The key screwup in this missive, at least to my outsider eyes, is the insinuation that facebook is succesful _because_ of the APIs. Anyone with even a passing memory of facebook's rise knows those APIs didn't exist until many years after facebook was gigantinormous. Specifically, this sentence:
*But that's not why they are successful. Facebook is successful because they built an entire constellation of products by allowing other people to do the work. * He has a point that facebook as it stands today benefits from mafiawars and the like, but I kind of get the feeling team G+ wasn't quite planning for G+ to turn into that. It might just be personal opinion but G+ feels like a better twitter, not a better facebook. Twitter also does NOT have farmville and co (fortunately!), though perhaps here Steve's own argument works better: A big reason for twitter's success was the API, which allowed powerusers to use custom apps instead of the website. Thanks to Chris Koerner for posting this, it was kinda hard to find for a while. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "The Java Posse" group. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msg/javaposse/-/UOFFcyMSqRMJ. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/javaposse?hl=en.
