MySpace Developer Platform Archive

Let the "featured application" wars begin! Today we’ve learned that MySpace is now charging to be listed in their "featured apps" section on the MySpace Apps Gallery. The Apps Gallery launched to all MySpace users a week ago.

How much is a placement? Nick O’Neill says it’s $100,000 per WEEK. And guess who has all four slots — the company supposedly worth half a billion dollars, Slide. So basically the app gallery will now feature those with deep pockets and MySpace tells all other application developers to f-off. How many app developers can afford that kind of money? Few. Of course if MySpace can show that a week in a sponsored slot leads to enough users installing an application to justify the cost, other developers might scrape every penny to get in.

To play devil’s advocate, SimplyHired also allows you to pay for your job listings to show up first on results pages. Google let’s you buy keywords for terms  you are interested in. If you see the apps gallery as a search result page, why shouldn’t MySpace be allowed to sell the space to the highest bidder? 

Peter Kafka goes with the "I am a stockholder" view which is to suck them dry. Adam Ostrow makes the point clear:

Applications like Top Friends and Super Poke have huge brand recognition, and the fact that those apps can now be front and center is going to make it nearly impossible for an upstart with little cash to gain big-time popularity. It also means that the big developers can piggy back on the little guys for innovation – copying promising ideas and then writing a check to MySpace to steal all of the exposure.

Here’s the difference between the MySpace platform and the Facebook platform. Facebook needs the developers and their apps for growth. MySpace doesn’t and that’s why they can charge and get away with it. If Facebook were smart they would play this up bigtime as to why they are the better choice for developers.

Here’s the hard sell slide, the other slides can be found on Nick’s site.

The MySpace Application Gallery which semi-launched a month ago has moved into a full public launch today. MySpace will be promoting the gallery heavily going forward which makes sense — if they want developers to build applications on their platform, they need to be the vehicle that brings users to the applications. Don’t make the developers do the marketing for the apps, let MySpace handle that piece.

MySpace notes the ways they will promote the gallery:

• The MySpace.com home page will feature an Application Gallery icon at the top of the page, so users can easily be directed to the Gallery
• Users will have one-click access to the Application Gallery from their home page through their individual “Control Panels”
• The Application Gallery splash page will be launched with featured apps in effort to further promote applications and support developers

The gallery will also be accessible in multiple languages based on the user’s preferences. With the current health status of Facebook applications, MySpace needs to capitalize on this and do whatever they can to sign on developers to their platform. It’s the perfect time for a potential switch operation.

MySpace has announced the launch of their application gallery which will allow MySpace users to add the applications (mostly widgets) to their profiles. This is basically the first real-world use of OpenSocial to-date.

Adam Ostrow at Mashable has an interview with Kyle Brinkman, VP and GM of the MySpace Developer Platform. Ostrow also notes that the platform is missing the messaging component so communications won’t be smooth for now. The platform opened for developers about a month ago. While the gallery won’t be pushed on MySpace yet, we’re sure that all of the Ashley Tisdale fans will be bling’in out their profiles by the end of today.

We’ve heard from multiple platform developers who have said that the process is a "mess" compared to leveraging Facebook’s platform.

Mike Berkley, SplashCast CEO sent over some information about the applications his company has created to leverage the MySpace platform. Berlkey notes, ‘each of the SplashCast applications contain dynamically updated video channels programmed by the label, streaming music videos, "lifestyle" (behind the scenes) footage and personal video messages by the artists. They also contain live chat and "fan channels" where users can submit their own favorite photos, songs, & videos (from their cell phone, computer, or pulled from YouTube) to the application and shared by the entire fan community.

Not sure why you need a platform to do the things above and not just on a typical profile/widget but in any event, here is an example of what the Ashley Tisdale application looks like:

MySpace will be launching their new developer platform on Tuesday morning. Intially the developer site will include sample code, forums, guidebooks along with a developer blog will be available.

There are three APIs available immediately: OpenSocial with MySpace Extensions, REST API and a variety of Action Scripts. The idea with the action scripts is simple – they are premade functions that you can tie into widgets within MySpace. Unlike the Facebook platform, the MySpace Platform won’t launch with any premium partners; instead everyone gets a fair shot at success (or as fair as possible).

Adam Ostrow from Mashable has additional details regarding the launch and the privacy options and revenue model that MySpace will utilize. He notes regarding the revenue model, "In terms of monetization, the revenue share hinted at last week won’t be available initially. Instead, developers will be able to control 100% of ads on their "canvas page," where most of the main functions of applications will live. In the future, developers will be able to utilize the same tools currently being beta tested by MySpace, which allow advertisers to place "hyper targeted ads" based on user’s profile characteristics."

On the privacy side, Ostrow notes, "On the privacy side, we now know that MySpace will be applying the same privacy controls users currently have for their profiles to applications, meaning that apps will have access only to data that user’s have already made available." There will also be a sanitization process to verify that no hanky panky will take place regarding the JavaScript code inside the apps.

Since the MySpace Platform is built on OpenSocial, applications will be able to be magically transferred over to other OpenSocial partners including Bebo, hi5, and LinkedIn. This could make the MySpace Platform very attractive to developers. NY-based KickApps also supports OpenSocial. If I see one poke application on Tuesday, all bets are off.