• The Guardian, Thursday, December 13, 2007 10:45 AM

Facebook is opening up the Facebook Platform to other social networks, which means that software apps developed for Facebook can run on other social sites with no added work required by the developer. The company will also license Facebook Platform methods and tags to other platforms.

Facebook's platform extension succeeds a similar announcement by popular UK rival Bebo, which unveiled its Open Application Platform today, but the Guardian points out that Facebook's move is really aimed more at Google's cross-platform consortium, OpenSocial. Facebook's platform is more established than its competitors, with thousands of developers.

It will be interesting to see if rivals like LinkedIn and Ning--both members of OpenSocial--decide to join Facebook's software network, too. They might be reticent about sharing software and data with a competitor. Google's might be construed as less of a direct competitor by the same sites, many of which are already members of OpenSocial.

Read the whole story at The Guardian »