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Facebook Goes Twitter With a Real-time Comment Widget

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In a move that looks and smells strangely like Twitter’s status feeds, Facebook has launched a new widget that may actually be better than Twitter’s status feeds. The new tool, the Live Stream Box, is intended for installation on any website, but particularly sites which are broadcasting a major event in real-time. According to Facebook’s Developer site, “The Live Stream Box works best when you are running a real-time event, like live streaming video for concerts, speeches, or webcasts, live Web chats, webinars, mass-multiplayer games, and more.” The Live Stream Box enables Facebook users to log in, post comments, check out friend’s comments about the event—all without leaving the website of the event that they are watching.

Facebook ran a successful test run of the program during Barack Obama’s inauguration. As Facebook’s Tom Whitnah blogged, “It was a significant moment for Facebook Platform. We realized how powerful it was to see what your friends were saying, not just on Facebook, but right in context on CNN.com.” And now that Facebook has seen how successful the program has been not only for a presidential inauguration, but also for a ball game, and an awards event, it’s time to roll it out to the general public.

The new widget is easy to use for website owners (check out Facebook’s Developer’s site to find out how to install it) and for Facebook users alike (just log in using Facebook Connect). Any input that users enter into the Live Stream Box will automatically show up as their Facebook status, and be shared with friends. Friends can then follow the link to the Live Stream Box themselves, or “like” what has been written.

Facebook’s Live Stream Box may just be a well-placed blow at a Twitter strategy, and by employing the widget on popular events, Facebook has defeinitely gained a huge advantage in real-time social networking.

Thursday, June 25th, 2009 at 5:07 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.