Facebook wants to become like Windows (an Internet version) by allowing new partners access to their 23 million registered users. In a press conference Thursday Facebook revealed their new strategy, which will kick-off by giving the users the possibility of uploading and share videos. This to compete against YouTube off course, one of Google’s latest acquisitions.

However, the second big news might be even more exciting. Mark Zuckerberg (CEO - Facebook) compares his new strategy with Microsoft’s in the last part of the 80’s.

Zuckerberg announced, like the rumours had said, a new strategy that will allow other companies to reach the users using their own applications served through the Facebook system (web).

It’s a very ambitious goal and is somewhat opposite of the way we are used to explore the Internet. Rather than jumping from one site to another Zuckerberg believes that the users (you and me) wants as many services gathered on the same service - which is Facebook off course.

So far the social networks have been closed platforms, but this is now coming to an end apparently.

Facebook has already recruited 65 software companies that wishes to add their applications/services to Facebook. Among the most known is Amazon who wants the users to write book reviews that will appear simultaneously on Facbook and Amazon.

Google continues to acquire the most popular companies on the web. In the past they’ve got Blogger and YouTube and most recently the RSS management company Feedburner.

Feedburner is in the closing stages of being acquired by Google for around $100 million. The deal is all cash and mostly upfront, according to our source, although the founders will be locked in for a couple of years.

So who’s next? If they had the possibility they would probably go after Facebook. Then again according to recent development it doesn’t sound like Mark over at Facebook is looking to sell out just yet. I’ll write a follow-up on this shortly. My bet would be a rising company in the top 500 sites ranked by Alexa, as I’m sure Google wont stop yet.

All these acquisitions kind of reminds me of another big company striving to keep their world domination (monopoly) - or is that just me…

The Top Ten Design Mistakes

Summary:
Blogs are often too internally focused and ignore key usability issues, making it hard for new readers to understand the site and trust the author.

To reach new readers and respect your existing readers’ time constraints, test your weblog (blog) against the following usability problems.

Does what happen in the Facebook stay in the Facebook? When you post something on your own website does it stay there? Watch this presentation of what happens with your personal info when you create a profile on Facebook (according to the author(s)).

Conclusion

Whatever you don’t want people to know about you or people you know - don’t put it on the Internet. Simple as that…

I suppose a lot of you saw that the magic numbers for decrypting/decoding HD-DVD’s on Linux got dug to the front page of Digg.com yesterday. Later the same day the link/post got removed (on demand from MPAA I believe). This of course triggered a storm of mirror’s from thousands of digger’s, and as far as I can tell the code is still on the front page.

Not only did Digg suffer from the massive numbers of visitors (actually the site went down for the first time) but they somewhat violated their own mission statement;

Digg is all about user powered content. Everything is submitted and voted on by the Digg community. Share, discover, bookmark, and promote stuff that’s important to you!

By deleting links/posts they’re censoring user powered content that they (or some powerful organization) don’t see fit, which in my opinion makes Digg a less desirable site to visit. The removed information is still available all over the Internet and I don’t think Google has removed any of their links yet…

Update: Digg listened to their community and made a very promising turn today. Read all about it in their blog.