It was first reported by BusinessWeek today, that as part of their step-on-the-gas hiring spree, Facebook has landed one of the most prominent figures in the Open Web movement, David Recordon. David confirmed the report, first via Twitter (after receiving a few congratulations from key players on the Facebook Connect platform team, including Dave Morin and Josh Elman) — and later via a blogpost.
I think this is great news for the emerging Social Web, as this now gives David a chance to cross-pollinate between the grass-roots open-spec world of OpenID, OAuth, Portable Contacts, and the rest of the Open Stack and the mainstream, rapidly growing Facebook platform that is serving over 300 million active users and countless thousands of developers of all sizes.
I hope and believe we can continue to count on David to be a passionate and clear-headed voice on behalf of user rights and the Open Web. And I can’t wait for the next episode of The Social Web TV, where David joins me, Joseph Smarr, and Chris Messina on a frequent basis, to make sense of the evolution toward a more open and interoperable Web.
[Update: gotta love Chris Messina’s post on this!]
The Real McCrea 