For outsiders, coming to address the Silicon Valley crowd at an interent conference is a bit like running the gauntlet. The Valley is deep in one of its self-regarding frenzies of internet creativity, and woe betide anyone who doesn’t "get it."
Rupert Murdoch and Steve Ballmer have each managed to carry it off at this week’s Web 2.0 Summit - up to a point. The Valley has been calling for Murdoch’s MySpace to emulate Facebook and open up so that other developers create their own applications for the social network, and last night Murdoch was on hand as MySpace’s Chris DeWolfe announced just that. (We first reported DeWolfe’s decision to go this way back in June.)
Developers will get the chance later this year to try out their applications in a new "sandbox" - a controlled environment were a small percentage of users will be able to play with them, before MySpace decides if it is appropriate to unleash them on users at large. Also, developers won’t be able to make money from the "widgets" that carry their services on MySpace (a continuation of the policy that has made MySpace enemies in the past) - though they will be able to put adverts on the "control page" that users visit is they click through a widget.
Depending on how you look at it, MySpace’s approach is either measured or half-hearted. The muted response from the crowd last night suggested the latter, but the feedback today has been more positive. I spoke, for instance, to Max Mancini, eBay’s platform strategist, who thought it was a fair way for MySpace to "test their way in." Expect other social networks to follow fast.
Meanwhile, Ballmer seemed to have the Valley crowd uncharacteristically eating out of his hand with a barnstorming performance today that brought back memories of his most famous stage appearance. There is little love lost for Microsoft in these parts, but Ballmer raised the biggest applause of the day with a blustering promise that one day Microsoft’s puny search engine would get strong enough to stick it to Google (a sign, perhaps, of how Google’s days as darling of the Valley are starting to pass.)
Microsoft’s clearest gesture towards Web 2.0 today: a beta launch of Popfly, a tool for non-techies to create mash-ups of Web applications that use Silverlight, Microsoft’s answer to Adobe’s Flash. The rich media presentation technology has already won some very favourable reviews this year, and the Popfly demonstration today went down well. Who knows: maybe there’s a place for Microsoft in Valley hearts after all?
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