Life is grand

Here is another reason Facebook and OpenSocial style “walled application gardens” are a bad idea for the web:

some developers’ applications are getting perpetually stuck in the directory approval process.

Since when did web application developers need approval to launch applications? Since Facebook (and Ning and now OpenSocial.) Since we started thinking it would be cool to build proprietary platforms on the web and host applications in them. Platforms controlled by some pretty young and naive guys and their terms and conditions. Platforms which are going to be bought out by the likes of Microsoft or News Corp and have terms and conditions changed by old and jaded lawyers.

We are just emerging from a world of corporate control of our media and communications. And now we are jumping all over putting our applications inside a corporation’s platform?

We have an open platform controlled by nobody*; the world wide web running on the internet. Use it.

* to a degree

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 14th, 2007 at 10:36 am and is filed under Post. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.