I’ve been talking a lot about remixability lately, but Nat Torkington just pointed out that the web services and APIs from commercial organizations aren’t as infrastructural as we might think.
Offering the example of Amazon suing Alexaholic (for remixing Alexa’s data), he tells us that APIs are not “a commons of goodies to be built on top of for fun and profit, like open source software.” Here are his “six basic truths of free APIs:”
- Free APIs are not a god-given right. Businesses offer them for their own self-interested reasons. If you build on top of the API but aren’t delivering the value for the business that provides the API, your use of the API will probably go away.
- If you build your own business on top of an API, you need a contractual relationship to ensure the service doesn’t get taken away from you. These generally cost money.
- If you find a way to get something from a site that isn’t explicitly offered as something for you to build on, your use of it will probably be fought unless you’re delivering value as in (1).
- The provider of your API will find it easier to implement services on top of their API than you will. Therefore you have to add something of your own that’s difficult to replicate, something beyond a simple UI tweak or a feature like “search”, so that the business that provides the API doesn’t simply compete with you when you look like you’re succeeding.
- For these reasons, free APIs are a very poor substitute for having the source and the data and thus owning and controlling every piece of your application.
- For these reasons, there’s no such thing as a free API if you’re looking to build a business.
Surely Torkington means free as in free beer APIs, as many of the problems he cites arise because the data and services are not free as in free speech. And this leads to two things I want us to be aware of in libraries: giving over our data to companies that lock it up behind licenses that restrict how it can be reused and remixed is dangerous; and we have an opportunity — some would say responsibility — to build out some of that information infrastructure and deliver free as in free speech APIs and data for all to use.
remixability, mashups, self interest, public good, api, apis, free, free beer, free speech,
Related:
Posted April 30, 2007 by Casey
Categories: Libraries & Networked Information, Politics & Controversy, Technology. Tags: api, apis, free, free beer, free speech, mashups, public good, remixability, self interest.
No Comments
No comments yet.
Comments RSS
TrackBack Identifier URI
Leave a comment
User contributed tags for this post:
remixability (121) - api business models (74) - arap sex (68) - sex fak (67) - fak sex (58) - arap porno (52) - ???sex (47) - arap 69 (45) - arap 69 tv (44) - SEX ARAP (39) - free API (39) - sex tv2 (35) - soa (34) - WWW ARAP SEX (32) - WWW Arap sex com (30) - www.arap sex.com (30) - arap-69.tv (12) - arap pornosu (12) - www arap tv (11) - www arap tv com (11) - arap.sex.com (10) - sex fak you (10) - arap sex tv (10) - arab 69 (10) - business (10) - fak you (9) - ΠΟΡΝΟ (9) - arap sextv (9) - arap sex video (9) - you sexs (9) - www.arap.sex.com (8) - arap sex.com (8) - arap porn (8) - 89 com (8) - fak porno (8) - arap sexs (7) - six arap (7) - arap sex com (7) - www.arap sex (7) - www arap 69 tv (7) - www.arap.tv (7) - www arap sex tv (6) - grandma had more sex grandma sex stories (6) - arap six (6) - sex.arap (6) - bangla sex.3 (6) - bengali porno (6) - arap sexsi (6) - sexs tv (6) - bangladeshi porno (6) - sexy fak (5) - sexs fre (5) - six.arap (5) - www.arap.sex (5) - sex-arap.tv (5) - 8091220069870 (5) - www sex arap (4) - sexs tv2 (4) - arap-sex.tv (4) - free fak (4) - bengali porna (4) - 69 sex dreams tv (4) - free arap sex (4) - six fak (4) - xxxl sex v (4) - business self interest (4) - bengali sex stories (4) - arap.sex (4) - bangla porno (4) - www.arap porno (4) - canlı sexs pornosu (4) - sextv 2 (4) - www porna sex canlı (4) - bengali sex.com (4) - sex xxl fak (4) - arap.69.tv (4) - sex fre (4) - arap sex.tv (4) - www arap 69 (4) - 6 arap (4) - fak porn (3) - xxl arap (3) - fak sex video (3) - www.arap (3) - 89 X SEX TV (3) - vedeo sexs fre (3) - sex fak free (3) - fak for sex (3) - ???sex védeo (3) - sex.tv.2 (3) - free photo arab 69 tv (3) - sexs fak (3) - sex with great grandma (3) - bangla xxl (3) - arap six com (3) - arap sex t.v (3) - xxxl arap (3) - arap sex vidio (3) - sex.tv2 (3) - free vidio sexteacher (3) - fak sex move (3) - sex (3) - sextv 1 (3) - arab 69 tv (3) - sex arap tv (3) - good interest about business (2) - sex x ???sex (2) - fak you in filme (2) - www.arap.porno (2) - www.fre sex tv.com (2) - arap 69 sexs (2) - fak sexs (2) - sexsi fak (2) - SEXS,PORNOSU (2) - arab porn (2) - arap.porn (2) - SEXS FREE (2) - 69 sex tv (2) - WWW.YOU PORN ARAP,COM (2) - arap video (2) - www.sex arab.in (2) - canlı sex tv .com (2) - www 89 fak (2) - www.arap.69.tv (2) - www arap 89 com (2) - www/arap sex.com (2) - grandma sex (2) - sex.tv (2) - free sex fak (2) - free fak sex (2) - fak you sex (2) - sex video free cost 89.com (2) - 66.arap (2) - canli sex tv (2) - www.arap.sex.tv (2) - grandma sex.com (2) - www.arap porno.com (2) - πορνο sex (2) - www.canlı tv.com (2) - www.arap 69.com (2) - canlı t.v (2) - 69 sexs (2) - maisonbisson com (2) - arab-69.tv (2) - 3 ARAP TV (2) - www.arap porno com (2) - sex arap free vidio (2) - arap.sex.tv (2) - sex.tv.3 (2) - www.sex arap (2) -
