Comment Re:I see no problem here. (Score 1) 224
When one company controls the source (and hence official version) of an API, then they have a competitive advantage over *anyone* else using that API. I would wager that Slashdotters younger than 30 (please stay out of my yard, etc...) never followed the software scene in the 1990's pre-Linux, pre-Google, pre-Firefox. At the time a serious question for *anyone* developing PC software was was whether it was worth it since Microsoft had such a huge competitive advantage due to owning the OS (and hence controlling) the Windows APIs. Microsoft killed Netscape, killed almost all competing Office products (remember Word Perfect and Ami Pro anyone?) partly because Microsoft app teams had access no one else had to Windows OS developments and enhancements.
Thankfully the Internet happened and the standard API is no longer Win32 but HTML, XML Javascript, CSS, etc. We need to be aware of the same competitive advantage Google, Facebook, Amazon have internally and keep in mind that "OpenAPIs" at this time still amount to vendor lock-in and an inherent competitive advantage for the company owning the API.