Dave Winer looks at how Facebook is opening up, allowing bits of data from its social network to be freed via RSS feeds. Such feeds bypass traditional walls that are put up around these closed social networks, and give users freedom to integrate their information and networks with the internet as a whole.
“According to convention wisdom, Facebook was, until today, considered a sandbox, a walled garden, a silo. Now that we know that the feeds are being implemented (many are still needed to make it really open) it’s possible for Facebook-generated data to percolate into other Internet applications.”