Section: New Software and Platforms

SocialBus

Universal Social Network Bus

Keywords: Middleware - Interoperability - Social networks - Software Oriented Service (SOA)

Functional Description: Online social network services (OSNSs) have become an integral part of our daily lives. At the same time, the aggressive market competition has led to the emergence of multiple competing siloed OSNSs that cannot interoperate. As a consequence, people face the burden of creating and managing multiple OSNS accounts and learning how to use them, to stay connected. The goal of the Universal Social Network Bus (USNB) is to relieve users from such a burden, letting them use their favorite applications to communicate.

Social Entities. Social entities can be humans or systems. They can create a profile in the USNB and link it with their OSNSs identities. Social entities can also choose the OSNS identity they want to use when contacted through the USNB or specify one or more OSNS identities for message reception concerning specific events or senders.

Personae. Personae are USNB entities interacting with users within concrete OSNSs or systems, achieving interoperability between heterogeneous OSNSs. New personae can be developed, registered in the USNB, discovered and used to include additional OSNSs.

Privacy & Security. The USNB is designed to be as less intrusive as possible. It does not ask users their credentials nor any kind of authorization concerning their OSNS accounts.

• Authors: Rafael Angarita Arocha, Nikolaos Georgantas and Valérie Issarny

• Contact: Valérie Issarny

• URL: https://gitlab.inria.fr/usnb/universal-social-network-bus