Google is set to launch a social networking site today, and already the Web is ablaze with details surrounding the revealed partnership with MySpace and how the two Internet giants will compete against Facebook.
Digital Journal — With the growing power of Facebook, it was only a matter of time before Google got in the ring. With details emerging earlier this week about Google’s upcoming OpenSocial platform (reportedly launching tonight), rumours swirled about a possible partnership with MySpace.
The social networking godfather, MySpace, has seen Facebook take a lot of its business over the last year.
In news that broke today, Google revealed it has been working with MySpace for more than a year in secret.
OpenSocial is a project led by Google to introduce common standards to allow developers to write programs for Orkut (Google’s social network) as well as others including MySpace, LinkedIn, hi5, Friendster and Ning.
Earlier this year, Facebook opened up its site to third-party developers to make applications for the network. Since then, more than 5,000 programs have been built to run on Facebook, but the language is unique to that site, so developers have to spend more time and resources to integrate and the code is useless outside of the network.
OpenSocial will see an open network that combines social applications across the Web.
As the New York Times reports,
“It is going to forestall Facebook’s ability to get everyone writing just for Facebook,” said a person with knowledge of the plans who asked to remain anonymous because he was not authorized to speak on behalf of the alliance. The group’s platform, which is called OpenSocial, is “compatible across all the companies,” that person said.
According to a press release:
“MySpace, the world’s largest social network, and Google, Inc. today announced that they are joining forces to launch OpenSocial— a set of common APIs for building social applications across the web. The partnership spearheads an initiative to standardize and simplify the development of social applications. Today’s announcement underscores MySpace’s commitment to supporting standards that foster innovation in an increasingly social Web.”
As a member of OpenSocial, MySpace will provide Google with “critical user mass and platform guidance” and the project will be open source, a collaboration of many partners including Engage.com, Friendster, hi5, Hyves, imeem, LinkedIn, Ning, Oracle, orkut, Plaxo, Salesforce.com, Six Apart, Tianji, Viadeo, and XING.
“Our partnership with Google allows developers to gain massive distribution without unnecessary specialized development for every platform,” Chris DeWolfe, Chief Executive Officer and co-founder of MySpace, said in a press release. “This is about helping the start-up spend more time building a great product rather than rebuilding it for every social network. We’re pleased to collaborate with Google to establish a landmark standard for social applications.”
MySpace has been flogged for quite some time for letting itself fall behind in competition with Facebook, but this deal shows the company had an ace up its sleeve.
MySpace says the company’s upcoming platform efforts will be solely focused on OpenSocial.
Most social networks have got on board with this project, and Google says it has left an invitation open to “everyone” who wants to join, so that presumably includes Facebook.
The only question now is: Will Facebook join the competition and, as Mashable comments, make it a Facebook/Microsoft versus Google/MySpace?
“As the most trafficked website in the country and the most popular social network in the world, MySpace is one of the leading forces in the global social Web,” Google CEO, Eric Schmidt, said in a press release. “We’re thrilled to grow our strategic relationship with MySpace by joining forces on this important initiative.”
With so many developers joining Google’s open network, the entity will no doubt become attractive to advertisers. While Facebook does have a large user base (40 million), it will have to decide whether it joins the group or stands out on its own to compete.
With so many people partnering with Google, the network might not have a choice.
When Google launches OpenSocial later tonight, you can find it live at this link.
