Microsoft's deep-rooted Vine isn't just another social network

Let's get something clear up front: Whatever you've heard elsewhere, Microsoft doesn't intend for their Vine service to take over your Twitter or your Facebook or your texting or any of your other social networking tools. They've got bigger fish to fry.

Back in 2005, as we watched Hurricane Katrina upend our faith in America's emergency response system, some Microsoft folk started asking what software development might bring to the table in future crises. Tammy Savage, general manager for Microsoft's public safety initiatives, says that the original Vine team spent a lot of time thinking about "all aspects of crisis, from preparation to recovery -- all kinds of organizations, asking what Microsoft might uniquely be able to provide."

Note the word "uniquely," which would let out Twitter-replacement and the like. So is Vine an aggregator, combining a bunch of data streams in the way Facebook can include Twitter or Trillian combines all your instant messaging? Again, think unique, think bigger, and think about the company involved.

How large is your social network, anyway? Here's the answer: Smaller than Microsoft's, if you regard all the constituencies they touch as constituencies to which they are networked. Though, as Savage puts it, "we didn't go in with the assumption we can help," scrutiny of the organizations and entities involved in a disaster ("first responders, emergency management, humanitarian organizations, critical infrastructure, consumers..." and Savage's list went on) showed the Vine team a role they might undertake and "a sustainable investment" in filling it.

And so the Vine aggregation picture starts to become clearer -- Twitter and Facebook and instant messaging and text and e-mail and local news and weather data and... well, let's give Microsoft some air to figure that out. Right now, the project is entering what Savage refers to as "an old-fashioned" (private, access-controlled) beta, with approximately 10,000 participants drawn mainly for now from the Seattle area. Those participants include the City of Seattle, Boeing, Microsoft itself, national service organizations, neighborhood watch groups, Americorps, volunteer coaches, fire departments, and so on.

So it's also not the Emergency Broadcast System, which has also already been invented. "There are a lot of top-down alerts" out there, Savage notes. "This is a complement to that. Information from sources we trust isn't always top-down information." Your spouse, for instance, doesn't have the information one could get from the local traffic cameras, but s/he is the world's leading authority on whether s/he is running late for dinner, and Vine can adapt accordingly.

The service has three components. The dashboard -- the main interface -- is map-based and culls location-specific information from over 20,000 news and official information sources. Your main contacts appear there too when they post something or otherwise update their status.

Beyond the dashboard, there are alerts and reports, both of which can go out to individuals or, more usefully, contacts you're grouped together (e.g., The Neighbors, My Students, Family). Reports are sent dashboard-to-dashboard, while alerts can be sent to any device the recipient chooses, so you don't have to remember that Mom prefers text messages while your boss would rather get an IM in a crisis, and by Vine application, text or e-mail.

Now about crises, which is how this conversation started. For every individual in each of your groups, there's not only a different set of information sources with which one would want to keep in touch, but quite likely a different set of situations that would constitute a crisis. For instance, the chief of police probably doesn't care that your kids' usual soccer practice field is too muddy to use this evening, and your Facebook pals don't all need to know that you're heading out of town and need a neighbor to keep an eye on the house.

Vine can handle those variations, which is where some of the confusion over social networking comes in. In fact, variations are sort of the point. You may be someone who groups your IMs and Twitters and so forth for ease of perusal, but in an emergency, ease becomes a ruthless push to prioritize. Though no one will discourage you from trying, using Vine as currently conceived to simply ride herd on an unruly friends list seems a bit like taking an Uzi to a knife fight.

Or maybe not. For now, Microsoft doesn't have all the answers about how people will use Vine. Though Savage has some nice examples of using alerts in ordinary sub-critical situations, there's a lot to discover about real-world use as situations rise and fall. "Right now we're focused on listening," says Savage, explaining how the beta period will operate -- not open to just anyone, but if you've got an invite of your own, you can invite others. (Very, um, social.)

As the system develops, there will be myriad tech problems to address -- especially, considering its public emergency emphasis, the problem of staying connected if all hell really is breaking loose. Though the beta currently requires broadband, Windows, and a Live ID account, that won't always be the case, Savage says. Of equal significance is Vine's need to not rely entirely on Internet connectivity. "The product roadmap takes into account that some communications systems won't work," says Savage. "Internet, mesh networks, peer-to-peer, satellite mobile phones, landlines, SMS -- we need to create a system that's smart and inclusive."

Testing is expected to build out to other locations soon, and the site is taking signups for beta invitations. Pricing's uncertain, though as Savage points out, there's almost always concern with a project this big about "what the business looks like."

[Photo credit: Microsoft Corp.]