Japan’s mixi has launched its OpenSocial Container for all users!
September 17th, 2009 | Published in Google OpenSocial
Hello! My name is Yoichiro Tanaka, and I belong to the Platform Team of mixi, Inc. "mixi" is currently the most popular social networking service (SNS) in Japan and has more than 17 million registered users. I am happy to announce that we have released "mixi apps" which is based on OpenSocial to all of our users. As of September 4th, more than 220 apps have already been registered and launched!
Background
mixi was originally launched in February 2004 as one of the first social networking services in Japan. It lets users create profiles, make friends with other users, post diaries, discuss in communities, share pictures and music with friends, etc.
mixi apps is a new service which lets social application providers develop applications that use social graphs formed within mixi, and provide these applications to mixi users. To achieve this, we chose OpenSocial as the best solution.
In order to be ready with a quality set of applications for our public launch, we have been running a beta version of mixi apps for our developers since last December.
Applications
Since our launch of mixi apps, we are finding some applications that are substantially more popular than others. Here's two of the more popular applications.
The first application is "Kanji test" produced by Drecom. It challenges users, who compete against each other, to write down how to read Kanji characters (also known as to "furiganize"). It also shows the ranking of the number of Kanji sets that the user successfully furiganized. In the relatively short period since it has been available to users, it has skyrocketed in popularity and already has over three hundred thousand users!
The next application is "Recollect sketch" produced by REAL. Users are given a theme, and are challenged to draw it entirely from memory! What results is usually a very unique and funny image which users can share and enjoy with friends. This application is visually entertaining and social, and it already has about one hundred thousand users.
The preceding applications are just a sample of the continually growing application directory of mixi apps, which averages several new applications per day!
Supported Features
Upcoming Supported Features
mixi Ad Program
In addition to mixi apps, we have also recently announced the "mixi Ad Program". This service is one of the business support programs from mixi for developers. If you decide to join this service, ads will be shown within your application, and you will make profits through revenue sharing based on your application's page view. This service has already started from September 3rd, 2009.
The features of "mixi Ad Program" are the following:
More information on this service can be found at:
http://developer.mixi.co.jp/appli/mixi_adprogram/adprogram_info (Note: this site is in Japanese)
We believe this production release of "mixi apps" and overall support of the OpenSocial standards will enable us to easily continue innovating on compelling future social services for our users. In addition, we hope that our business support programs will greatly contribute to developing the market of mixi apps.
Background
mixi was originally launched in February 2004 as one of the first social networking services in Japan. It lets users create profiles, make friends with other users, post diaries, discuss in communities, share pictures and music with friends, etc.
mixi apps is a new service which lets social application providers develop applications that use social graphs formed within mixi, and provide these applications to mixi users. To achieve this, we chose OpenSocial as the best solution.
In order to be ready with a quality set of applications for our public launch, we have been running a beta version of mixi apps for our developers since last December.
Applications
Since our launch of mixi apps, we are finding some applications that are substantially more popular than others. Here's two of the more popular applications.
The first application is "Kanji test" produced by Drecom. It challenges users, who compete against each other, to write down how to read Kanji characters (also known as to "furiganize"). It also shows the ranking of the number of Kanji sets that the user successfully furiganized. In the relatively short period since it has been available to users, it has skyrocketed in popularity and already has over three hundred thousand users!
The next application is "Recollect sketch" produced by REAL. Users are given a theme, and are challenged to draw it entirely from memory! What results is usually a very unique and funny image which users can share and enjoy with friends. This application is visually entertaining and social, and it already has about one hundred thousand users.
The preceding applications are just a sample of the continually growing application directory of mixi apps, which averages several new applications per day!
Supported Features
- OpenSocial 0.8.1 core APIs (People, Activities, Persistence, and Invite).
- The gadgets "core" and "feature-Specific" APIs (mostly supported).
- Partly supports Albums API in OpenSocial 0.9.
- A mixi specific "Community API," which allows application access to mixi community (or group) information along with its members.
Upcoming Supported Features
- Sending a notification between users using a requestSendMessage function.
- Sending a event of app's life-cycle for developers.
mixi Ad Program
In addition to mixi apps, we have also recently announced the "mixi Ad Program". This service is one of the business support programs from mixi for developers. If you decide to join this service, ads will be shown within your application, and you will make profits through revenue sharing based on your application's page view. This service has already started from September 3rd, 2009.
The features of "mixi Ad Program" are the following:
- Registry and usage fee are free!
- Both corporate and individual developers can join this program.
- Ordering and confirming your reports is easy through a single management page.
- Assured profit of a minimum of 0.01 yen per page view.
More information on this service can be found at:
http://developer.mixi.co.jp/
We believe this production release of "mixi apps" and overall support of the OpenSocial standards will enable us to easily continue innovating on compelling future social services for our users. In addition, we hope that our business support programs will greatly contribute to developing the market of mixi apps.