Brace yourself: the words “Welcome, Yahoo!” have appeared on the Official Google Blog. This isn’t some merger- or search-related announcement, however; Yahoo instead joined OpenSocial.
Yes, those mid-month rumors came true earlier today as Yahoo joined the likes of MySpace, LinkedIn, and Plaxo in support of OpenSocial specifications. And in that official blog post, Dan Peterson noted, “This addition means even more distribution for developers, encourages participation by even more websites, and, most importantly, results in more features for users all across the web.”
Yahoo Joins OpenSocial
Admittedly, there may still some fundamental problems – this morning, our own David Utter summed up OpenSocial and wrote, “Kind of sounds like ‘write once, run anywhere’, doesn’t it? I guess no one’s ever heard of Java.” Also, Peterson wasn’t able to provide much of a list of OpenSocial applications currently accessible to users, and Yahoo has even less than Google (see Orkut) in the way of successful social networks.
On the whole, though, this is at least a promising development from Google’s point of view. Since it and Yahoo typically stand on opposite sides of every line, getting the Sunnyvale-based company to join OpenSocial counts as a moral victory.
We just wish Google had found some less shocking way to express its joy.
