Facebook Launches Developer API

andrewman327 writes "The popular college social networking site Facebook recently unveiled an API open to developers. Programmers can utilize data from profiles, friends, photos, and events. An early example is FaceBank, which allows students to keep track of how much money they have lent their friends. The appeal of this platform will be slightly limited, however, as both developers and users must be members of Facebook. Facebook is the 60th most popular website for American websurfers and recently allowed high school students and employees of certain companies to join."

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[0100010001010011]

By releasing the API, people can add features to facebook without requiring any additional facebook developer resources.

Like the Piggy Bank. Facebook could have implemented this... or it could have let millions of adoring fans write it for them. There are a few ideas floating around the developer network. Imagine if Facebook had X ability. Well now it can be done.

Just like MySpace and Blogging... the people make the content. Look at all the great google maps api applications. Google spent 0 amount of time m

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[andrewman327]

It is worth noting that Facebook's developers very quickly implement stable and functional new features. Facebook is always adding more features. Just today it added a special "badge" that allows you to post dynamically updating information from Facebook on your website, blog, or message board. While I agree that this could take some work off of the developers, I do not think that they will stop working feverishly to constantly improve the service.

I hate to compare the two services, but Facebook again h

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[0100010001010011]

Agreed.

I in no way meant a jab at the FB developers. But one team can only do so much. I've been on facebook since the beginning. Since then features show up and 'just work.' I remember looking at the JS before they added the "In a relationship with" thing. I was like "wow... I wonder what they're going to do with this." Sometimes I find a feature and brag about it to my friends only to find out that it was added months ago.

Facebook trumps MySpace in more than the API arena. It's the type of website that I

Too bad they killed VCard Export

[Kadin2048]

That said, they also occasionally remove features.

A while back, they had a great feature: they let you download your friends' addresses and other contact information as VCard-format files, which you could import into your local addressbook.

This was brilliant. Frankly it was better than any LDAP-type or Active Directory system I'd used; and it meant that my local address book suddenly had stuff like postal addresses, birthdays, plus email addresses in it. I'd never had the time to hand-enter that stuff in th

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[0100010001010011]

My guess is spam related.

Take a look at people's e-mail addresses. It's a generated image, it's not a text/link anymore.

In addition, I've been pounding my head against a wall trying to get CURL to work with Facebook and it seems that they've taken quite a few measures to make sure this can't happen.

Re:Interesting...but...

[moosesocks]

Good question. There are a few valid uses, but from the look of it, it appears that the API's crippled such to prevent most of them.

After briefly glancing at the documentation, it looks like this is only good for pulling information from facebook, but not actually being able to make changes or add information.

Granted, this makes it a bit more secure and less prone to spam, but still.... an interface that would allow me to programatically upload photos or create events would be great.

Kudos to the facebook guys for making a social networking site that's actually usable.

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[mounthood]

Good question. There are a few valid uses, but from the look of it, it appears that the API's crippled such to prevent most of them.

After briefly glancing at the documentation, it looks like this is only good for pulling information from facebook, but not actually being able to make changes or add information.

If you work at a school you could build a custom student monitor; make sure all those parties and bad words are exposed.

Shudder..

[clickclickdrone]

I don't know why but the name Facebook just creeps me out. I always imagine a big scrap book full of peeled of faces. Maybe I need to see someone about that..

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[Lurker2288]

You probably just need to relax a little. Maybe it should rub some lotion on it's skin before it gets the hose again.

Take note, Murdoch

[mattpointblank]

This is a lesson Myspace should learn. I use both sites, and here's why Facebook is better:

• Actual networking facilities. I'm not sure what the creators of Myspace think "social networking" means, but it definitely _does not_ mean a small box saying "______ is in your extended network" on an area of the profile nobody looks at anyway. And what does that even mean? There's no links to see your "extended network". Facebook, on the other hand, shows you how someone else is linked to you (eg, which of their friends are listed as yours) and lets you narrow down networks by class and college, or graduation year.
• Intelligent image manipulation. Facebook's gallery features allow you to upload a picture and then select an area of the image "containing" a person, which is then linked to that user's profile when the photo is viewed. On Myspace, you're lucky if the image itself loads.
• Better relationship definitions. Facebook allows you to specify how you know someone, what classes you took, when you lived together, and even if you're a couple. You can then click links to see your "timeline", showing courses you took, who you took them with, when you lived with people and where, and other stuff. Myspace? "an unknown error has occured".
• Not owned by News Corp. ...
• This new API. I can't imagine Myspace opening up any of their information for this kind of thing. I was pleased but not surprised to see stuff about open source on Facebook's new developer section. I can't see Myspace ever embracing any of the OSS concepts.

What Myspace needs to do is realise that it has more users, more information about them, less specifically linked, so thus it has more potential. They have the ideas (on the School forums they have mostly-unused bulletin boards for craigslist-esque classifieds) but without the implementation, they just look like amateurs.

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[DarkDragonVKQ]

You forgot an important one (to me at least). Everything looks the same. No ugly layouts, no ugly colors, no annoying videos and music, etc.. (granted this is an easy fix in Firefox and Opera with a greasemonkey script)

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[Rachel Lucid]

I would still appreciate being able to set 'color schemes' of some kind in facebook, regardless of whether they're only schemes YOU see when you log in, or having users select from a preset series of schemes in order to prevent Color abuse. I could see this becoming very popular with Frats that have certain colors, or if people want a color scheme specific to their school/network.

I may have to tinker with this API a bit.

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[DarkDragonVKQ]

That'd actually be nice. As long as its not forced on everyone else I wouldn't have a problem with it.

Re:Take note, Murdoch

[Kadin2048]

Also, unlike MySpace, Facebook doesn't give me the urge to go out and stab people for making me try to look at their attempts to write HTML.

Whoever thought it was a good idea to let regular people design their own webpages needs to be put in front of a monitor, Clockwork Orange-style, and made to look at the results of their handiwork, forever.

Facebook does it right: you enter your information into little text blocks, and it generates the page. It's easy to search and link, because everything's categorized, and it doesn't encourage homicide.

Less Ads

[mozumder]

There's only 1 ad on a facebook page, compared to the 10 billion on the horrible myspace pages, nevermind the ads that myspace morons put on their own pages themselves.

Facebook is actually usable, whereas myspace is probably the worst site on the internet.

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[WillAffleckUW]

yeah, gotta admit I love that part.

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[jizziknight]

Not to nitpick, but IIRC there are two ads. One on the left under the menu, and one at the bottom of the page. The one on the left can also be bought by users for flyers, and shown to a particular group of people (I think), which is kinda cool. Let's also not forget that Facebook generally loads pretty quickly, whereas MySpace either takes forever or just doesn't load at all.

Facebook v. Myspace

[JimBobJoe]

The two sites take a different approach to things. I like to say that Facebook is better when you already have friends, and are using it to foster closer relationships. Myspace is better when you're trying to make friends.

I'm a bit more wary of Facebook though, it will sell your data to the highest bidder, whereas Myspace has a slightly higher regard for its users privacy.

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[mattpointblank]

That's true, which is why I say Myspace has the advantage since it enables "networking" in the "meeting new people" sense much more easily than Facebook does. However, as the posters above me have said, the site itself is horrible and doesn't do much to encourage tech-savvy users to stay with it.

With regards to the security; I am sceptical about Facebook; having heard some CIA link type stuff. On the other hand, Myspace seems much more underhanded (I don't trust News Corp for a second) and some of the stuff

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[neelm]

It might be nice to see facebook one day, but until it's open I don't see the point. Last thing I'm going to do is sign up to a facebook / myspace with a work email account - i'll get fired on my own, thank you very much.

The API...

[Lazbien]

Oh good... one more reason to return to the site more than the 22 times I do during the day already.

FaceBank, wait a minute

[coop247]

An early example is FaceBank, which allows students to keep track of how much money they have lent their friends

Since we're talking about college students, shouldn't this be "keep track of drug debts and unpaid gambling loans"