• GigaOm, Thursday, December 13, 2007 10:45 AM

Bebo on Wednesday opened its doors to software developers, in a move that was closely modeled on Facebook. The Web's No. 3 social network with 40 million uses, Bebo intends to work closely with Facebook to ensure that developers don't have to put too much effort into transferring those programs built for Facebook to its Open Application Platform.

It looks like the UK-based social site's strategy is to be accessible to software developers everywhere. Aside from having its own platform, Bebo is also part of Google's OpenSocial, an initiative to make inter-operable software applications across multiple social networks. Company CEO Michael Birch says Bebo wanted to get its own platform ready before the Google alliance goes live. By the way, Birch said he expects OpenSocial's launch to take place early next year.

At the product launch in San Francisco, the Bebo CEO admitted his company, whose user base is mostly from the UK, was following Facebook in enhancing its developer application programming interface (API). "We're trying to take the great product and utility of Facebook and wrap that around the content and self-expression of MySpace," Birch said. He added that Bebo's compatibility with Facebook would allow thousands of developers to run their apps on both social networks.

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