

Think APP.net's Just a Twitter Clone? Then, You're Missing the Point - teawithcarl
http://gigaom.com/2012/08/13/think-app-net-is-just-a-twitter-clone-then-youre-missing-the-point/
by Mathew Ingram, GigaOm
======
natrius
This is wishful thinking. App.net describes itself as essentially a third-
party-developer-friendly Twitter with user-friendly privacy practices.

From their FAQ:

 _"OK, great, but what exactly is this product you will be delivering?

As a member, you'll have a new social graph and real-time feed that you access
from an App.net mobile application or website. At first, the user experience
will be very similar to what Twitter was like before it turned into a media
company. On a forward basis, we will focus on expanding our core experience by
nurturing a powerful ecosystem based on 3rd-party developer built "apps". This
is why we think the name "App.net" is appropriate for this service.

From a developer perspective, you will be able to read and write to a Twitter-
like API. Developers behaving in good faith will have free reign to build
alternate UIs, new business models of their own, and whatever they can dream
up."_

Notice how the only differences between their described product and Twitter
are the two factors I mentioned above.

Developers don't build Twitter-based products because they need a stream-as-a-
service to build upon. They build them because there are users there. This is
why I don't understand the App.net hype.

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rdudekul
"It would a huge benefit to society if we can get with social networking to
where we are with email today."

If Twitter, Facebook and other Social networks are controlling their APIs,
they may as well choose to create restrictions around App.Net accessing the
APIs. So do you think App.Net will be successful in creating this open
platform?

~~~
MisterBastahrd
If you want something to get where email is today, you don't do it through an
API. You do it through a standard protocol.

We already have something that handles messages from all over the world. It's
called Usenet.

~~~
rdudekul
Thanks for the clarification. I like many misunderstood the project scope.

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dsl
I think a lot of people are "missing the point" because of the poor job Dalton
is doing of describing what exactly he is trying to do. By the score of my
comment [1] on the original announcement a lot of people agree.

1\. <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4241821>

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jdonaldson
They keep inviting comparisons to e-mail and instant messaging, and they keep
insisting how app.net is not twitter. In many ways, all we know at this point
is what app.net is not, and not what it is designed to do.

The additional problem in all of this is that they're selling this service to
developers, not users. Users are not going to care whether they use app.net,
twitter, or whatever. Most are just wanting to see what Oprah or Shaq are
going to say next.

I see this project as more of an expression of collective frustration on
behalf of anyone working in social media. I don't see it as a viable service.

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RossDM
That's exactly what it is, a Twitter clone. The inspiration is clear from
looking at the UI mockups and API. <https://github.com/appdotnet/api-
spec/blob/master/objects.md>

Maybe it will turn into something else someday, but not today.

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amirmansour
APP.net = ghost town social network with a fee.

------
tkahn6
Can someone give an example of an application that would be built on top of
App.net?

