Uniting online social networks with places and things

As the Web of Things (WoT) broadens real world interaction via the internet, there is an increasing need for a user centric model for managing and interacting with real world objects. We believe that online social networks can provide that capability and can enhance existing and future WoT platforms leading to a Social WoT. As both social overlays and user interface containers, online social networks (OSNs) will play a significant role in the evolution of the web of things. As user interface containers and social overlays, they can be used by end users and applications as an on-line entry point for interacting with things, both receiving updates from sensors and controlling things. Conversely, access to user identity and profile information, content and social graphs can be useful in physical social settings like cafés. In this paper we describe some of the key features of social networks used by existing social WoT systems. We follow this with a discussion of open research questions related to integration of OSNs and how OSNs may evolve to be more suitable for integration with places and things. Several ongoing projects in our lab leverage OSNs to connect places and things to online communities.