really isn't a problem with bbPress, but it is a tough issue to figure out when you are just learning the LAMP ropes. Thank goodness for knowledgeable server buddies!

Not sure if this explains anything, but this is one of the reasons (a minor one) why this LAMP newbie like the idea of allowing others ways to login like FB Connect...(it eliminates that potentially-troublesome email verification step and allows them to jump right in).

BTW, I would be ecstatic is FB Connect emerged as a plugin first and the next bbPress release focused on other things like integration, some cool new features, etc. You are a good salesman. ;)

Here's some anecdotal evidence. Of all the forums I run (three) no one has ever asked me about Facebook Connect. People who are engaged with the community or topic don't seem to have a problem creating an account to participate there. I still think there are many more basic things to get working before worrying about a moving target, external API. Plus, it should probably start out as a plugin anyway. If there is interest in it, it will happen.

My opinion.

You make a lot of excellent points. It's funny you bring up the memory issues (had to move my news website site from Godaddy to my own server because of that very issue with WordPress).

This is a great community and have no doubt it's going to be a fun year for bbPress. Can't wait to see where things go in the next six months!

1) bbPress needs a Facebook connect feature
2) That feature (along with a bunch of others) should be in the core

1) FB Connect

On the first point... typically the way new features get built is to either:
* build it yourself, or to
* hire someone to build it for you.

The third path is to try and convince others to build it for you for free... but I've very rarely ever seen that work.

I've actually read stats that show that Facebook Connect can greatly uptick registration:
http://www.businessinsider.com/2008/12/facebook-connect-still-tiny-will-grow-fast

So it may be worth building. But it's very very difficult to convince someone to develop plugins for free, especially when we don't have many (any?) active plugin developers... so that basically just leaves the options to build it yourself or to hire someone to build it for ya.

If you tell the developer that it will be open source, maybe they will discount their fee? Or you could ask other users to contribute to the fee...

2) All/most major features should be in the Core

WordPress has put a ton of features into the Core. It's gotten to the point where even smallish sites can't run without a caching plugin:
http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/001105.html

It's not just CPU - the latest versions also eat up lots of memory just to serve up a single page:
http://www.oceanlight.com/log/wordpress-28-memory-usage-and-bloat.html

I'm not sure if this Canonical Plugins initiative would help reduce this bloat or not:
http://wordpress.org/development/2009/12/canonical-plugins/

We don't have to predict that moving most features into the core will increase bloat and slow down servers... it's already happened on the WordPress side of things. I think most smaller blogs don't mind - you can just add caching and be fine for a while. It's a lot harder for larger sites... I've wrestled with scaling my blog, and I'm on a dedicated server. But Matt mentioned that scaling is not really an issue, so I must be missing something:
http://www.sitepoint.com/blogs/2009/08/28/podcast-25-wordpress-matt-mullenweg/

I think it will be a lot harder to cache bbPress than it will be to cache WordPress, since community sites update so many more times than to a blog. So the WordPress strategy to put a lot of features into the core and address scaling through a caching option... probably won't be as effective on the bbPress side of things. So that makes it even more important to keep the bbPress core clean.

In any case, I don't want to be a downer here - there's still hope for the bbPress platform, if we can unite around keeping the core engine "simple, fast, and elegant" (especially fast!!). If not, then it will be tough to keep the platform viable and we risk losing what progress we've made so far.

1) re: the 350 million facebook users, there was just a story on Mashable 'Facebook’s Road to 350 Million Users': (http://mashable.com/2009/12/02/facebook-350-million-users/)

"Mark Zuckerberg’s note detailing Facebook’s latest privacy changes also contained an announcement about another important milestone for Facebook: 350 million users."

Facebook's own website: (http://www.facebook.com/press/info.php?statistics):"'More than 350 million active users"

I'm just going with what they said :)

2) I don't have official 'stats' but can tell you Facebook connect is put to use on my site (I run Intense Debate, which offers various ways folks can leave comments). Twitter connect is occasionally as well (but not as much as FB connect) My general point is this: it's optional and it and brings new folks into the discussion. IntenseDebate was smart to incorporate several different optional login methods! From my standpoint, I am very happy to offer FB connect to my readers :)

3) "So, who are these magical little elves that are going to build and then maintain all these features??" (BTW, I too am a South Park fan so I immediately got your reference):

Build and maintain all those features? You are missing my point...if existing popular plugins like 'topic views' or 'bbcode' are built into the core a third party no longer needs to maintain the plugin and make sure they don't break in bbPress 1.0, bbPress 1.1, etc. They are STANDARDIZED and can be further fleshed out! (WordPress example: Just like WordPress did with the automatic updater and ability to thread comments...) _ck_ came up with some really slick and widely used plugins, and she is probably won't be maintaining them from here on out. Maybe stuff like 'BBcode Buttons' should continue as a Core features?

Even though we both disagree on some of these things, we both want the same thing...bbPress to be more widely used & developed and the bbpress community to grow (those that make plugins, templates, etc). I would also like to see bbPress to emerge as a vBulletin alternative.

Again, things like Voices, gravatars, profile pics, profile occupation and location, tags etc could have all been simply left as plugins, but they were incorporated into the core. My overall point (forget FB connect for a sec) is that things like Voices, gravatars, profile pics, profile occupations, location, and other features are part of the core and that is a very good thing! It makes it easier for bbPress to be more widely used because a separate plugin is not needed for each (good for newbies, stability, and so community can further flesh them out via plugins or themes) There is less danger of those features breaking (they are now features of the Core, not separate plugins). The use of those features is standardized so plugins and themes can be developed to make use of those features without requiring a plugin to use each.

In a nutshell, I think things like bbcode, topic views, and some other plugins should sit alongside Voices, gravatars, etc as features that should be incorporated into the Core.

kevinjohngallagher, I love your passion. I am someone who is probably not as skilled as you are with computers and technology (17FB accounts...you sound busy!) I'm not a developer, just some newbie that taught himself how to run WordPress and bbPress by messing around with the stuff.

We aren't going to agree on Facebook-connect (it's a tougher sell than some of the others), but I would wager that there is probably a popular plugin or two that you might also agree should logically be part of the core for stability and out-of-the-box-feature issues. Thoughts?

Sir,

We don't agree on these things, but its very cool we can discuss them openly, and in a manner such as this. My hats off to ya'.

On my site I offer Twitter and FB login via IntenseDebate and get people to use them all the time for commenting.

That's awesome. Could you garnish us with some figures please mate, because the other figures and stats that i could find (Alexa etc.) all point to a poor take up of FBconnect, and a very low "new user" clickthrough - unless replying to a post from facebook (have to get that caveat in there because those stas look good).

Number of Users?
Number of Users who used to signing normally and now use FBconnect?
Number of Users who have never signed in normally but have only used FBconnect?

That would be really useful to us all i think, to put it in context.

You may call it the flavor of the week, but Facebook has more than 350 million active users.

It doesn't, it has over 200million unique accounts, but it doesn't have even 200million unique people (i personally run 17 FB accounts between myself, my company, and the charities i help out).

Dont get me wrong, the site is both huge and popular, but its not gotten the number of people that some folks claim. Heck according to Facebook's Mark Z in February, when it overtook MySpace as the #1 social networking site in the US (again - in the US), that half of its userbase logs in once a day, and 80% of its userbase logs in at least once a month. Now in the month that it overtook MySpace, Alexa claims for 350million page views, its imply cant have 350million people. But that slightly off-topic, so lets bring it back.

If number of possible users is the main positive for FacebookConnect then it fails, as it actually comes 4th. So does that mean we should build FBconnect after writing the other 3 into the core? Or are we going with FBconnect because you use it...

1. GoogleFreindFinder (or whatever its new branding is: apparently GoogleSingleSignon) has access to everyone with a (specific type of) gmail account and everyone on Okurt - it covers a ridiculous number of people (worldwide).
2. MSN passport has access to everyone with an MSN or Yahoo email address for single signin.
3. MySpace uses OpenID so OpenID has access to the third most users.
4. Facebook comes in fourth (and there's a big big gap betwen 3rd and 4th)

Also, its not so much that Facebook is the "flavour of the month", its just that we've seen this all before. The dominant website in its field, looks like no-one will ever topple it and BAM, yesterdays news. The long you spent developing for the internet (this is my 15th paid year), the more you see the simple fact that content is what engages people, regardless of systems or context.

The reason we're so adamant about this subject is not because we're being stubborn, its because we've had this conversation before. We had it with AoL, we had it when Microsfot rolled out MyPasspost/Hailstorm, we had it when Microsfot rolled out Live, we had it with OpenID, we had it with myspace, We had it with GoogleSingleSignon. I, and in deed we, are not knocking Favebook or FBconnect - its just that its software owned and maintained by a company outwith BBpress, and sooner or later they are going to dip in popularity or make such a large change to the API that the standard BBpress will fail with no notice.

We know this, becuse they already did it 3 times this year :)

Imagine (as a user...please separate yourself from the admin process) visiting a forum and knowing you can immediately log in and join the discussion with your FB account.

1) You're going to need a facebook account. There are not as many people with FB accounts as i think you think there are. Not to mention, Non-white, Non-North-America, Non-College-Educated, Non-Under-25s, Non-broadband-users are FAR FAR FAR less likely to have one (80% of FB users tick all those boxes).

2) If you are so engrossed/captivated/moved by the content of a forum post that you feel the need to add to the conversation, is registering really a deterant? As a user, if i really want to comment/reply/converse, i usually see what the registration process is like. I know from my phpBB forums, the drop off after the registration page is loaded is HUGE, and the drop off after a failed registration is over90%. I suggest you check your stats too. Alot more poeple go to registration pages than its presumed, but the registering process is where it ends.

3) Surely, if registration is the problem, our time is better suited on making that easier for the user.

4) Purely from an end user perspective (and not an admin), i dont want to use FBconnect, i can just use anonymous posting and thats the even easier option! FBconnect is a half way house for you as both a user and an admin, but it requires a massive amount of work for the BBpress team - again for a feature that not common, not worldwide, nor often-used.

Matt's made a comments re: bbPress and forums a while back along the lines that forums really haven't changed that much in the past ten years. Exactly. Allow stuff like FB connect to encourage conversations and bring them into the next century!

Surely good conversation and topics encourage conversations and not FBconnect. I doubt many people find a forum very boring, but feel compelled to join in just because the website lets them log in via FBconnect.

You know, when somethings been the same for a long time (is basic, usable without too much instruction, and does exaclty what it says on the tin) there usually isn't a whole lot you can do to make it better; and on the rare occasion when there is... its usually come form a total overhaul and not adding to the original.

I say that because much smarter people than you and I have been using Forums for a greater number of years that either of us, and no-one has yet came up with a better format. There's an inate desire in humans to make things better, but that does not mean that something can always be improved greatly simply because its worked the same way for a great amount of time.

Also, single signons became availible last century, heck last millenium, and they didn't take off in the last 10 years because people didn't want or like them; so somehow integrating FBconnect isn't going to magically make forums current or "this century".

I do not understand the opposition to making FB's core more robust feature wise.

What is the harm in including additional features

We've had 1 developer (working close to part-time) on BBpress for 2 years.
We've had NO developer working on BBpress since July 15th.
The two main plugin suppliers have left the project.
The wiki / developer documentation is now a loans/spam/porn website

So, who are these magical little elves that are going to build and then maintain all these features??

It kind of reminds me of the Gnomes in South Park http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gnomes_(South_Park).
1. Features
2. ???
3. Kill vBulletin

It seems like step 2, the bit where the work actually comes in, is just presumed to happen magically. Which is the only way it would happen, given that right now our development team consists of... no-one.

Adding more features to the core standardizes those features so they do not break in future builds

Adding thigns to the core doesn't automatically stabalise them, a developer stablises them.
Again, that developer is currently... no-one.

Thats the issue BBpress has had for the last year. Sam added loads of things to the core, changed loads of functions, hardcoded alot of template functions into the core, and has now gone without telling anyone until months after (N.B. This was Sam's pain emplyment, and is not a criticism of the man himself - merely a statement of the facts).

These things dont stabalize themselves, they need development, and adding them to the core does not guarentee that, all it does is guarenteee that time is taken away form other things.

allows even better plugins to be unveiled to customize them further.

BBpress 1.0.2 has bee a stable RC release for over 6 months now. Where are all these plug-ins? Where are all the plugin developers rushing to add functionality? Where are all the massively different customisations? *tumbleweed*

Let's help bbPress evolve and become more robust featurewise so it buries vBulletin

Robust is the polar opposite of harcoding reliance on an extrnal and ever-changing API into core.
And mate, we're not here to bury vBulletin, thats not the goal; we're here to make forum software in accordance with the Philosphy and Features on the about page. IF you're ever wondering if something fits into BBpress, always check http://bbpress.org/about/ and see if it fits into those 5 design philosophies. If it doesn't, chances are, it wont be going into BBpress.

Take care, and good health.

Kev

The harm is that there are a limited number of resources, so prioritizing what gets worked on is important to using those resources wisely.

I'm not looking at it at all from the perspective of "now I have to use this" I'm looking at it from the perspective of "we have XX hours this month to work on bbPress, what should we be working on?"

Another thing...many of you look at proposals to add features to the core as things you MUST use.

What is the harm in including additional features which can be optionally turned on or off.

FB connect aside, I do not understand the opposition to making FB's core more robust feature wise. Adding more features to the core standardizes those features so they do not break in future builds and allows even better plugins to be unveiled to customize them further.

bbPress should try to make it as EASY as possible for folks to join in the conversation. Short of anonymous forum posting (which can get personal and go to the gutter quick) FB connect is the next best thing to someone registering traditionally. Heck, they are essentially signing their name to their stuff! On my site I offer Twitter and FB login via IntenseDebate and get people to use them all the time for commenting.

You may call it the flavor of the week, but Facebook has more than 350 million active users. Imagine (as a user...please separate yourself from the admin process) visiting a forum and knowing you can immediately log in and join the discussion with your FB account. I've used FB connect myself on some sites where I would not have bothered registering. Again, this should be an optional feature a la Intense Debate's interface where it can be turned on or off.

@ kevinjohngallagher (btw, I appreciate your comments, shame we disagree on some of this stuff):

"Maybe i've got this wrong, but BBpress is forum software. Forum's of this format have been around for 20 years now, and have gotten along with without Facebook Connect. If this has changed, can someone pelase let us know?"

Matt's made a comments re: bbPress and forums a while back along the lines that forums really haven't changed that much in the past ten years. Exactly. Allow stuff like FB connect to encourage conversations and bring them into the next century! Let's help bbPress evolve and become more robust featurewise so it buries vBulletin!