Facebook F8 vs Google OpenSocial

The Facebook F8 platform pretty much revolutionised the face of Social Networking. Opening up ones architecture for other parties required great courage and Facebook were able to successfully pull it off.

Growing valuation and massive increase in usage meant that Google had to respond. Orkut was and is still hardly used in the United States. It's not too popular with the Europeans either. Google knew that simply opening up their social network to 3rd party developers wouldn't be the best of options.

So what...?

They decided to go one step further and decided to come up with a system which would seamlessly fit into a lot of other social networks and together all of them would be able to beat Facebook with Google being the adhesive binding them all.

But will they be able to succeed?

3 reasons OpenSocial might be able to beat Facebook?

1) Developers might not need to make 10 or 15 different applications based on the API's of various different Social Networks. This is the prime weapon.

2) Streaming data out of the system - as compared to only feeding in the content. Allowing 3rd party applications a medium where they really stand to benefit in terms of traffic, usage and the ability to impart a better feel of personalization. Perhaps allowing inter-connectivity between Social Networks.
For eg: My flixster account is connected to all the Social Networks which I am on - and not limited to just one social network. If I write a film review on a movie on my Orkut Flixster app - all my MySpace friends get alerted about it too.

A lot of users might have accounts in multiple social networks - and many are pretty active in at least 2-3 of them. Especially when it comes to niche social networks.

3) Language. Facebook is highly limited to an English speaking audience currently and this is where the OpenSocial can really WIN big. Having a set of APIs where the back-end of an application works efficiently and the front-end serving up different languages depending on nationality, country and language spoken.

3 reasons Facebook might still have the last laugh?

1) Facebook has the most monetisable traffic - the US traffic. It's not to bad in the European countries either. Facebook Apps have increased pageviews and time spent on the spent to an incredible extent as compared to pre-F8 days.

2) They are the first movers. Few apps on Facebook have become the very reason why users log on to their Facebook accounts daily. Apps grow on you before they get virally spread and massively used and this has already happened on Facebook.

3) Facebook has Social Networking at it's core while Google has Search as it's primary focal point.