May 16, 2010

Replacement for Facebook?

I discovered an interesting project the other day where 4 software developers are embarking on a project this summer to develop an open source, distributed, privacy-aware social network. It sounds kind of like what Tor is for surfing this network is for socializing. In the video on the main page they complain that they don't want a central hub handling their messages to their friends.

It's an intriguing project and one that has attracted quite a few supporters. I know this because they launched a donation website where one can donate to their project and receive certain benefits. They said they need at least $10,000 to fund the development of the project: as of 12:00 PM UTC on Sunday May 16 they have 4,493 backers who donated a total of $168,730. I wonder what they'll do with the extra cash.

One wonders if this will seriously compete with Facebook's 350 million users or maybe it will get Facebook to fix their privacy policy which has gotten a beating recently. Time will tell with this.

Check out the project here.