Facebook, The App Store, And The Sound Of Inevitability
“That is the sound of inevitability...” — I'm reminded of this quote from The Matrix as I read headline after headline around the blogosphere about how Facebook and Apple and their (at least relatively) closed ecosystems …
Context & Ripple Effects
Facebook had already prompted the question of whether it could become the next Microsoft in 2007. By April 2010, it had made a major platform change to open users’ data to other applications, making its role as an application layer more consequential.
Apple presents the contrasting form of control: iPhone and iPad do not support Flash, while Steve Jobs has said Flash will not be allowed on Apple platforms. The comparison matters because developers are confronting both a device-and-distribution gatekeeper and a social-data gatekeeper.
First-order effects
- Developers targeting iPhone and iPad must build without Flash support, concentrating product choices around Apple’s approved platform capabilities.
- Applications that integrate with Facebook gain access through Facebook’s expanded user-data platform, making Facebook’s terms and interfaces a direct dependency.
Second-order effects
- Adobe and Flash-dependent developers face pressure to redirect mobile product work toward technologies compatible with Apple devices.
- Developers building social features must balance Facebook integration against the risk that access to user data and distribution is governed by separate platform owners.
Third-order effects
- Apple’s control of device capabilities and Facebook’s control of social data point toward a platform market in which access to users is divided among distinct gatekeepers rather than owned by application makers.
- If these models persist, product strategy will increasingly depend on navigating platform rules as much as on shipping standalone software.
The trend: Consumer software is moving toward platform-controlled distribution and data access, with Apple and Facebook occupying different chokepoints.