Facebook App?

[ktb53]

What's going on with the facebook app? Hope someone works on this soon.

[onethumb]

Originally Posted by ktb53

What's going on with the facebook app? Hope someone works on this soon.

So I just got a comment on my blog about this, too, so I'm very interested...

*However*, there's a big problem: SmugMug doesn't *have* a Facebook app. So I'm not sure what's going on with it - because it doesn't exist. :(

That being said, we're certainly open to building one. If we were to build one, what would you want it to do?

[Nimai]

I have no idea how feasible this is, but I would love to have tagging work.

Could people tag SmugMug photos just like they can tag themselves and their friends in the Facebook Albums?

Being able to buy prints from the Facebook app would be great too.

[PBolchover]

I've been using the "Big Smugmug" app for a long time - it still appears to be working.

There also appear to be apps called "My Photos from SmugMug", "My Smugmug Gallery" and "SmugFoto". Perhaps one of them has stopped working...

[ktb53]

I'm not a super facebook fanatic and I'm still getting the hang of things but I see all my friends posting their images and I would like a simple way to choose from my smugmug albums what photos I want to see on there, whether that is through a special tag, or something on the facebook app side I don't really care. I would be nice if the tagging that you put on your smugmug apps would "transfer" over to the facebook tagging but it's not a feature I use a lot.

Like another user said, there are like 4 (not very good) smugmug apps and I have yet to figure out one that works at all. I realize they are not made by you guys but you're not being represented well, especially when I hear a lot of people talking about flickr's solid facebook app. Viva Smugmug!

Originally Posted by onethumb

So I just got a comment on my blog about this, too, so I'm very interested...

*However*, there's a big problem: SmugMug doesn't *have* a Facebook app. So I'm not sure what's going on with it - because it doesn't exist. :(

That being said, we're certainly open to building one. If we were to build one, what would you want it to do?

[CSwinton]

Originally Posted by onethumb

So I just got a comment on my blog about this, too, so I'm very interested...

*However*, there's a big problem: SmugMug doesn't *have* a Facebook app. So I'm not sure what's going on with it - because it doesn't exist. :(

That being said, we're certainly open to building one. If we were to build one, what would you want it to do?

With the way Facebook is growing, having a solid SmugMug Facebook app. would be brilliant marketing for smugmug as well. Currently Flickr is the best integrated - with the code gurus that SM has it shouldn't be hard to make something competitive. ;)

[hyachts]

I'll pile on this request. I'm not huge into Facebook but a lot of people I know are, and are less likely to click through to my Smugmug site from my profile than they are to look at pics within Facebook. I'm loathe to put the pictures both places, so having a portal from one to the other would be ideal.

[marieboyer]

Agree completely with those hoping for a conduit between smugmug and Facebook.

[tomauto]

I am ready for a facebook app from smugmug! I've stopped posting photos on facebook (I used to use it as a blog of sorts for all my friends) It would be great for them to know that I actually am still taking pictures!

Make is happen!

[afarber]

I completely concur. I've been using My Smugmug Photos app on Facebook, but it seems to not allow me to update it. All that app does is display 4 galleries in the facebook profile, which when clicked link directly to the smugmug gallery. That would be fine. Another option would be that the photos would appear in Facebook. Not sure which is better, but more flexible and more stable are hugely important for this to be a success.

I can't imagine why SM wouldn't want to jump on this. It would be very much worth the effort, I believe.

Thanks!!

[jamesl]

Add me into the list!!! What I would LOVE would be a slideshow app, similar to the one that many use with the sm pages. Can't that slideshow be embedded anywhere? Any facebook code monkeys around who could embed that into a facebook app?

Here's what I did in leau of a smugmug option. I put my photos on www.ning.com, and created a facebook slideshow application there. They have instructions there for setting up a facebook app to show your photos. I setup this facebook app:

http://apps.facebook.com/langfordphotography/

Works pretty well, but doesn't auto start or loop like I would like, and it is not configurable.

James

[kerwien]

Glad to see this topic coming up. Let me describe my scenarios and provide a few detailed requirements.

Scenario: FB has rapidly become a key network tool for family, friends, and co-workers. The integration of news feed with applications, status updates, etc. has provided an ambiant and sticky appearance for habitual traffic. Translation: easy to see what people are up to. FB's photo features are nicely integrated. My main issue is that I want to use my SmugMug site for sharing photos and storage, not FB, so I need an easy way to share my SmugMug photo activity with my Facebook crowd. The current SM apps out there (there are only 3 from what I can, and one of them appears useless) really do not provide an adequate level of photo insight or customization that I already have on an SmugMug home page as a regular subscriber.

Requirements:

• Allow me to post a SmugMug app on the new wall page of my FB profile. (this is the new FB UI, not the old one)
• Allow me to share which Albums I want to appear in my App. The other SM apps do not provide the level of customization I'd like to see - they're either randomly appearing photos, album organized by category (who cares?), or a single custom profile photo (too limiting). I would like to see 2-4 albums minimum in the app, each using their assigned feature photo. Optional whether they display the photo album name.
• Add an entry to the FB news feed with SmugMug details such as "Craig created a new album called Flying Toads and added 23 photos." "Craig added 15 new photos to Blue Angels photo album."
• Optional: display a slideshow of the last 4 uploaded photos to an album(s).

Several Flickr apps have similar functionality listed above, so would love to see a well rounded and supported app for SM. This is essentially a new distribution mechanism for our photos that drives traffic back to our SM sites - good for everyone all around.

(I would be happy to help beta test such an app if that helps.)

Thanks for listening...!

- craig
kerwien.smugmug.com

[omonra21]

Originally Posted by kerwien

Glad to see this topic coming up. Let me describe my scenarios and provide a few detailed requirements.

Scenario: FB has rapidly become a key network tool for family, friends, and co-workers. The integration of news feed with applications, status updates, etc. has provided an ambiant and sticky appearance for habitual traffic. Translation: easy to see what people are up to. FB's photo features are nicely integrated. My main issue is that I want to use my SmugMug site for sharing photos and storage, not FB, so I need an easy way to share my SmugMug photo activity with my Facebook crowd. The current SM apps out there (there are only 3 from what I can, and one of them appears useless) really do not provide an adequate level of photo insight or customization that I already have on an SmugMug home page as a regular subscriber.

Requirements:

• Allow me to post a SmugMug app on the new wall page of my FB profile. (this is the new FB UI, not the old one)
• Allow me to share which Albums I want to appear in my App. The other SM apps do not provide the level of customization I'd like to see - they're either randomly appearing photos, album organized by category (who cares?), or a single custom profile photo (too limiting). I would like to see 2-4 albums minimum in the app, each using their assigned feature photo. Optional whether they display the photo album name.
• Add an entry to the FB news feed with SmugMug details such as "Craig created a new album called Flying Toads and added 23 photos." "Craig added 15 new photos to Blue Angels photo album."
• Optional: display a slideshow of the last 4 uploaded photos to an album(s).

Several Flickr apps have similar functionality listed above, so would love to see a well rounded and supported app for SM. This is essentially a new distribution mechanism for our photos that drives traffic back to our SM sites - good for everyone all around.

(I would be happy to help beta test such an app if that helps.)

Thanks for listening...!

- craig
kerwien.smugmug.com

+1 - Sounds great

[staceyeid]

Originally Posted by kerwien

Glad to see this topic coming up. Let me describe my scenarios and provide a few detailed requirements.

Scenario: FB has rapidly become a key network tool for family, friends, and co-workers. The integration of news feed with applications, status updates, etc. has provided an ambiant and sticky appearance for habitual traffic. Translation: easy to see what people are up to. FB's photo features are nicely integrated. My main issue is that I want to use my SmugMug site for sharing photos and storage, not FB, so I need an easy way to share my SmugMug photo activity with my Facebook crowd. The current SM apps out there (there are only 3 from what I can, and one of them appears useless) really do not provide an adequate level of photo insight or customization that I already have on an SmugMug home page as a regular subscriber.

Requirements:

• Allow me to post a SmugMug app on the new wall page of my FB profile. (this is the new FB UI, not the old one)
• Allow me to share which Albums I want to appear in my App. The other SM apps do not provide the level of customization I'd like to see - they're either randomly appearing photos, album organized by category (who cares?), or a single custom profile photo (too limiting). I would like to see 2-4 albums minimum in the app, each using their assigned feature photo. Optional whether they display the photo album name.
• Add an entry to the FB news feed with SmugMug details such as "Craig created a new album called Flying Toads and added 23 photos." "Craig added 15 new photos to Blue Angels photo album."
• Optional: display a slideshow of the last 4 uploaded photos to an album(s).

Several Flickr apps have similar functionality listed above, so would love to see a well rounded and supported app for SM. This is essentially a new distribution mechanism for our photos that drives traffic back to our SM sites - good for everyone all around.

(I would be happy to help beta test such an app if that helps.)

Thanks for listening...!

- craig
kerwien.smugmug.com

+2 - Would love to see a well integrated SM app on Facebook.

[hyachts]

Now that Facebook has built a pretty substantial non-college-student user base (read: people who might actually pay for a web service) I would think this would be a smart investment for SM. A smooth integration with Facebook could drive a lot of traffic to SmugMug. I know the head muckety-muck chimed in on this thread at the very beginning, but can anyone from SM comment on whether this is a "never", "maybe", "probably" or *gasp* "soon"?

I, for one, am getting tired of having people on Facebook tell me to post more photos when my SM site is linked in my profile.

[Ryanrk]

I would love to see a integrated facebook app. One where it places the photos maybe in the facebook image section. Just want one so my friends can see the pictures in there news feed.

[palak]

I want this too!

So i've tried almost all the facebook apps built by others (and no offense to the authors) but they never work correctly. i am an avid facebook user (i'm on it everyday, many days multiple times a day)

I'd want:
1. facebook "downloads" smugmug pictures so that smugmug is the only place i have to upload pics too.
2. The pics can be viewed through the facebook instead of a click through to smugmug.
3. i don't need various sizes or the functionality of smugmug. all i need is the pic captions transfering over. and you're more than welcome to add in some smugmug advertising on each page :)
4. comments should still work but they don't have to transfer back to smugmug (would be a nice v2 though)
5. Tagging has to work...that's important for this to be worth it. something simple like what facebook pic has now
6. lastly my friends shouldn't have to add the app to view the pics...this may be a more facebook thing but this really puts a hamper on useage.

so.....when we getting a working facebook app :)

P.S. I'm a product manager for a SaaS company so feel free to ask me for more detailed specing / use cases info if you need it.

Thanks,
Palak

[darryl]

Originally Posted by hyachts

I know the head muckety-muck chimed in on this thread at the very beginning, but can anyone from SM comment on whether this is a "never", "maybe", "probably" or *gasp* "soon"?

The head muckety-muck also posted this:

http://blogs.smugmug.com/don/2008/09...ocial-sorcerer

:-}

[encosion]

Originally Posted by CSwinton

With the way Facebook is growing, having a solid SmugMug Facebook app. would be brilliant marketing for smugmug as well. Currently Flickr is the best integrated - with the code gurus that SM has it shouldn't be hard to make something competitive. ;)

I second this motion... I'd be happy to volunteer my services on the spec'ing, wireframing and UI front if SmugMug were willing to commit some serious development time to building an app...

Alterntely, if SmugMug isn't interested, perhaps someone else here is? Please get in touch! The current Facebook App offerings fall short in a number of ways - flexibility, ease of use, reliability, etc...

[Andy]

Originally Posted by encosion

if SmugMug were willing to commit some serious development time to building an app...

We hired a full-time Social Sorcerer on 15 October and he's been doing nothing but this since then Stay tuned!