Activity Streams Chris Messina Internal
meeting January 29, 2009 ☕ Facebook, Palo Alto, CA

“Lifestreaming”

Today Last.fm • Jaiku •
Facebook newsfeed • FriendFeed • etc. •

The challenge Develop a format
for expressing activities • Compelling experiences from activity feeds • The zero-knowledge test • etc. •

FriendFeed Services

The Benefits Staying in touch
across the web • An open, emergent ecosystem of activities • Filtering, search, automation & stats • Optimal, compelling, custom experiences • Coalescing, merging, de-duping • etc. •

Examples

last.fm

sweetcron (yongfook.com)

Facebook

FriendFeed

boxee.tv

Movable Type Motion

Eventbox

Anatomy of an activity

Actor verb object [context]

factoryjoe tweeted Niches Bitches! [via
SMS]

Actor verb object {indirect object}
[context]

Chris bought Planet Earth {for
Brynn} [at Amazon.com]

Activities on the Social Web

I visit davidrecordon.com

I decide I want to
follow his activities Sign in to follow Dave!

I sign in with my
OpenID

Before I’m sent back, I’m
asked whether I want to follow Dave

I say yes, and am
asked which activity types I’m interested in... Add contact Dave Recordon Add subscriptions Worst username evar. Contact details San Francisco, CA Status updates davidrecordon.com Photos Bookmarks Your message (optional) Blogs Hi there! We met that conference daveman692 last week. I’ve subscribed to your updates on my site. Six Apart Location -Chris Music Movies Slide presentations Events Travel Local reviews Books Access requires permission from Dave Inspired by Jyri Engeström

Should any of the selected
types be protected, I will be asked whether I want to request access Dave’s contact details, photos and location are protected. Would you like to request access to these items? Please note that Dave may deny your request. No thanks OK

If I say OK, an
OAuth request will be sent which Dave will later be able to approve, deny or ignore

...And Dave’s public activities will
show up in my activities dashboard.

...And if Dave later approves
my request, his protected activities will show up too

Activities on the Open Web

I visit stammer.com

I decide I want to
join this community Sign in to start posting!

I sign in with my
OpenID

Before I’m sent back, I’m
asked whether I want to authorize Stammer to postback my activities Stammer can post the activities you take on their site to your profile. Would you like to allow this? If you’re not sure, you can decide later. These activities will not be made public unless you want them to be. You can always revoke this permission later. Decide later OK

If I say yes, I
am returned to Stammer, authenticated. As I use the site, my actions are posted to my activity stream

If I defer, I am
returned to Stammer, authenticated. As I use the site, my actions are posted to my activity dashboard, where I can choose to share my activities later

Sound familiar?

Sound familiar?

Current work

ATOM Extension

<entry> <id>tag:photopanic.example.com,2008:activity01</id> <title>Geraldine posted a
Photo on PhotoPanic</title> <published>2008-11-02T15:29:00Z</published> <link rel=quot;alternatequot; type=quot;text/htmlquot; href=quot;/geraldine/activities/1quot; /> <activity:verb> http://activitystrea.ms/schema/1.0/post </activity:verb> <activity:object> <id>tag:photopanic.example.com,2008:photo01</id> <title>My Cat</title> <published>2008-11-02T15:29:00Z</published> <link rel=quot;alternatequot; type=quot;text/htmlquot; href=quot;/geraldine/photos/1quot; /> <activity:object-type> tag:atomactivity.example.com,2008:photo </activity:object-type> <source> <title>Geraldine's Photos</title> <link rel=quot;selfquot; type=quot;application/atom+xmlquot; href=quot;/geraldine/photofeed.xmlquot; /> <link rel=quot;alternatequot; type=quot;text/htmlquot; href=quot;/geraldine/quot; /> </source> </activity:object> <content type=quot;htmlquot;> &lt;p&gt;Geraldine posted a Photo on PhotoPanic&lt;/p&gt; &lt;img src=quot;/geraldine/photo1.jpgquot;&gt; </content> </entry>

<entry> <id>tag:photopanic.example.com,2008:activity01</id> <title>Geraldine posted a
Photo on PhotoPanic</title> <published>2008-11-02T15:29:00Z</published> <link rel=quot;alternatequot; type=quot;text/htmlquot; href=quot;/geraldine/activities/1quot; /> <activity:verb> http://activitystrea.ms/schema/1.0/post </activity:verb> <activity:object> <id>tag:photopanic.example.com,2008:photo01</id> <title>My Cat</title> <published>2008-11-02T15:29:00Z</published> <link rel=quot;alternatequot; type=quot;text/htmlquot; href=quot;/geraldine/photos/1quot; /> <activity:object-type> tag:atomactivity.example.com,2008:photo </activity:object-type> <source> <title>Geraldine's Photos</title> <link rel=quot;selfquot; type=quot;application/atom+xmlquot; href=quot;/geraldine/photofeed.xmlquot; /> <link rel=quot;alternatequot; type=quot;text/htmlquot; href=quot;/geraldine/quot; /> </source> </activity:object> <content type=quot;htmlquot;> &lt;p&gt;Geraldine posted a Photo on PhotoPanic&lt;/p&gt; &lt;img src=quot;/geraldine/photo1.jpgquot;&gt; </content> </entry>

Starter verbs/objects

Weblog Entry Note Photo Video
Bookmark ...

What can we observe?

The Benefits Staying in touch
across the web • An open, emergent ecosystem of activities • Filtering, search, automation & stats • Optimal, compelling, custom experiences • Coalescing, merging, de-duping • etc. •

More soon at activitystrea.ms

Fin.
me -› factoryjoe.com

Fin.
me -› factoryjoe.com