The New Facebook API: Graph Search

Users of Facebook will soon have a new search tool at their disposal: Graph Search feature will let those on Facebook go through photos, people, places, and business pages. You will be soon able to ask questions like: “What are the sushi restaurants that my friends like in Kaslik?”

Apparently, what people search for the most on Facebook are people, brands and business pages. Graph Search is different in the sense that it improves results by putting together diverse elements.

After the Facebook’s statement that it would make it easier to source for data and photos, worries were raised concerning privacy. The company made sure to address those worries, saying that Graph Search will respect privacy settings. People won’t be able to look for those who have blocked them; they will be able to look up information and photos that have been shared with them.

Zuckerberg wants people to use Facebook in order to discover places where they could go eat, or things that they could go do and have been working in-house on this API for the last couple of years. It is now available for some English speaking users in beta version.

For him, this new feature will form the “Third Pillar” of the ecosystem, after the being able to see what’s going around in the News Feed and what’s going on in ones’ life on the Timeline.

Some people have raised other concerns. Graph Search could be used for less noble reasons. For example one could look up: “People who like child pornography” and do whatever with this information.

How will you be using Graph Search when it goes public?