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What is OpenSocial? An Explanation Without Code

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Google’s recently released software development tools made a splash. Articles appeared everywhere with the usual social media and social networking buzzwords. But what does this set of software standards and tools from Google really do? Watch the excellent set of videos below to see the leading OpenSocial partners talk about their development projects. Here is my explanation of the power of OpenSocial:

Think about all of the different social networking websites. Think about the volume and diversity of interactions between users. There are millions of these digital transactions everyday. OpenSocial allows the user generated information on one social networking website to be shared with other websites. All of the stuff people do on those sites: comments, posts, lists, friends, favorites, ratings etc. can be organized, mashed up, and displayed on other sites. OpenSocial makes the process possible. Best of all the presentation of information is completely customizable and flows from its source automatically. Its impact on social networking and the web of the future have been understated.

OpenSocial Developer Interviews

OpenSocial Interview Post

Follow-up: Verizon Wireless to open up in ’08

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BusinessWeek’s article, Verizon Embraces Google’s Android, discusses the sudden shift in Verizon Wireless’s business model, from tightly restricted to an open-access network, and how Google’s Android helped facilitate this shift. The article details how the open movement at the company was spearheaded by CEO Lowell McAdam.

Some highlights of Lowell McAdam from the article:

[Verizon Wireless’s] surprise embrace of an open-access model and of the Android software culminates a dramatic yearlong evolution in the company’s thinking. The effort, championed by McAdam, involved meetings with the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission and late-night bull sessions with the top two executives at Verizon Communications, which owns Verizon Wireless in partnership with Vodafone.

McAdam was more amenable to shifting gears thanks to time spent during the 1990s in Europe and Asia, where the wireless industry is more of a free-for-all. …[he] says he was impressed that European and Asian mobile carriers backed technologies that allow subscribers to switch to rivals with ease.


The BusinessWeek article goes on to discuss how the open-access move could help reduce Verizon’s costs and help to combat market saturation in the US. The upcoming FCC wireless spectrum auction is also covered. Particularly, how the auction (and lobbying from Google and other tech companies for open-access) got McAdam to consider that a move to an open-access business model was necessary.

According to McAdam, Android was the final key influence in Verizon adopting an open-access business model. This is, of course, why Verizon is now “embracing” the Android platform. However, when Google first announced the release of Android, Verizon (along with AT&T) were absent from the press release. According to McAdam, the reason they did not sign on and support Android from the beginning is two-fold, “To get into that press release really didn’t do anything [for Verizon]…We needed to understand the details of that operating system.”

As I mentioned in my previous VZW open-access post, Verizon’s new open initiative will offer increased flexibility for VZW’s customers by allowing them to choose between VZW’s full service offering or going with a third party device and mobile applications. It was clear to me at the time of my previous post that “These innovative [third party] mobile web applications will initially be developed through the Android Open Handset Alliance.” McAdam also sees the potential in the Android Platform by saying, “Clearly the Android system gives a lot of developers the opportunity to develop applications for a wide range of handsets.” Clearly, if a lot of developers start developing applications, we are bound to get at least a few very innovative and useful applications from Android. Right? I can’t wait to see how much the US wireless market changes in the next few years.

Gmail Chat Can Now Use AIM

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Recently Google rolled out some upgrades to its mail platform Gmail. This is a great one. Up until now the chat functionality within Gmail has been limited to other Gmail and Google Talk users. Now Gmail users can reconnect with their friends on AOL Instant Messenger, AIM. Thanks for opening up Google!

10 million AIM accounts were resurrected from the dead today as a result! That’s a guess but I’m sure it was a lot. Thanks again Google.

Source Article

Online ad spend to leapfrog radio and magzines by 2010

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AdAge is reporting that a new ZenithOptimedia forecast predicts total ad spend in North America to increase by only 4.1% next year, with global ad spend growing 6.7%. According to the forecast newspapers, magazines, and radio ad spend will decline over the next two years with TV ad spend remaining flat.

Online ad highlights from the AdAge article:

It’s only online, of course, that the media business looks both fun and easy. Worldwide internet ad spending will climb to $44.6 billion from about $36 billion, increasing its share of the market to 9.4% from 8.1%.

“We predict internet advertising to pass three milestones over the next three years,” ZenithOptimedia’s forecast said. “We expect it to overtake radio advertising in 2008; to attain a double-digit share of global advertising in 2009; and to overtake magazine advertising in 2010, with 11.5% of total ad spend.”

Other interesting ad spend topics covered in the AdAge article:

  • The quadrennial year: ad-boosting events such as the Olympics, a presidential election, and a European soccer championship all take place in the same year.
  • The writer’s strike and TV market share.
  • The shift in global ad spend from North America to markets “east of Eastern Europe.”

Data: Ad Outlays by Medium (pdf) provided by AdAge.

Google launches “My Location (beta)” for mobile devices

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Google has introduced the beta version of its new “My Location” feature for Google Maps for mobile devices. The My Location feature enables a mobile user to display their current location on the Google map on their device. The feature uses both GPS and non-GPS methods to determine a user’s location.

When GPS is available on a device the user will get a much more accurate reading of their location, indicated by a blue dot. If GPS is not available for whatever reason, the My Location feature takes information broadcast from mobile towers near you to approximate your current location on the map. Basically triangulation using cell phone towers. When the feature uses this method, it displays your location as a blue dot surrounded by a light blue circle. This light blue circle represents the amount of uncertainty about your location. Google claims that this method “comes pretty close (approximately 1000m close, on average).”

The My Location feature is available for most web-enabled mobile phones, including Java, BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, and Nokia/Symbian devices.

I think the My Location feature will encourage more people to use Google Maps for Mobile. The feature will save mobile users time by allowing them to simply press a single button to find their location, instead of finding a nearby address and typing that into Google Maps as well as their search query.

The following is a video from Google about the My Location feature.

What do you think of the new My Location feature?