Ning announced OpenSocial support in October 2008, and now Ning is formally opening up a developer platform. It’s in private beta and will launch in full later this month. OpenSocial is a framework pioneered by Google, primarily as a response to Facebook’s developer platform. Developers of applications can write their application once and be able to deploy it on any site that supports OpenSocial. People developing social networking websites or web applications nowadays should consider building to the OpenSocial specification to take advantage of this.
There are a couple of things that make Ning Apps different from the social platforms found on the likes of Facebook or MySpace. While the earlier, limited array of apps offered on Ning was strictly for members to embed on their profiles, the formal Ning Apps product is geared toward the creators and administrators of Ning social networks. They can add an application–from a cash donation widget for a nonprofit network, to a ticket sales app for a band's fan page, to a live video stream of what-have-you–and it'll mesh right into the social network.
This opens up interesting customization options for folks interested in extending the out-of-the-box social network features supplied by Ning. Ning userID’s are still, however, id’s for all Ning networks, which may or may not be attractive.
via Ning opens up more to developers | The Social – CNET News.
Tags: ning, OpenSocial, platform
