• Time, Monday, June 9, 2008 11:32 AM

Everyone in tech wants what Microsoft has: A software platform like Windows that so thoroughly dominates its market, that software developers are compelled to create programs for it. But now that the platform wars are moving to the Web, Time's Josh Quittner believes that several contenders will emerge; choosing a winner between Apple, Google and Facebook's might be a little like saying 'which one dominates the food market: chicken, beef or lobster?

Why? Because thanks to the Web, the winners of the next platform wars stand to make billions selling everything from devices (Apple) to online advertising (Google and Facebook) to services such as movies, music, and computing (Apple, Apple, and Google). But there's far more at stake than money, Quittner says; this is a battle for control of the Internet.

It all started last year with Facebook, a social networking startup enjoying runaway success, opening up its platform to third party developers. The "open" idea then became a movement among tech companies, with Google, Apple and others following suit. Why did the open platform movement start with social networks? Because this second phase of the Internet, dubbed "Web 2.0", is all about connecting people. The next phase is about controlling, maintaining and profiting from those connections.

Read the whole story at Time »