MySpace Wants Third Party Applications Like Facebook



Murdoch and MySpace co-founder and CEO Chris DeWolfe have a plan to change the parent company's online fortunes: They'll make it easier for outside software developers to build MySpace tools and then let them share in resulting ad sales. MySpace is following in the footsteps of
Facebook, Apple (AAPL), and other tech trailblazers in harnessing the legions of programmers, many of them independent or affiliated with smaller companies, jonesing to craft the next big consumer application, be it related to games, photos, music, or other interests. "We are opening our platform within the next couple of months to all developers," DeWolfe said at the Web 2.0 conference put on by O'Reilly Media in San Francisco.

MySpace has confirmed its plans to open up MySpace social network website to web developers, enabling them to build applications based on its platform. Social networking Web sites like MySpace and Facebook enable people to connect to friends and share information, and third-party applications provide users with extra features and functions. MySpace has not yet build a public APIs that would simplify third-party development of its applications. Facebook decided to make itself a third party application and devloper friendly in May. MySpace would officially open its platform to developers in the next coming months.

MySpace plans to release a catalog of available widgets within few weeks so users could take a better advantage of the third-party applications.
Facebook began permitting third-party applications earlier this year, with the initiative becoming wildly popular. Facebook has about 6,000 applications at this moment. MySpace plans to implement a "sandbox" area on the MySpace site, where third party application developers can test to make sure their apps are safe and secure before making them available to the millions of MySpace users.

MySpace is also experimenting with a new way for advertisers to "hyper-target" MySpace users based on the Myspace user's profiles. MySpace has found 10 areas of interest, like "horror movies" and "action sports", which MySpace is will expand to nearly 100, and eventually to 1,000, that advertisers will be able to choose. Facebook however currently has a deal with Microsoft to run Facebook's ad network.