Facebook vs Open Social

Slide 1: Facebook vs. OpenSocial By: Jawad Shuaib

Slide 2: What is OpenSocial? • Google’s Response to Facebook Developer Platform • Write Once, Run Anywhere • Google Widgets on Steroids • Released too Early Email: Jawad.php@gmail.com

Slide 3: Social Networks that support OpenSocial Email: Jawad.php@gmail.com

Slide 4: What does it look like? Email: Jawad.php@gmail.com

Slide 5: Email: Jawad.php@gmail.com

Slide 7: Market Analysis Email: Jawad.php@gmail.com

Slide 8: Market Size and Competition • Ideally speaking, OpenSocial has a market potential for 250 million users as opposed to 64 million active users on Facebook • 15,000 Applications on Facebook. Difficult to rapidly grow user base due to a saturated market • Most existing Google Widgets can run on OpenSocial. Results? Difficult to rapidly grow user base due to existing competition Email: Jawad.php@gmail.com

Slide 9: Business & Marketing • Facebook applications leverage the social graph but lack the ability to scale to other networks. OpenSocial can scale, but the applications must be “generic” • Applications more viral on Facebook (i.e. support for email invites and better news feed) • OpenSocial profile box will likely support advertising • More applications won’t persuade users to switch from one network to another Email: Jawad.php@gmail.com

Slide 10: What’s your target market? Email: Jawad.php@gmail.com

Slide 12: Technical Differences • Facebook requires proprietary languages (FBML, FQL, FBJS). Google requires XML and JavaScript • Google provides an IDE (aka Google Gadget Editor) • Google hosts applications for free. Facebook doesn’t Email: Jawad.php@gmail.com

Slide 13: Language Support Facebook API OpenSocial API • FBML • XHTML/XML • FQL • JavaScript • FBJS • Full Support for AJAX • Partial support for AJAX • Backend languages like • Backend languages like PHP, Java, .NET on PHP, Java, .NET on Canvas Canvas Email: Jawad.php@gmail.com

Slide 14: Developer Environment Email: Jawad.php@gmail.com

Slide 15: Facebook: Email: Jawad.php@gmail.com

Slide 16: OpenSocial: Email: Jawad.php@gmail.com

Slide 17: Conclusion Email: Jawad.php@gmail.com

Slide 18: Conclusion • The choice of your platform should depend on demographic • OpenSocial is modeled after Facebook. So if you’ve built a Facebook application before, it is relatively easy to learn OpenSocial • “Write Once, Run Anywhere” is not exactly true. An Orkut specific OpenSocial app. Might not necessairly run on Hi5 Email: Jawad.php@gmail.com

Slide 19: Conclusion • Generic applications will do better on OpenSocial in terms of scalability. Applications that take advantage of Facebook’s social graph will have a difficult time scaling • Don’t make your OpenSocial applications too generic, because they probably already exist. • If Bebo supported both OpenSocial and FBML. I would develop using FBML. OpenSocial is buggy. Email: Jawad.php@gmail.com

Slide 20: Find me on Facebook  Jawad Shuaib Jawad.php@gmail.com http://www.j4wad.com

Slide 21: References & Resources • http://code.google.com/apis/opensocial/ • http://groups.google.com/group/opensocial • http://www.hi5networks.com/developer/ • Bit5media.com • xkcd.com for comics Email: Jawad.php@gmail.com

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