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> So, Facebook used interoperable tools to let ex-MySpace users eat their cake and have it too. Facebook provided those MySpace users with a “bot,” an automated

> So, Facebook used interoperable tools to let ex-MySpace users eat their cake and have it too. Facebook provided those MySpace users with a “bot,” an automated program that used the user’s login and password to impersonate that user to MySpace, scraping the user’s waiting messages and putting them in their Facebook inbox. I had completely forgotten about this! It's unthinkable today. As the piece says, if the tech giants feel the least bit threatened by a competitor they will just buy them up without any sort of regulatory hassle.

ilyt 3y ago
There was a point in history where both facebook and google offered XMPP with federation to their chats You could just join any XMPP server and chat with your google/facebook contacts directly from that. Imagine that now...
- peteradio 3y ago
  MBA has entered the chat.
- singpolyma3 3y ago
  Facebook never offered federated XMPP. They did offer federated email for a short while.
  - severak_cz 3y ago
    They provided XMPP gate - it did not federated with other servers but you were able to use multi-account client (e.g. Pidgin) and have it everything in one window. I did exactly that.
  - sseagull 3y ago
    I seem to remember being able to chat with Facebook users from my personal server, but it doesn’t look like it was possible [1]. Actually, searching for this stuff made me sad :( There are blog posts from Facebook still up about how they are using XMPP [2]. There are still notes out there on setting it up in Pidgin [3]. The internet has become a walled-off mess, and it makes me depressed to see such a powerful and wonderful technology abused like this. [1] https://stackoverflow.com/questions/5052780/integrating-facebook-chat#5056915 https://stackoverflow.com/questions/5052780/integrating-face... [2] https://developers.facebook.com/blog/post/110/ https://developers.facebook.com/blog/post/110/ [3] https://m.facebook.com/notes/socialblogr/how-to-setup-facebook-chat-in-pidgin-with-jabberxmpp/371950911048/ https://m.facebook.com/notes/socialblogr/how-to-setup-facebo... PS: looking through the other posts on the fb developer blog (just changing the number in the url) is interesting.
gumby 3y ago
> It's unthinkable today. Not really. There were all sorts of tools available to migrate off twitter once new management began to screw it up. (Of course they have since been blocked).

ilyt 3y ago

There was a point in history where both facebook and google offered XMPP with federation to their chats You could just join any XMPP server and chat with your google/facebook contacts directly from that. Imagine that now...

peteradio 3y ago
MBA has entered the chat.
singpolyma3 3y ago
Facebook never offered federated XMPP. They did offer federated email for a short while.
- severak_cz 3y ago
  They provided XMPP gate - it did not federated with other servers but you were able to use multi-account client (e.g. Pidgin) and have it everything in one window. I did exactly that.
- sseagull 3y ago
  I seem to remember being able to chat with Facebook users from my personal server, but it doesn’t look like it was possible [1]. Actually, searching for this stuff made me sad :( There are blog posts from Facebook still up about how they are using XMPP [2]. There are still notes out there on setting it up in Pidgin [3]. The internet has become a walled-off mess, and it makes me depressed to see such a powerful and wonderful technology abused like this. [1] https://stackoverflow.com/questions/5052780/integrating-facebook-chat#5056915 https://stackoverflow.com/questions/5052780/integrating-face... [2] https://developers.facebook.com/blog/post/110/ https://developers.facebook.com/blog/post/110/ [3] https://m.facebook.com/notes/socialblogr/how-to-setup-facebook-chat-in-pidgin-with-jabberxmpp/371950911048/ https://m.facebook.com/notes/socialblogr/how-to-setup-facebo... PS: looking through the other posts on the fb developer blog (just changing the number in the url) is interesting.

gumby 3y ago

> It's unthinkable today. Not really. There were all sorts of tools available to migrate off twitter once new management began to screw it up. (Of course they have since been blocked).