It’s been a whirlwind couple of days here at Cliqset since the launch of our public beta last Tuesday. We’ve gotten a ton of great feedback from folks through Twitter and the blogosphere and we’re looking forward to catching up with some of you at SXSW Interactive. In the meantime, we’d like to clear up a few things.
What is Cliqset? Confused? Check out our video. Still confused?
Well, Cliqset is an open platform that allows you (the user) to create, update and control your social data from anywhere (mobile, desktop, web). Familiar with FireEagle? What they do with location data, we do with social data. We’re still experimenting with how to describe our platform and some folks have been confused. So let’s try to clear it up (and we welcome any feedback or ideas you have).
We are a platform
Ultimately, we’ve created the first neutral social platform designed to allow a user to create a single, social identity that can be shared and used by any third party, in real time, in any way they see fit. The Cliqset platform is completely open to any developer to easily create, retrieve and manipulate social information across their applications and services. We also offer resources and support for building these applications.
Because of the openness of the platform, users can to carry their social identity (essentially their data, including contacts, etc.) with them no matter what Web site, application or service they interact with (as long as its Cliqset enabled), instead of being tied down to a proprietary site, like Facebook or MySpace. Cliqset users can continue to build and manage their unified social identity from any Web site, application or device they’ve authorized, without ever sacrificing their privacy or security.
This is a real beta
We just launched our early stage beta and are excited to offer users the ability to create and manage their social identity, and developers the opportunity to build out applications with our platform. But, this is still a work in progress and we’re still working out a few of the kinks, so if you experience anything strange, or if something isn’t working the way it should, let us know!
More is coming
Once developers start creating social apps on the platform, we’ll have more for our users to play around with and experience. We should have applications soon and will keep you all posted with developments on the blog and Twitter.
Some misconceptions
We are not like chi.mp and we are not just one more cross-site identity provider.
Many services are in the business of creating, sharing and/or aggregating social content. Some use open standards like OAuth and Portable Contacts as is the case with MySpaceID, others use more proprietary solutions like Facebook Connect, while Friendfeed lets you suck in and expose your data via RSS/Atom.
While the goal of making information more accessible is shared by all of these, including Cliqset, our approach and philosophy around social data is entirely different. Cliqset has created the first neutral social platform designed wholeheartedly to allow a user to create a *single* social identity that can be shared and used by any and all 3rd parties in any way they see fit. A single identity that doesn’t require data portability in the sense that you’re making copies of information on each service. Applications can instead simply share and mold one single copy of that same users’ identity that exists in one place…Cliqset.
If you step back and think about that for a second, you’ll start to realize how Cliqset really changes things… how it enables a new type of social interaction that couldn’t exist prior. Social applications no longer need to make a point to share content, they’re all part of the same underlying social infrastructure. Users can communicate and interact with each other across social applications without any boundaries. Imagine being able to search for people you know from Facebook and retrieving results for people you know who only use MySpace, Twitter or some other service you’ve never even heard of. Then not only did you find them, you can establish a relationship with them and interact (send messages, view activities, see their friends, etc) as if they were all on Facebook with you. That is the sort of social interaction Cliqset enables. A completely unified social mesh that operates in real-time.
Today when a user selects a social application they have to consider more than just their personal preference. They need their friends to use it as well and if they don’t, it’s close to useless. Cliqset eliminates that barrier adding value for the user but also the developer. Users can pick the app that’s right for them as an individual without sacrificing interaction with their friends and family who are spending their time on one or more other social applications. This is a win for both the user and for the developer–making the likelihood that the user will return far greater.
Enough explaining for now. Check out the platform and sign up for the beta.
We’re looking forward to the journey ahead and hope to have you along for the ride.
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