Focusing Attention on the Social Graph
Brad Fitzpatrick has written a comprehensive post regarding the global mapping of everybody and how they are related, aka the social graph.
Alex Iskold has taken a stab at tying the social graph into the attention discussion. His premise being that they are interconnected.
Brad calls for a brokerage-type service that collates attention data from the growing diaspora of social networks and passes it on end-users. It’s an interesting concept and Alex touches on whether a standards based body can fulfil this role. Doing so would require a catalyst - as with many IEEE-like standards this usually takes place when a powerful consortium or grass roots community coalesces with the intent of creating such a standard.
It’s doubtful the individual social networks will be motivated to join such a consortium ad initio. Others will need to take on this mantle and drive it forward.
