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Microsoft's Virtual Earth and the remixable web
Web 2.0 hacking with things like Virtual Earth is seductive but subject to potential lock-in. What we need are open data formats that can match the speed of hacking development that will make these services more plug and play. I wonder if microformats are up to that challenge.
Sections: Business Emerging Practice
Topics: microformats microsoft search where20 where2005
I'm at O'Reilly's Where 2.0 today. Microsoft has presented a neat application, Virtual Earth. It's not out yet, but you can see propaganda at the site I linked.
What's neat about this service is that they make explicit allowance for social applications. You will be able to do things like put up reviews of local businesses and integrate them with maps. I had been talking with Ryan King at technorati about this just two days ago in discussing a location microformat. I wanted to find a set of reviews for local gyms near my sister's house in San Francisco. Sure, she and her friends had ideas, but they were not tuned in to the kinds of things I look for (I am a workout addict).
Thinking about the geographic reviews application as I sit here listening to Tim O'Reilly, CEO of the crowd putting on the conference, the thing I am reminded of is the danger of lock-in. Right now, Virtual Earth is tightly integrated with MSN Spaces with plans to add other blogging services. Hmmm. Sounds like the old data lock-in story to me. Licensing will be free for non-commercial uses (what are those exactly?).
The good thing is that there seem to be a lot of competitors in this space. What we need is an open api, a microformat perhaps, to help push the interchangeability of these services for applications like geographically situated reviews. This will help insulate developers from the potential of having their data cut off as Tim O'Reilly has just warned is certainly within the realm of the possible. Such formats will also make it possible for companies to more easily introduce their services.
Bud posted this on June 30, 2005
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