updated
MySpace, the large social networking company, has joined the anti-Facebook coalition led by Google, we’ve confirmed.
Meanwhile, SixApart, the blogging software company, has confirmed with VentureBeat that it is joining the ever-growing coalition.
The grouping, called OpenSocial (see our coverage here), is setting open standards for sharing user information across applications that run on social networks. It is supposed to go live today. The MySpace rumor first came from AlleyInsider, which said an announcement could come by the end of the day. We’ve confirmed it with a separate source, but a MySpace spokeswoman still tells us “no comment.”
The moves are significant. The Google-led effort is clearly a way to counter Facebook’s momentum in this area, and MySpace is the still the 800-pound gorilla of social networking. Developers have been flocking to Facebook’s platform to build applications, ever since Facebook told them they were free to build applications on its platform and make money. With MySpace in Google’s camp, this is shaping up to be quite a stand-off.
Here are the obvious reasons for this: It stunts some of Facebook’s incredible buzz of late, it is good for Google because it potentially gives it more access to MySpace data (though its speculation to say how much), and it allows MySpace not to have to deliver on its own open platform, and instead rely on Google’s (MySpace’s weakness is its product delivery).
Here’s the bad, though: It could mean turning over more data to Google, MySpace won’t really own the core platform, and it makes MySpace more dependent on Google. Moreover, it may not impact Facebook at all (some people are skeptical on the concept of the concept, and we’ve our own piece on its challenges).
Meanwhile, the coalition now shows 5x traffic, compared to Facebook. Conclusion: Facebook has Microsoft in its camp; it may also consider warming up with Yahoo. And Yahoo could use some help from Facebook.
Update: Myspace and Google have apparently been working on this for the past year. Developers will be able to start building applications for Myspace tonight, using OpenSocial.
Google has also released an official list of OpenSocial members: Engage.com, Friendster, hi5, Hyves, imeem, LinkedIn, Ning, Oracle, orkut, Plaxo, Salesforce.com, Six Apart, Tianji, Viadeo and XING.
Flixster has also released an application for Myspace using OpenSocial.
Eric Eldon contributed to this article.
6 Comments
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John said:
that is not good news for facebook.
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Lapp said:
Matt, do you know some way to contact someone at open social about being involved? I have tried many times by calling to get an email address with no avail.
Thanks
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Matt Marshall said:
LAPP, contact me through VentureBeat’s contact form. Don’t want to provide email address here for a contact, because I don’t want them to get spammed.
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carhug said:
interesting moves rapidly developing. i think that MySpace’s move shows how concerned they are about Facebook. I also think the opensocial was a very smart move by Goog to counter FaceBook from trying to in some ways take advantage (ie; copy & steal the idea) of what the developers are creating on the FB “closed” platform.
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John Smithering said:
this is news for silicon valley digerati not for users. people aren’t going to flock to all of these services b/c their widgets work on all four.
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Brad said:
I am happy to see someone be so proactive and forward thinking. Myspace and Google are smart to work together. Atleast one Old media company gets it.
12 Trackbacks
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Everybody-But-Facebook Coalition Announces Membership Drive | Digital Daily | John Paczkowski | AllThingsD said:
[...] Coalition’ has two new members. News Corp.’s MySpace, Bebo and blogging outfit Six Apart have reportedly agreed to join OpenSocial, Google’s much-discussed social play. Bebo and Six [...]
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My Ghillie » Confirmed: MySpace joins Google’s OpenSocial movement said:
[...] Check it out! While looking through the blogosphere we stumbled on an interesting post today.Here’s a quick excerptMySpace , the large social networking company, has joined the anti-Facebook coalition led by Google, we’ve confirmed. [...]
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MySpace joins Google’s OpenSocial | Kocchi Kade said:
[...] of MySpace joining OpenSocial has been confirmed over at VentureBeat. Google’s move to create an open standard for information sharing across social networks was [...]
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Marc’s Voice » Blog Archive » Open Social compatibility: social networks and applications vendors working together said:
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MySpace joining Google’s OpenSocial said:
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[...] We’re going to hold off on analyzing the significance of this platform in detail until we get a closer look. Myspace has been saying it would be introducing its platform for months. So we’ve already looked at its potential here, here and here. [...]
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Myspace launching developer platform next week, for real this time! | BlogForward : Money said:
[...] We’re going to hold off on analyzing the signficance of this platform in detail until we get a closer look. Myspace has been saying it would be introducing its platform for months. So we’ve already looked at its potential here, here and here. [...]
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