Posts Tagged ‘OpenSocial’

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iLike playlist via Friend Connect

January 15th, 2009
social-playlist

Google Friend Connect is Google’s beginnings of a social infrastructure. Instead of a central location like Myspace or Facebook, Friend connect is spread to the far reaches of the net. In December, it opened to all Websites. That means that anyone with a Google, Yahoo, AIM, or OpenID username and password can sign in on any blog or site hosting a Friend Connect widget.

Friend Connect is also open to developers with the desire to design and build apps that integrate with Friend Connect.

Today, iLike (social music discovery service) announced a “social playlist” gadget utilizing the power of Google Friend Connect.

As the leader in social music discovery, we have used Google’s Friend Connect service to build a “social playlist” gadget, which launched today. This new feature empowers any Web site owner to add a playlist to his/her site. The social hook is that visitors to a participating Web site can “log in” (via Friend Connect) to edit these dynamic playlists by adding or deleting songs.

read entire iLike announcement.

Music has been a central theme in the social sphere since day one. People tend to adopt music related services rather quickly and I don’t think this will be any different. I do hope that the “Audio Police” leave this one alone…but if the recent news about “muting” copyrighted content on YouTube is any indication of future action, can we expect similar issues when the iLike gadget appears on 1 million blogs?

update: Upon further inspection I have noticed that the music is streamed through Rhapsody and they impose a “25 play” limit on non subscribers. (not sure if this is per song or plays per widget) This cripples the reach of this widget dramatically!

Look at the sidebar bottom for the iLike “Social Playlist” gadget widget

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Posted in Music

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Mahalo Answers widget leaves Widgetslab

January 15th, 2009

Mahalo Answers is a cool concept and I thought it would be a great way for readers to connect with other readers.
But it requires you to sign up just to post a question. This pretty much kills it for those that don’t want to sign up. (there are a lot of us out there)
I realize that the commenting structure on Widgetslab is somewhat similar with required “name” and “email” fields…but there is no need to verify your info and I surely won’t sell your info. (Not that Mahalo will do this either…I’m positive they won’t) but it just feels too much like “another registration”.

I plan on trying out the Google Friend Connect widget.

I realize that it requires you to have a Google account and in that it is similar to many other “services” but the difference here is…there’s a greater chance that you (the reader) already have some type of Google account.

Please comment and let me know what you think.

D

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Posted in Misc

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OpenSocial: One Year Of Limited Success

November 24th, 2008

OpenSocial it is now over a year old and in perspective it is clear that it has not evolved as fast as it should have. and yes i am still having its achievements in consideration:

Since launch, the platform has been deployed by over 7,500 developers and reaches a staggering number of users, with 315 million application installs across social networks including MySpace, Orkut, Bebo, and Hi5 and a total reach of 600 million users. MySpace alone has over 135 million application installs, 40 million users and 4600 applications available in its directory.

But the truth is that for A platform that is both for Social Apps and Widgets and that got multiple Social Network Partners and the backup of Google. it didn`t raise Developer Fire as the Facebook App Platform did when it launched and during the year it enjoyed maximum relevance. Another proof of it is that it didn`t reached out version 1.0 in its first year and it will not manage to reach that milestone in 2008.  The Facebook Platform is now no longer as important as it was 6 months ago but OpenSocial does continues to serve a good goal and purpose. that is to allow for developers to not put all their hopes in one single social network and be able to deploy their Social Apps and Widgets to many without a lot of effort.

The Social Network Landscape is now transforming and bleeding out of being containable. it is now reaching out to the Common web via Data Sharing API`s and Contact Sharing API`s. something that also will not manage to see the proper light in 2008 but that will be the other half of Social Network Platforms like OpenSocial for 2009.

opensocialgraph

But one has to wonder what would have happened if OpenSocial didn`t existed at all and its more than not agreed that its existence was a better scenario and that it`s opposing to Facebook allowed to Tangent development to take center stage wish Social Graph API`s now being the next big thing. 

I still wish i could have many examples of great OpenSocial Widgets and OpenSocial Apps but what i can come up could be counted with one hand and that is why i insist that OpenSocial Didn`t got to be as good as it should have been.

OpenSocial.org

via TC

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Posted in Web 2.0, Widget Development, Widget Platform

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Develop Your Own Music Widget With Imeem

October 25th, 2008

imeem

Music Widgets are one of the most popular kinds of Widget online and it is getting easier and easier not only to get well featured music widget. but also to make them. if you want to make your music widget you could try out Imeem. they now offer OpenSocial support and Out Of Imeem streaming support too:

Imeem Developers Platform

Imeem OpenSocial

Imeem Widgets Development

So now you can have your web music widget using Imeem Web Wervices API or put together Social Network Widget or Widget-App with Imeem OpenSocial JavaScript API. making a Music Widget is surely getting easier and easier.

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Posted in Music, Widget Development, Widget Platform

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Ning Gets OpenSocial Support For Profiles = Widgets For Your Ning Profile

October 15th, 2008

tmpE       

Ning is a Social Network provider. anyone can create a Social Network and join the Ning Community. it could be considered the Blogger.com for Social Network given how quick you can create a Social Network for whatever you have in mind (that is allowed) without having to work much for it. that is is why the recently reached 500,000 Social Networks in Ning. of course that most of them are fodder but given the quantity of Social Networks created there are a lot of jewels in the Ning Community

Widgets and Widget-apps (Social Network integrated Widgets) has always been a weak spot for Ning. Having that in thought. Ning did found a good solution by going with OpenSocial. there are many Instant Social Network providers now that want to compete with Ning. i seriously doubt any of the late in the game competitors could really make a dent to Ning but Ning is not taking any chances. on a second thought. they just needed Widgets and they needed them fast to make their users happy after the whole Widgets Laboratory fiasco that left Ning in a little PR storm not too long ago.

OpenSocial Support fixes both problems and replace them with 3 perks for them:

1.-Staying way ahead of any possible competitor

2.-Getting Widgets and Widget-apps to make Ning users happy.

3.-Ning gets a better Developer Network that the one they had.

This will start with Users Profiles and the support will be limited to 30 widgets available right now while the Support gets better and more OpenSocial Widgets get ported to work with Ning as more OpenSocial developers get interested with Ning. while this is not a full solution since it is only for Users Profiles. OpenSocial Widget Integrations for the actual Ning Social Networks should follow fast enough.

Ning Official Announcement

OpenSocial is now live across our more than 500,000 social networks this morning. This release replaces and improves our older “Gadgets” beta functionality, and enables Network Creators and their members to add all sorts of great new features, or Applications, to their profile pages with a single click.

Each social network on Ning now offers more than 30 OpenSocial applications from which to choose, including file sharing from Box.net, poll creation from Polldaddy and e-commerce from Shopit.

It’s been a pleasure to work with the vibrant (and ever-growing) community of OpenSocial developers and see the diversity of the applications they’ve created.

Dave Westwood, who built a fantastic application called BuddyPoke, was especially enthusiastic, stating that “Releasing BuddyPoke on Ning has been the easiest port we’ve done, taking just an hour to be up and running. Excellent documentation. Congratulations!”

Here are some cool highlights of our OpenSocial integration:

  • The OpenSocial directory on each network automatically inherits the branding and visual design of that network.
  • OpenSocial applications on Ning can inherit the visual style of the member profile page to which they’re added.
  • OpenSocial applications are automatically integrated into a network’s viral loops. The ability for OpenSocial applications to write to a member’s latest activity feed, send messages on behalf of the member and spread using a network’s default viral sharing options are all there by default.

So there you have it. Ning Widgets will be now OpenSocial Widgets. that is another good news for those that have chosen OpenSocial to develop as they now count with other option to display their work.

Ning Developer Network

Ning

via Ning Blog

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Posted in Web 2.0, Widget Development, Widget Platform

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