There's just something about gossip that gets people's tongues wagging. So when I ran across two social network-related rumors this morning, I had to do something about it. Obviously, the first thing that came to mind was "spread the news!"

First up, an article in the Wall Street Journal is reporting that Bill Gates has stopped using Facebook. Gasp! Does this mean that Facebook and Bill Gates are... "no longer in a relationship"??? Turns out ol' Bill was spending a half an hour every day on the site, but eventually grew tired of accepting all the friend requests he was getting (up to 8000 a day apparently). Gee, I never knew he was such a popular guy.

The other interesting tidbit of non-authenticated-information floating around the internet today, is that social networking site Bebo definitely may have been acquired by Google for $1 Billion. Of course, there's nothing to substantiate this story besides a "reliable source" who claims it has "definitely happened", but that's what makes it such a great rumor. It's what we don't know that makes us curious after all.

Ok, that's probably enough dirt on the dirt. Everyone get back to work.

In a bid to regain some respect in the ever-fickle web development community, MySpace is about to launch their developer platform. Why should anyone care? Because despite all the hype around FaceBook and its platform, MySpace is still the most popular social networking site on the web by a long shot, that's why.

Of some significance, the MySpace platform is said to be compatible with OpenSocial, Google's social networking developer platform (yes, they have one too). OpenSocial is also supported by Bebo and SixApart, so it seems there's a bit of a cartel forming to compete with FaceBook.

Apparently these platforms are great ways for developers to make money. How exactly? By plastering their embedded applications with ads and/or PayPal donation buttons, or alternatively by selling the "pro" versions of their applications for some coin. It's a win-win scenario I guess: Users get some added functionality and developers get some revenue. Too bad I just removed all my 3rd party apps due to privacy-invasion fears.

Seems like every startup these days is launching a new product or service with "social networking" features. And predictably, every old-school web property is either retooling their current offering (or acquiring another company) to provide similar features and functionality. So what gives? Why has everything suddenly become so... social? And more importantly, what does it mean for us as a species?

In the old days of the Web, one of the key selling points of this great new technology called the Internet was anonymity. For the first time ever, you could get access to, what seemed at the time like, an unlimited amount of information, without anyone else knowing what you were up to. Initially, this basically meant two things: porn and bomb-making. At least, that's what my peers were really excited about back in '94. But things really exploded when e-commerce came along and suddenly you could buy virtually anything anonymously, including everything from clothing (lingerie) to hardware (sex toys), to books (porn) and movies (more porn). Oh, and of course you could finally complete your childhood collection of ultra-rare Star Wars action figures. Life was wonderful back then, and none of your family, friends, or colleagues had to know about it.

In a classic case of "Oops, we didn't think of that!" the fine folks at Facebook have had to do some major back-peddling in response to a huge backlash that resulted shortly after releasing their Beacon ad platform. Because of the way Beacon announces purchases made on participating e-com sites in the Facebook news timeline, friends and family were having their surprises spoilt by this innovative social-advertising model. Imagine logging into your Facebook account and seeing an update that your girlfriend/husband/mom/etc. had just bought a new digital camera at Best Buy - the same one you had hinted at wanting for Xmas. Doh!! Not surprisingly, the public outcry has resulted in a plague-like retreat from the Beacon offering by major advertisers.

Facebook CEO and founder Mark Zuckerberg posted a humble blog entry explaining the screw-up to his user base in response. Hopefully he won't lose too many users as a result of this gaff. As has been mentioned many times before, Social Networks are extremely vulnerable to mass-desertion/defection if users deem them to be not cool, or even worse, untrustworthy. Lessons learned, to be sure.

Yesterday Facebook announced a new and ambitious platform called Facebook Ads to leverage the social network to become an ad network in and of itself with tentacles that reach out beyond their own site.