December 13, 2007
Facebook opens up its lead over Google
Has Google’s OpenSocial arrived too late to stop social networking sites joining the stampede of developers to Facebook’s platform?
Bebo, number one in the UK, Ireland and New Zealand and the number three social networking site in the US, says its Open Application Platform is a straight use of Facebook’s application programming interfaces, the advantage being that, with the minimum of effort, developers of thousands of applications for Facebook could now make them available on Bebo as well.
In an entry on its developer wiki, Facebook announced the next step in the opening up of its platform, which began in May when outside developers were allowed to introduce applications to its service.
“Facebook is now making its platform architecture available as a model for other social sites,” it said.
Michael Birch, chief executive of Bebo, said at the launch of the Open Application Platform that he still supported Google’s OpenSocial initiative for a shared platform architecture for social networking sites, announced last month. But he had also been talking to Facebook and his developers had been focused on making Bebo Facebook-compatible.
He insisted Bebo would get round to adopting OpenSocial, but it seems Facebook’s first-mover advantage has created a critical mass of support from developers that could diminish Google’s efforts.
Facebook is giving away a major advantage in allowing its rivals to mirror its arsenal of applications. This suggests it is both confident of its leadership in innovation and worried about the threat of Google amassing an axis of opposing social networking forces.
MySpace seems firmly in the Google camp, basing its new open platform, due in the New Year, on OpenSocial. But it will be interesting to see whether the smaller players review their commitment to OpenSocial now that Facebook has responded with this giveaway.
For users, the benefits of the new interoperability between Bebo and Facebook include them being able to interact and play with one another.
Bunchball announced its Games and Avatars application, allowing Bebo and Facebook members to play a range of games with one another, while Webs.com said its popular WarBook game would be available to play across the two networks.
