When Google announced that its new social-networking initiative would extend to any site that wanted to participate, the land grab for the social web's attention became a whole lot more intense.
In a move that was anticipated for weeks, Google has unveiled a set of application program interfaces (APIs) that allow third-party programmers to build widgets that take advantage of personal data and profile connections on a social-networking site. But instead of limiting the project to its own social-networking property, Orkut, Google has invited other sites along for the ride — including LinkedIn, hi5, Plaxo, Ning, and Friendster.
The initiative, appropriately, is called "OpenSocial". It's a clear contrast to Facebook, the social-networking site that became the talk of the tech world when it announced the opening of its developer platform in May but has kept developer activity restricted to its own service (and has since signed an exclusive ad deal with Microsoft in exchange for an equity investment, probably snubbing Google in the process). When other social networks began to announce their own "platform strategies" this autumn, concerns were raised that developers would have to create a completely new application for each site. That could prove inefficient and costly, especially for smaller developers working on a shoestring budget.
