FourEyesSquad

Five months after Facebook announced that it’s opening its platform to third-party developers, Google comes forward and gives the phrase “opening social networks” a whole new meaning.

Google’s OpenSocial aims to “open” social networks in the sense that developers can write applications that will work on any web site that chooses to implement OpenSocial. These applications can access user profiles in the social networks that implement it in a standard manner. One of the reasons why Google went with OpenSocial is because it is said that they believe that for a social network to be successful it needs to have a lot of user base and by being able to access one social network’s user base with one another, a certain social network will be able to gain momentum. That way, revenue, if it’s in the form of ads or if it even exists at all, will be significantly higher.

Standardization, somehow the word gives chill to my spine. I have always maintained that one of the greatest things with the web is the kind of freedom that it gives to any individual who has enough imagination and guts to follow an idea. Sure, Google have always wanted to categorize the web, however, this gives the feeling that it’s closing down on the web. But, of course, I may just be a little paranoid.