Insider Chatter by Donna Bogatin

Marc Andreessen is but the latest Internet veteran to laud 23 year-old Mark Zuckerberg for ”amazing” Facebook leadership that has accomplished “one of the most sigfnificant milestones in the technology industry in this decade.”

A sandal-clad Zuckerberg was feted as the “prince” of social networking when he unveiled Facebook8 in San Francisco to an eagerly awaiting Web world last month; Only ”three weeks in” and Facebook is now crowned for the “dramatic leap forward” it has bestowed upon the Internet industry.

Andreessen is effusive, “metaphorically”:

Facebook is providing the ease and user attraction of MySpace-style embedding, coupled with the kind of integration you see with Firefox extensions, with the added rocket fuel of automated viral distribution to a huge number of potential users, and the prospect of keeping 100% of any revenue your application can generate.

So Facebook8 promised, AND delivered? Not so fast.

Whille Andreessen marvels over the ingeniousness of F8, he nonetheless acknowledges that not all is rosy for all in Facebook developer land.

There is, most notably for Andreessen, the “success kills” scenario experienced by iLike, reported to have attracted more than 6 million Facebookers. Not surprisingly, the small start-up was not adequately prepared with infrastrucure sufficient to support a huge spike in activity. iLike now scrambles to meet the Facebook spurred demand.

Unfortunately for legions of would be Facebook8 applications, however, “obscurity kills,” may be the literal scenario, rather than a figurative ”success kills.”

Andreessen on fighting for face time on the Facebook Application Directlory:

When you develop a new Facebook application, you submit it to the directory and someone at Facebook Inc. approves it, or not. If your application is not approved for any reason, or if its just taking too long, you apparently have the option of letting your application go out “underground”. This means that you need to start your application’s proliferation some other way than listing it in the directory, by promoting it somewhere else on the web, or getting your friends to use it. But then it can apparently proliferate virally across Facebook just like an approved application. There is already long list of underground apps that you can use, and proliferate.

Andreessen muses: “It will be fascinating to see how Facebook deals with this, will they embrace underground apps, or move to shut them down? The answer will go a long way towards understanding the true level of freedom that developers have on the Facebook Platform.”

BUT, an understanding of who really controls the Facebook Platform can already be had, simply by reading the F8 Terms of Service, as I highlight in Is Facebook Playing DMCA Games?.

We may at any time, and over any given period of time, limit the number of Calls any Facebook Platform Application may send to the Facebook Platform, or prohibit any Facebook Platform Application from sending Calls to the Facebook Platform, as we deem appropriate in our sole discretion.

We reserve the right to charge a fee for using the facebook platform and/or any individual features therof at any time in our sole discretion.

The moral of the Facebook F8 story?

Just as Google SEO: Don’t Stake Your Business On It, Facebook F8 developers, beware.

CONTACT DONNA BOGATIN