For the last 3 weeks I've been tackling Flex4, trying to build a webcam chatroom to awaken one of my dormant social networks.

The idea is that the chatroom will be free to use, easy to access and should incentivise visitors to keep returning and to eventually join the network.

Free? Because you can't build a brand on the web without a following!

I came up with the idea that this application should run in a dual-instance - firstly it should be accessible from the main site by the same usual mechanism (a link), but it should also run as an application in facebook.

Why Facebook?

I'm not going to lie, I fully expect more of the chatroom users to come from facebook than from the main site, but is this such a bad thing? - after all, it provides powerful social mechanisms such as;

• awareness - automatic posting on the wall (after being given permission, of course)
• user-endorsed recommendations - the user can refer friends for extra features
• user details - it helps us lower the barrier for registration by using the user's details

Two instances of the same application, both with a registration form to the main social network, one to be enhanced by Facebook.

I'm a strong believer of requesting action from a user only up until the last possible opportunity - this way you can fully engage the visitor, total reward, with no commitment of effort on their part - so we're going to keep this concept in mind when building the application.

So there's the challenge and that's what I'll be blogging about for the next few posts.

chris.