MySpace is set to launch its 3rd party developer platform in just a few weeks, according to sources speaking to Michael Arrington at TechCrunch. If what Arrington is reporting is true (and it almost always is) then things are really changing at the industry leading social network. By this time next year you'll be getting spam from MySpace applications and be running to shut off your account altogether. If you feel embarrassed perusing the Facebook apps directory ("yes mom, these are my peers, this is the new frontier - let's send some 'booze mail!'"), you'll feel nauseas when you see the MySpace apps directory.
It was just one year ago last month that News Corp. chief operating officer Peter Chernin told company investors that "if you look at virtually any Web 2.0 application...almost all of them are really driven off the back of MySpace." Chernin's statement was a hostile one, said in the context of the company blocking access to some third party widgets and shutting off outbound links that were key to viral spread of all widgets, for purported security purposes.
The company aimed instead to drive users towards its own photo, video and audio services. Those services are remarkably good compared to the 3rd party alternatives, and yet the debate raged on.
Tech bloggers, and TechCrunch in particular, kept a running tally of third party developers whose companies were shut down by threats from MySpace.
MySpace engaged in a huge battle with Photobucket over running ads on MySpace pages, ending in a large acquisition of Photobucket.
Now Arrington reports that rumor has it MySpace platform developers will be allowed to run ads and keep 100% of the revenue.
Does MySpace see the writing on the wall? If so, what does it say? I have said before and I'll say again that the rise of Facebook has been in spite of the opening of the Facebook platform, if anything. It's a result of the maturing demographics of social networking services, a backlash against the wretched user experience of the poorly designed and spam ridden MySpace and the power of syndication represented by the Facebook wall.
That wall functionality will be the most significant development that other companies take from Facebook. The open development platform may very well make a difference at Google, it could move the needle at LinkedIn (in a year when that platform launches) but it's very unlikely that it will be important at MySpace or anywhere else. As Kara Swisher wrote today, the vast majority of apps developed for the much-vaunted Facebook platform - including the most successful ones, are vapid wastes of time.
It's the newsfeed, clean site and well designed user experience of Facebook that really matters - and perhaps privacy. These platforms will just be the bush leagues for the real companies to watch features be developed before building the same things - as features, and they'll be ad networks for a handful of lowest-common-denominator, dust-weight apps. Arrington says the MySpace platform will require that apps built on it are hosted on the MySpace platform!
In other words, I don't expect a MySpace platform to account for a whole lot. If the "open platform on huge monolith's terms" meme ever has any meat on it, I don't expect it will be in the long-hostile quarters of MySpace.
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Sounds very scary.
Posted by: Nitin | October 10, 2007 12:25 AM
Couldn't agree more with the penultimate paragraph. I'd love to see some stats on usage of these critical elements pre and post F8.
Posted by: Neil | October 10, 2007 1:18 AM
I agree that the Facebook wall is one of their most important innovations. Smart aggregation and syndication will be important for any service in the social space.
And quick comment on the value of the apps; The apps that work well in the Facebook system are the ones that add value to the social information exchange: what music iLike and cities I've visited, books I read, etc... And a few of them work as entertainment.
Posted by: Lars G. Teigen | October 10, 2007 2:32 AM
Yikes the knives are out and Signor MySpace had better watch out for the stiletto of spam at it’s throat. A great article Marshall.
Following on from Om Malik’s keynote at FOWA last week we’ve yet to see the disruptive apps enter the social operating system, we’re still in the quick fix, cheap thrills cycle, let it run it’s course then seek to innovate in this space, make your app portable to any network or desktop, when the virtual poop has been virtually scooped we’ll see some exciting developments and real business models emerge in this space.
Start to ask ‘what can brands do for people?’ rather than ‘what should we tell people about our brand?’. When you have the answer let them take it onto their social operating system of choice or their iPhone and let them share it.
Posted by: Adam Martin | October 10, 2007 6:20 AM
This is indeed going to be interesting. With the amount of pornstars requesting to be my friend on a daily basis I can only assume these spammers will jump on the application platform and develop even more annoying ways to clutter my inbox with useless stuff.
However, on the positive side I'm chomping at the bit to see what positive can come of a Myspace platform. If there is anyway for developers to start creating revenue from the profile pages of users, its a huge enough opportunity where I can't see companies NOT creating a Myspace app.
Let's just hope Myspace's TOS isn't as rigid as Facebooks...given Myspace's history though that's a REAAAAL long shot.
Posted by: Marco Hansell | October 10, 2007 6:32 AM
Great comments, folks - I appreciate your bringing up the causes for optimism as well. They are certainly there. The FB has been so widely praised, though, that I really want to make sure to be smart about this news.
Posted by: Marshall Kirkpatrick | October 10, 2007 6:54 AM
I just love how a whole cottage industry has sprung up for companies creating 'apps' . . . yet none of them seem to have any real ideas on how to monetize them. The 'just slap AdSense on it until Google or Yahoo buys us out' business model that so many other Web 2.0 companies seem to adopt doesn't translate as well in this area.
I agree, the apps platform isn't what makes Facebook the current hot property. That's just the reasoning some techies like to use as if they're looking for an excuse to justify their infatuation with a site that (when you step back and look at it from the big picture) is basically just a new flavor of MySpace - which most techies routinely bashed. For the average user, the biggest selling points to Facebook have less to do with the wall, the 'clean' design, or the feed (although the feed has been by far its biggest and most useful innovation.) The biggest selling point for the masses is its sense of exclusivity. The 'walled garden', which is ironically the biggest complaint of techies regarding Facebook, is what people currently like. It gives people a sense of a gated community effect (that wouldn't be possible without being framed in the context of the free-for-all that is MySpace.)
It's all cyclical though. New properties will always emerge and there may eventually be a push back toward a more open platform if Facebook grows into a monolith and starts to seem passe. I don't think 'apps' is going to be the killer answer for MySpace. I'm not sure creating a more open platform is the answer either. This is a very fickle space.
Posted by: RustyS | October 10, 2007 8:07 AM
"company blocking access to some third party widgets and shutting off outbound links that were key to viral spread of all widgets, for purported security purposes.
The company aimed instead to drive users towards its own photo, video and audio services. Those services are remarkably good compared to the 3rd party alternatives"
I disagree with their apps being better. But the back bone of the webs success is freedom and restrick that and you just get AOL.......
Posted by: Omad | October 10, 2007 10:56 AM