As I mentioned in a previous post, online identity is emerging as a powerful trend which is reducing the dominance of the top-level domain in the Web browsing experience. Social sites like Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, and a legion of others create a Web experience which centers around the user rather than some www.top_level_domain.com. Additionally, innovations such as OAuth and Facebook Connect allow a user to log into multiple services using the same credentials – the beginnings of a true Web identity.

Problem is, there is such a multitude of competing services, each having something unique which sets it apart from the others. Nobody has every cool feature, not even the mighty Facebook. How can you take advantage of all the cool stuff without fragmenting your identity so badly that you lose track of the pieces? No one has managed to solve that problem perfectly so far, but FriendFeed is trying. FriendFeed is a social network aggregator which allows you to plug in about 50 of the most popular social networks, then view and post to them from one interface. It's quite an ambitious project, but it works surprisingly well once you invest the time and effort it takes to set up.

However, due to the complex nature of what FriendFeed does, the setup process can be hella confusing. With so many options it is bound to be. I found out the hard way that enabling certain options can lead to double, triple, or even quadruple-posting, depending on how you have set up some of your individual social networks. For instance, I had installed the Twitter Facebook app that pushes your tweets into your Facebook Status updates. And I set up Posterous to push into Twitter and Facebook. Oops! Now I'm inadvertently link-spamming my Facebook friends and Twitter followers. Debugging such mistakes can be confusing for a newbie like me. To make it even more confusing, Friend Feed has its own Twitter push options:

Yeah, I know! Imagine if I plugged in every possible service! I'm still not entirely sure if I have it worked out properly yet, so if I link-spam you, please be patient and don't get mad. I'm working on it.

One of the coolest features of the FriendFeed Home Page is that it updates in real-time. You don't have to hit the refresh button to see what's new like you do with Twitter's or Facebook's Home Page. Another cool FriendFeed feature is that you can plug it into the Gmail Chat widget (you have to enable chat in Gmail Settiings). Once you do that, your FriendFeed updates will appear in the Gmail chatbox. You pan post your own updates in the chatbox too. If your online activities revolve around Gmail like mine do, this is a very handy option.

FriendFeed Settings:

Gmail Chatbox with FriendFeed stream: