Facebook Feature Request: Event Search to Honour ‘center’ and ‘distance’ Parameters

Posted on in api, facebook

For quite a while now one feature I’ve felt was missing from the Facebook Graph API was searching for events by latitude and longitude along with a distance. You can currently issue a search for place objects, but the place object is the only one which honours the center and distance parameters.

I’ve filed a bug report for the feature request for Facebook to implement this and we’ll see how that progresses. If you would like to add your notes to the feature request or show your support you can do so at https://developers.facebook.com/bugs/288653361182652.

Activate Facebook Timeline for Your Profile

Posted on in facebook, timeline

If you would like to active Facebook’s new timeline feature for your own profile page, then you can activate it by visiting http://www.facebook.com/about/timeline/.

Set Your Facebook Username

Posted on in facebook

One of the most often asked questions for me when it comes to Facebook is how administrators of pages and profiles can set usernames. In the past, Facebook haven’t really pushed this feature but in the age where social marketing and name based branding is becoming more important – setting your username is a bonus point when it comes to promoting your brand.

You can set your Facebook username at the following URL:

http://www.facebook.com/username/

How to Report IP or Copyright Infringements on Facebook

Posted on in facebook

One task I had to recently complete was cleaning up the Facebook ecosystem for a particular business. Around Facebook there were a few groups, profiles and pages purporting to be the business which needed removing. There are two types of infringement that you can report to Facebook and get actioned, explained below.

 

Copyrighted Works

For copyrighted works, such as music, movies or images you can have them removed via the Facebook automated DCMA removal form.

 

Intellectual Property

If you are the legitimate representative of a business you can ask Facebook to remove any unofficial pages, groups or profiles which are purporting to be you. You need to complete the Facebook non-copyright removal form.

Platform vs Web Site

Posted on in amazon, api, facebook, google, modern web, platform, twitter

Over the past six years we’ve seen major developments around the world in online services and computing. Traditional web sites such as Google, Amazon and eBay have now transformed into multinational platforms offering more than just a site to use. All of the services I’ve just named still provide their main web site, but isn’t it about time we started referring to them as platforms rather than sites. In my opinion, it is.

You can do so much more than simply search with Google or buy with Amazon and eBay. I don’t see the naming and references changing any time soon, but this is a thought I’d like to see come to fruition. The traditional roots of each of these large platforms can never be forgotten but through their own research, development and improvements they’re providing excellent services for the rest of the world to use.

In the more recent history, Twitter and Facebook have provided platforms for people to develop with which in turn created a boom for both enterprises. Its nice to see Facebook referring to their infrastructure and service as a platform, rather than a site. Perhaps others can follow suit, but I doubt it.

Awesome Error Message

Posted on in error, facebook, facebook lite, failware

image

Interesting Facebook Debug Console

Posted on in debug, facebook, facebook lite

Not too sure if I’m supposed to see this. To view this, goto Facebook Lite, and scroll to the footer, right most link (looks like an asterisk). You can see larger versions here and here.

FB Debug

FB Debug

Update, this only seems to be visible at http://lite.facebook.com/settings/