In the April edition of Business 2.0 (requires paid subscription) there is an interesting article, "The Great Giveaway", about Amazon, Google and eBay, as they open up their data for others to create innovative web applications and services. The basic realization is that one company alone cannot follow all of the innovation possibilities, so let’s open it up for other developers to expand the potential of our platform. Though not for all kinds of business, opening up some of the data is a growing phenomenon:
Eric von Hippel, a business professor at MIT’s Sloan School of Management, explains those old rules: "We come from a culture where if you invested in it, you kept it. That was your competitive advantage." The rise of open-source software certainly challenged that notion. The rise of open data and Web services goes even further, holding out the promise of automating the links between online businesses. In geek-speak, such links are known as application programming interfaces, or APIs, through which more and more companies are revealing their vital data. As Vermeulen says, "Those that succeed have to think about removing walls instead of putting them up."
Opening up the data has spawned new companies, such as ScoutPal, which lets you check the price of Amazon’s merchandise, via your cellphone, as you shop for bargains off the Net. The service is particularly aimed at used book buyers who need to know the current market value of the books they wish to buy.
Update: If you would like to dig deeper into API’s and how they are the HTML of Web 2.0 (lots of acronyms there), then go to Seth Goldstein’s post:
As of 2005, the Internet has replaced the desktop PC as the primary platform for APIs. Unlike Microsoft and the desktop, however, nobody controls the web as a platform; although certain companies do oversee enormous pools of user data and have the opportunity to direct such traffic as they see fit. The talk of Google and Yahoo! (and now IAC) as web platforms center around their ability to recycle users through complex interconnecting networks of search, email, dating, travel, shopping, local services and more. This is the web version of the gated AOL community circa 1996. Ironically, AOL is now desperately racing to open their proprietary (Rainman) environment to a public web site (AOL.com) before Yahoo! fully eclipses its relevancy.