Facebook waited a very long time to release its iPad app. There may be all sorts of reasons for that; disputes over the ownership of data, an argument over Apple's Ping social network, and concern about the propagation of platforms to support sound like obvious show stoppers. But let’s take Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerburg at his word. Facebook wants to be a mobile company but the iPad, as His Majesty informed us ages ago is not mobile — and that's an idea Grok still supports, BTW.
So what’s changed? Well, 28.7 million iPads for starters, says Businessweek.
Techcrunch got in with this piece by one of its blogging celebs, Jason Kincaid, who didn't quit over the spat between Michael Arrington and Adrianna Huffington. They followed up shortly afterwards with a more developer-flavoured piece called One App to Rule Them All.
The app, according to Kincaid, "looks good". "It looks like Facebook. And it’s going to be the iPad’s most downloaded app of all time in, oh, about two days...The app features a slick navigation menu on the left side of the screen, which lets you quickly jump to features like News Feed, Messages, your Groups, and the other places you commonly access on Facebook. The remainder of the app ties together the features you’d expect from Facebook’s mobile experience (like Check-ins) with the features you find on the desktop, like a Chat bar that’s presented alongside the News Feed"
Mashable's story, which later appeared on the SMH under the headline, "Facebook hits iPad: time wasting just got easier", notes that the app " is launching with surprisingly little fanfare, given the anticipation of the app’s launch and the multitude of leaks and speculation surrounding it."
Indeed to Grok, there of a fair sense of "more in sadness than in anger" about the whole announcement, which leads us to believe those very long winded negotiations where more unpleasant and unyielding than anyone cares to discuss.
There Can Be Only One and neither Facebook nor Apple seems inclined to give the other a leg up.
What an adolescent industry we remain. Speaking of which...
Blogger goes blendr’ing
Facebook wasn’t the only long anticipated app being pitched yesterday. The developers of grindr — an iPhone app for the gay and lesbian community that News.com.au somewhat presumptuously called a casual sex app — released blendr, an evolution of the grindr platform, but designed for a wider audience. The article describes blendr as more of a social networking and dating app. Apparently straight people don't have casual sex, they network.
Actually blendr has been available overseas for about a month but the story got fresh impetus courtesy of local launch yesterday.
Paid dating sites like Fairfax Media's RSVP have the most to lose from developments like blendr. That’s because dating websites sell trust, or at least the vague promise that if the guy at the end of the wire really is an axe murderer, then the police can start with his credit card if they need to find the body.
blendr matches the dating sites on that score, and maybe even does a little better when you chuck in location-based services.
For online business model wonks, this will actually be an interesting little side story.
Twitter tattle
One of the best things about being a journalist is that even when you stuff up, it's someone else's fault. Which brings us to flu season on Twitter, or virus season at least. The latest, is a nasty bit of malware that sends the following message.
“I saw a real bad blog about you, you seen this?” There’s a link attached, which for obvious reasons we won’t include. That’s because if you click the link from within Twitter it sends the message on to all the people you follow. Frictionless sharing anyone?
Now, when you get paid to write crummy things about people for a living, frankly that's a pretty plausible tweet. So, yes, we clicked, and you clacked. My bad.
Here’s the instructions http://ow.ly/6TqOr on what to do if you have already caught the sniffle.
Andrew Birmingham is the CEO of Silicon Gully Investments. Follow him on Twitter if you dare @ag_birmingham, but be aware that the Chinese mafia got there first.