When Facebook opened up its technology to third-party developers to create the likes of Scrabulous or official applications from other sites like Digg or Flickr it was hailed as the ‘MySpace killer’ or the ‘anti-MySpace’, but as of today MySpace will no longer be on the other side of the fence.
The social networking site has invited developers to sign up for the MySpace Developer Site and learn how to use the developer platform to create interactive applications that will sit inside user pages.
It will also be compatible with OpenSocial, an initiative started by Google to give embedded web applications, known as widgets, the ability to plug in to any social networking system and also works with Hi5 and LinkedIn.
While Facebook is currently the world’s fastest-growing social network, MySpace, a granddad in comparison, is still the most visited and has a far bigger user base at over 200 million in comparison to Facebook’s population, which is roughly at the 63 million mark.
The MySpace developer platform will be open for use from 5 February, although many had doubted its delivery given that MySpace co-founder, Chris DeWolfe, had announced in October 2007 that it would be much sooner.
While Facebook spent no time in opening up its platform to third-party developers, it has a limited personalisation setting in comparison to MySpace.
MySpace has always allowed users with or without knowledge of web programming to create their own page with a unique background, text, colour scheme etc. This appealed more to the younger user base and music heavy orientation of members. This facility can now be used in conjunction with widgets.
Alongside this new development, MySpace has also named Amit Kapur as chief operating officer, a role which makes him responsible for worldwide business development within MySpace.
By Marie Boran
