Problems

Right now, your buddy list is represented in groups. When you get above a certain number of contacts, it becomes difficult to find people, and there's no way currently to represent your relationship to the contacts or names in your buddy list.

How do we enter all this data?
Where does the data come from? Can we aggregate existing social networking service data?

Existing Sources of Data

Various service buddy lists
Chat services (Skype, Jabber)
Social networking sites (MySpace, Friendster, LinkedIn, FaceBook)
Address books
FOAF or OPML
Gaming clans or Second Life
Contact frequency (SMS, call, IM)
Blogroll, XFN

Buddy Representation

Full-screen representation of buddy list sorted by relationship - because the sidebar buddy list doesn't show enough
tree with you in the center with your buddies clustered by group/relationship
location-based grouping by graph instead of group
Temporal representation based on usage pattern
Search-based, quick-threaded (Spotlight-like text-based filter)
Folded identity (joe@yahoo is the same as joe@aim).

Possible Solutions

Quicksilver plugin to search buddy list
Adium plugin
Web UI based on existing buddy list service (AIM Pages has a buddy list service)
Dartboard-like representation of tags.
Spotlight for people, based on previous conversations, tags, etc.

Today's problem

There's a topic that you've chatted about in the past. You want to find out which buddies you chatted with about that topic. How can you find those people? Are they online?

Today's solution

limit scope to one buddy service (AIM)
index keywords in the AIM chat log. record the buddy screennames and the number of occurrences of keywords for each
build a ui that shows all of your buddies around a circle with a keyword search box in the center. buddies gravitate toward the center as you enter keywords.

Existing Services

AIM Presence API: http://developer.aim.com/faq.jsp#presence
AIM Pages Buddy List: http://www.aimcreate.com/.resource/bl (you have to be logged in @ aimcreate.com) returns your buddy list.
AIM Minipic: http://www.aimpages.com/SCREENAME/.aim/aimface.40.jpg

MashPit -- Co-op Hackathon

BuddyListRelationships