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In good times everyone wants to be a platform. But when times are bad and platforms are just an expense, the resources suddenly shift away. The recent re-design of Facebook,

When the Facebook platform debuted last year it was touted as the next big thing. Media, VC, startups and big companies shared the enthusiasm for its future. And no wonder:

Facebook quietly added the ability for users to vote up or down on ads last night. Facebook watcher Nick O'Neill points out that the site has recently gotten rid of

Last November, when Google launched Open Social we asked readers if Facebook would join Google's platform. The results were split right down the middle, but as we get farther from

Many small and medium sized businesses may have an interest in maintaining a presence on social networks, but don't the time, money, or resources to do so. For them, a

Mobile social networking company Frengo has released a toolkit for development of Open Social and Facebook applications on mobile phones. The Open Social Mobile Toolkit supports MySpace, Hi5, Bebo, and

Veteran Open Source businessman Bob Bickel will launch his new company Ringside Networks at the Open Source Business Conference tomorrow and he's set his sites high. Ringside will let developers

One of the big social news stories this evening was Facebook's announcement that it is actively working on a redesign to user profiles that would break the profile page down

There appears to be evidence that Facebook users are beginning to suffer from app fatigue, and there is growing discontent about how applications are being distributed and about the amount