Important Notice for Clients Using Convio Facebook Connect Integration

Cynthia Balusek

Because of the recent changes that Facebook made to their product strategy regarding the changes to Facebook Connect, Convio has decided to discontinue support for the current Facebook Connect Integration within Convio – effective in the Summer 2010 release.

Instead, we have partnered with Gigya to power our latest Social Sharing and Open Authentication features (available in the Summer 2010 release). These new features are a significant upgrade from the existing Facebook Connect integration in that they provide an efficient way to integrate not only Facebook but Twitter, LinkedIn, MySpace, Yahoo! and other social media; they enable both tell-a-friend and login functionality; and they provide integrated reporting.

Convio is strategically committed to socializing our platform.  With this change we have elected to pursue a strategy that allows our clients to connect and participate with MANY social media sites instead of just one.

If you are currently using Facebook Connect on your Convio hosted sites for sharing or site login, please review our new Social Sharing and Open Authentication features (below).

As always, please contact Convio support with any questions.

Please review the short FAQ below for more information.

What Is the Product Impact?

-          The configuration menus for Facebook Connect will be removed from the administrative console.

-          Anywhere a Facebook Connect component has been placed on your site will disappear once you are upgraded to the Summer 2010 release.

-          The Facebook Application Integration remains unaffected at this time.

-          Within the TeamRaiser Participant Center, Social Sharing components will automatically appear by default once Social Sharing is enabled.

Why are Social Sharing / Open Authentication better?

-          Social Sharing allows your users to share to not only Facebook but Twitter, LinkedIn, MySpace, Yahoo!. Social Sharing also includes the existing Tell-A-Friend functionality.

-          Open Authentication allows your users to login using not only Facebook but Twitter, LinkedIn, MySpace, Yahoo!, Google, AOL.

-          Both solutions include integrated reporting.

-          Both solutions are provided via Gigya which allows you to standardize on one Gigya API key instead of having to maintain multiple API keys for each social media site.

Where can I learn more about Gigya, Social Sharing and Open Authentication?

-          Gigya: www.gigya.com

-          Social Sharing: http://community.customer.convio.com/docs/DOC-2844

-          Open Authentication: http://community.customer.convio.com/docs/DOC-2841