[uf-discuss] Proposal: Mandatory connection of a XFN to a"source" hCard and a "target" hCard

[Paul Downey]

Hi Roger!

>  I too am a big fan of "separation of concerns."  However, if there is
>  no way for a robot application to determine in some automated way "who"
>  is "friends with" xxx then the separation of concerns buys me nothing.

So it might be nice if Flickr pointed to profile pages,
which publish hCard identifying the links, e.g:

"""
<a href="/photos/24172116 at N08/" rel="me">&larr; Photos</a>
"""

> I'm afraid that URL doesn't do much for me in terms of understanding
>  who that person is.

You know, I don't think link to a vcard is going to help here.
Google's social graph search:

http://socialgraph-resources.googlecode.com/svn/trunk/samples/findcontacts.html?q=http%3A%2F%2Fflickr.com%2Fphotos%2F24172116%40N08%2F

tells me:

"""
Contacts you link to
People who link to you as a contact
to  flickr.com/photos/24172116 at N08/

  flickr.com/photos/fiveandlime/ contact
  flickr.com/photos/tantek/ contact
  flickr.com/photos/twatson/ contact
"""

Which is better, IMO, than it saying "Keir", "Tantek", "Tom"
because ultimately whilst flickr.com/photos/tantek/ might claim
to be Tantek, how I come to trust it's The Tantek
is far more subtle and complex than any amount
of metacrap in a hCard.

Paul
-- 
http://blog.whatfettle.com