Facebook

A few days ago Facebook announced their new Open Graph Protocol.

It’s basically a way for people to interact with pages on the internet (in theory pages representing real world items, but it will be hard to moderate) in basically the same way as they do with existing Facebook pages. For a page to be eligible all you need to do is add a few meta tags to it specifying its  name and type (film, book, actor, product, game etc.). To actually do anything useful, you then add a Facebook “like” button. Once some people have liked it, it appears in their Facebook news feed like any other item (with the data you added in the meta tags).

One of the optional meta tags you can add specifies user IDs of Facebook users who can administrate the page. If you do, you can get access to the same sort of admin page you get with any traditional Facebook page. Conveniently I just developed a use for this sort of thing so I added support to my blog. A few edits to the theme and cunning use of Wordpress’s custom fields and now any page or post on my site can support Open Graph.

Currently the only support is on the Gravitas page.

Anytime Pool for iPhone (and iPod touch) is now available on the app store outside America. A quick marketing blurb:

Now you can play Pool against your Facebook friends anytime you like. Anytime Pool is the first social game to allow you to play no matter whether you are sat at your PC or out and about on your iPhone, iPod Touch or mobile phone.

Not only does Anytime Pool have an incredible and robust multiplayer game, but you can also take part in a single player game against 14 cool characters in 5 exotic locations, from the UK and USA to the Philippines to China.

• International Version.
• US Version.

The latest update to Anytime Pool on Facebook is here. Anytime Pool is a cool Flash game I was involved in making on Facebook that lets you play pool against your friends. Changes and new features in the latest version include:

• Chat mode is back. People asked for it’s return almost from the moment it was taken out. Can be disabled and can also be limited to ‘friends only’.
• Practice mode. Perfect those tricky shots or just hit the ball around.
• Power remembered between shots. A time saver everywhere, but mainly for shaving those last couple of seconds off your weekly challenge times.
• Improved ‘ball in hand’. Moving the white around the table no longer feels like a wrestling match.

I just thought I’d announce a game that I’m involved with at Distinctive Developments called Anytime Pool has just relaunched.

It’s a flash based pool game that lets you play against your Facebook friends. There is a also a mobile version (to be released soon) that includes a full single player game as well as the social play through Facebook. Have fun.