Interesting commentary on the hijacking and usurpation of open protocols by web companies intent on making a profit by closing their ecosystems via non-standard apps layered over HTTP. As Mattheij notes, this is very similar to the way AOL, CompuServe and other commercial providers used to lock in their users. Now, instead of running proprietary systems over layer 2-4 protocols (as AOL et al used to do), vendors are running them over layer 5 (or, for OSI purists, layer 7) protocols, with proprietary APIs designed to hook others into their closed systems (think Facebook or Google logins). The end result is the same, and it’s a very bad result.
Mattheij writes
Please open up your protocols, commit to keeping them open and publish a specification. And please never do what twitter did (start open, then close as soon as you gain traction).
I completely concur.
Address of the bookmark: http://jacquesmattheij.com/aol-20
