Introductions
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Aral Balkan
May 13, 2010, 9:46:40 AM5/13/10
to devrights
Please take a moment to briefly introduce yourselves.
e.g.,
Who are you?
What do you do?
What brought you here?
What would you like to contribute?
Thanks!
e.g.,
Who are you?
What do you do?
What brought you here?
What would you like to contribute?
Thanks!
Aral Balkan
May 13, 2010, 9:49:11 AM5/13/10
to devrights
Hi, I'm Aral, and I'm an interaction designer/developer and the author
of the Feathers and Feathers for Facebook iPhone apps.
I'm currently waiting for Facebook to tell me why they disabled my app
without notice when it is currently featured in the German and
Austrian app stores.
I'd like to help out any way I can in drafting a Developer's Bill of
Rights or a logo certification program that API providers can sign up
to if they are Developer Friendly.
Aral
<snip>
of the Feathers and Feathers for Facebook iPhone apps.
I'm currently waiting for Facebook to tell me why they disabled my app
without notice when it is currently featured in the German and
Austrian app stores.
I'd like to help out any way I can in drafting a Developer's Bill of
Rights or a logo certification program that API providers can sign up
to if they are Developer Friendly.
Aral
<snip>
@ikbenmartijn
May 13, 2010, 9:50:46 AM5/13/10
to devrights
Hi I'm Martijn,
I'm just a young developer (23) working in a university college as a
member of the mutimedia department. My main job is to create tools to
help facilitate the education of the students and the work of the
teachers there. Next to dev'ing we make instruction video's, podcasts,
screencasts, ... Made the first iTunes U site in Belgium (Benelux
actually - don't mean to get poshy :) )
I saw @Aral's tweet and at the same time was feeling very frustrated
over the Gowalla API :) Thought: Hey I can change this and here I
am :)
I'm just a young developer (23) working in a university college as a
member of the mutimedia department. My main job is to create tools to
help facilitate the education of the students and the work of the
teachers there. Next to dev'ing we make instruction video's, podcasts,
screencasts, ... Made the first iTunes U site in Belgium (Benelux
actually - don't mean to get poshy :) )
I saw @Aral's tweet and at the same time was feeling very frustrated
over the Gowalla API :) Thought: Hey I can change this and here I
am :)
Stuart Herbert
May 13, 2010, 9:57:21 AM5/13/10
to devrights
Hi everyone,
I'm Stuart, and I'm the Head of Engineering for Gradwell (where I'm
currently building an API for third-party developers to use). I'm also
an occasional PHP conference speaker and author.
I'm here because I want to build the right ecosystem in my day job for
third-party developers to use. And understanding the needs of those
third-party developers surely has to be an important part of getting
that ecosystem right.
I'd like to help out in any discussions by contributing feedback to
ideas and suggestions from someone who is building an API. And if
there's any other way I can help, I'm up for that too :)
Best regards,
Stu
--
I'm Stuart, and I'm the Head of Engineering for Gradwell (where I'm
currently building an API for third-party developers to use). I'm also
an occasional PHP conference speaker and author.
I'm here because I want to build the right ecosystem in my day job for
third-party developers to use. And understanding the needs of those
third-party developers surely has to be an important part of getting
that ecosystem right.
I'd like to help out in any discussions by contributing feedback to
ideas and suggestions from someone who is building an API. And if
there's any other way I can help, I'm up for that too :)
Best regards,
Stu
--
Pelle Wessman
May 13, 2010, 10:05:36 AM5/13/10
to devrights
Hi, I'm Pelle and I work as a web developer for the swedish company
Good Old. I'm an active open source contributor, working a lot with
eg. Drupal. I'm mainly doing PHP, JavaScript and HTML/CSS.
I've been working on third party integrations like Facebook Connect,
OEmbed, OAuth based login solutions etc and come across a fair bit of
odd demands, bugs and silence from providers.
I would like to take part in figuring out what we as developers should
demand from providers and how we can shed light on some of the issues
that are buried deep down in the providers API-terms that nobody
reads.
I can be found as @voxpelli on eg. Twitter and GitHub.
/ Pelle
Good Old. I'm an active open source contributor, working a lot with
eg. Drupal. I'm mainly doing PHP, JavaScript and HTML/CSS.
I've been working on third party integrations like Facebook Connect,
OEmbed, OAuth based login solutions etc and come across a fair bit of
odd demands, bugs and silence from providers.
I would like to take part in figuring out what we as developers should
demand from providers and how we can shed light on some of the issues
that are buried deep down in the providers API-terms that nobody
reads.
I can be found as @voxpelli on eg. Twitter and GitHub.
/ Pelle
Fending
May 13, 2010, 10:10:31 AM5/13/10
to devrights
Who: Brian Fending, owner of development shop Fending Group in the US.
I'm a dev who employs other devs to make righteous stuff happen.
What: We do Drupal dev almost exclusively, creating line-of-business
apps for mid-size businesses and partnering with startups to bring
their online products to market. </pitch>
Why: Everybody loves an API. Documented ones are even better.
Documented APIs that work as advertised? Rare. We've come up against
some tricky situations where we had to walk away from business because
availability wasn't guaranteed or even supported on the targeted API.
We come across that a fair bit in the travel & hospitality industry.
Every API we develop - all of them private at this point - include
implicit support, because we're making money from them. Likewise, just
because a company has made an API public or semi-public doesn't
exclude them from a similar obligation - the agreement to use that API
to bring many more customers and dedication to use the platform should
be enough for such firms/vendors to make an explicit commitment to
"make it right" for everybody.
How: I have some talented designers I work with who I am willing to
pay for the logo/badge design you mentioned. Fending Group can also
contribute some cash to get the movement going, if that's what it'll
take. As far as soft goods, we do drupal dev. If you need something
more than a wiki, we can contribute in that way, too.
I'm a dev who employs other devs to make righteous stuff happen.
What: We do Drupal dev almost exclusively, creating line-of-business
apps for mid-size businesses and partnering with startups to bring
their online products to market. </pitch>
Why: Everybody loves an API. Documented ones are even better.
Documented APIs that work as advertised? Rare. We've come up against
some tricky situations where we had to walk away from business because
availability wasn't guaranteed or even supported on the targeted API.
We come across that a fair bit in the travel & hospitality industry.
Every API we develop - all of them private at this point - include
implicit support, because we're making money from them. Likewise, just
because a company has made an API public or semi-public doesn't
exclude them from a similar obligation - the agreement to use that API
to bring many more customers and dedication to use the platform should
be enough for such firms/vendors to make an explicit commitment to
"make it right" for everybody.
How: I have some talented designers I work with who I am willing to
pay for the logo/badge design you mentioned. Fending Group can also
contribute some cash to get the movement going, if that's what it'll
take. As far as soft goods, we do drupal dev. If you need something
more than a wiki, we can contribute in that way, too.
fdelin
May 13, 2010, 10:14:16 AM5/13/10
to devrights
I'm Fredrik, owner of a small design/dev studio in Spain
(quickform.net).
We mostly build sites for own clients or help larger agencies with
production work. Mostly we rely on services developed in-house, but of
course API's is and will change the way internet works forever. I saw
Aral's tweets about facebook and I felt for him. I can also see the
other side of the coin so a discussion is totally due and most
relevant. Better nip it while still a bud!
What I would love to see is a movement primarily raising awareness of
the issue and point out that it is not only a problem for us
developers. Some of do charge for our services and when they break
(for no apparent reason) it is our customers that gets hurt. I'd like
to see more people than developers involved in this! It's also a fact
that even a giant like facebook owe a lot of their success to us the
developers. It's in everyones best interest that we can get some
simple rules (or guide lines if you will) down on paper and have
public services adhere to them.
Willing to help with anything from ideas, input, discussions,
conforming to what we agree, and of course spreading the word both in
dev circles and public.
-fred
Pilky
May 13, 2010, 10:19:31 AM5/13/10
to devrights
Hey all,
I'm Martin Pilkington, a Mac/iPad developer from the UK and the lone
person behind M Cubed Software.
I'm here for two reasons:
1. I like the idea of a sort of dev friendly certification for API
developers and would like to see this taken up
2. I'm opposed to the idea of it being a "bill of rights" and want to
fight for the API developer's as well, so anything that gets decided
doesn't impede their ability to make changes or innovate
Thanks
Martin
I'm Martin Pilkington, a Mac/iPad developer from the UK and the lone
person behind M Cubed Software.
I'm here for two reasons:
1. I like the idea of a sort of dev friendly certification for API
developers and would like to see this taken up
2. I'm opposed to the idea of it being a "bill of rights" and want to
fight for the API developer's as well, so anything that gets decided
doesn't impede their ability to make changes or innovate
Thanks
Martin
Ross Ritchey
May 13, 2010, 10:21:12 AM5/13/10
to devrights
Hi, My name is Ross Ritchey and I am a Web Devigner.
At the moment, I build online training content and its delivery
mechanisms (An XML-driven interface with an Actionscript 3 front-
end.)
In my personal life, I work with a wide variety of tools, with my
main
focus being on PHP, MySQL, Flex/Flash.
I am here to help out in any way I can, whether that is by giving
feedback and advice to API creators, critical feedback in the
standards-process, even web development if needed. I think the ways
that API creators work with and deal with developers has been
something that has needed standardized for a very long time. If it
would have been standardized, perhaps we could have avoided this
whole
Apple vs Everyone gunk that has been filling the media of late.
I can be reached @ross_ritchey on Twitter or by email from the group.
At the moment, I build online training content and its delivery
mechanisms (An XML-driven interface with an Actionscript 3 front-
end.)
In my personal life, I work with a wide variety of tools, with my
main
focus being on PHP, MySQL, Flex/Flash.
I am here to help out in any way I can, whether that is by giving
feedback and advice to API creators, critical feedback in the
standards-process, even web development if needed. I think the ways
that API creators work with and deal with developers has been
something that has needed standardized for a very long time. If it
would have been standardized, perhaps we could have avoided this
whole
Apple vs Everyone gunk that has been filling the media of late.
I can be reached @ross_ritchey on Twitter or by email from the group.
Aral Balkan
May 13, 2010, 10:37:00 AM5/13/10
to devr...@googlegroups.com
Hi Brian,
> How: I have some talented designers I work with who I am willing to
> pay for the logo/badge design you mentioned.
Sounds like we could really use your help there.
> Fending Group can also
> contribute some cash to get the movement going, if that's what it'll
> take.
Not sure what we would use it for at the moment but it's good to know.
If this is going to be a sustainable, long-term effort, I'm sure we
will need to think about its structure and funding at some point in
the future.
>As far as soft goods, we do drupal dev. If you need something
> more than a wiki, we can contribute in that way, too.
I was only thinking of a wiki as a quick way to let people collaborate
with minimum admin/overhead. If you can set something simple up in
Drupal I'd be more than happy with that.
Aral
> How: I have some talented designers I work with who I am willing to
> pay for the logo/badge design you mentioned.
> Fending Group can also
> contribute some cash to get the movement going, if that's what it'll
> take.
If this is going to be a sustainable, long-term effort, I'm sure we
will need to think about its structure and funding at some point in
the future.
>As far as soft goods, we do drupal dev. If you need something
> more than a wiki, we can contribute in that way, too.
with minimum admin/overhead. If you can set something simple up in
Drupal I'd be more than happy with that.
Aral
Aral Balkan
May 13, 2010, 10:38:30 AM5/13/10
to devr...@googlegroups.com
Hey Martin,
I completely agree that the items set in the certification should not
be unreasonable. They should be so basic, so fundamental that an API
provider would look evil if they were to oppose it.
If we make them onerous, this won't work.
Aral
I completely agree that the items set in the certification should not
be unreasonable. They should be so basic, so fundamental that an API
provider would look evil if they were to oppose it.
If we make them onerous, this won't work.
Aral
Naz
May 13, 2010, 10:52:43 AM5/13/10
to devrights
Hi I'm Carlos Nazareno (call me Naz)
I'm a game developer and interactive media artist working mostly on
the Flash Platform (mucked around with Processing and Arduino too).
Twitter brought me here.
I'd like to bring in my views and those of dev friends in my circle.
The topic is a really weird one.
IMHO, honestly and at first glance, developers have no rights when
using APIs. You use them at your own risk and at the whim of
environment owners (example of the worst of this: App iPhone dev
program where they can reject your app just because they feel like
it.).
Thinking further though, yes, developers do have rights when it comes
to APIs if you're contributing to the richness of the ecosystem of the
API owner. For example: Facebook -- 3rd party apps have brought a
level of richness to Facebook via apps that allowed it to crush
Friendster.
So yes, API owners should abide by certain principles to not screw
developers who have chosen to invest time and add to the value to
their ecosystem.
-Naz
I'm a game developer and interactive media artist working mostly on
the Flash Platform (mucked around with Processing and Arduino too).
Twitter brought me here.
I'd like to bring in my views and those of dev friends in my circle.
The topic is a really weird one.
IMHO, honestly and at first glance, developers have no rights when
using APIs. You use them at your own risk and at the whim of
environment owners (example of the worst of this: App iPhone dev
program where they can reject your app just because they feel like
it.).
Thinking further though, yes, developers do have rights when it comes
to APIs if you're contributing to the richness of the ecosystem of the
API owner. For example: Facebook -- 3rd party apps have brought a
level of richness to Facebook via apps that allowed it to crush
Friendster.
So yes, API owners should abide by certain principles to not screw
developers who have chosen to invest time and add to the value to
their ecosystem.
-Naz
Neil
May 13, 2010, 10:53:02 AM5/13/10
to devrights
Hi, I'm Neil.
By day I'm the head developer at a digital marketing agency, where we
often deal with Twitter and Facebook APIs.
By night I'm an independent iPhone and (aspiring) web service
developer.
I therefore am quite interested in this discussion from the
perspective of using APIs, but also to ensure any APIs I create can be
as developer friendly as possible.
I'm on Twitter here: @NeilSmith85
Thanks,
Neil
By day I'm the head developer at a digital marketing agency, where we
often deal with Twitter and Facebook APIs.
By night I'm an independent iPhone and (aspiring) web service
developer.
I therefore am quite interested in this discussion from the
perspective of using APIs, but also to ensure any APIs I create can be
as developer friendly as possible.
I'm on Twitter here: @NeilSmith85
Thanks,
Neil
Robert Turrall
May 13, 2010, 11:17:10 AM5/13/10
to devr...@googlegroups.com
Hi
I'm Robert Turrall. In addition to being a Flash developer (AS3 and all that entails), I also develop Facebook and other Apps which rely on the use of third-party APIs and earn part of my income doing so.
Because I rely on APIs to complete work for my clients or to support sites/Apps of my own, the stability of those APIs is a huge issue for me. I've suffered numerous sleepless nights and delayed deadlines because of Facebook's random and frankly unprofessional approach to maintaining and "improving" their API.
This initiative gets my support because we really do need to do something about the standard of some heavily-used APIs out there. The web is so intricately woven and inter-dependent now. Without stable and reliable APIs we, as developers, are only going to find it harder and harder to create stable solutions for our clients.
Looking forward to contributing.
Robert
I'm Robert Turrall. In addition to being a Flash developer (AS3 and all that entails), I also develop Facebook and other Apps which rely on the use of third-party APIs and earn part of my income doing so.
Because I rely on APIs to complete work for my clients or to support sites/Apps of my own, the stability of those APIs is a huge issue for me. I've suffered numerous sleepless nights and delayed deadlines because of Facebook's random and frankly unprofessional approach to maintaining and "improving" their API.
This initiative gets my support because we really do need to do something about the standard of some heavily-used APIs out there. The web is so intricately woven and inter-dependent now. Without stable and reliable APIs we, as developers, are only going to find it harder and harder to create stable solutions for our clients.
Looking forward to contributing.
Robert
Will
May 13, 2010, 11:44:09 AM5/13/10
to devrights
Hi,
I'm Will Young (@whatupwilly). I'm a developer (java, rails, .NET)
and product manager.
My day job is currently the Product Manager of the early-stages
Zappos.com Public API (http://groups.google.com/group/zappos_api and/
or @zappos_api). We are just getting kick started with our API and
similar to Stu, we want to build the right ecosystem for our third
party developers and partners.
I'm looking forward to hearing this groups discussion and contributing
from a developer and API provider's perspective.
Will Young
Zappos.com API Product Manager
I'm Will Young (@whatupwilly). I'm a developer (java, rails, .NET)
and product manager.
My day job is currently the Product Manager of the early-stages
Zappos.com Public API (http://groups.google.com/group/zappos_api and/
or @zappos_api). We are just getting kick started with our API and
similar to Stu, we want to build the right ecosystem for our third
party developers and partners.
I'm looking forward to hearing this groups discussion and contributing
from a developer and API provider's perspective.
Will Young
Zappos.com API Product Manager
phunehehe
May 13, 2010, 12:36:15 PM5/13/10
to devrights
Hello,
My name is Hoang Xuan Phu (Phu is the given name).
I'm a software developer at multinc.com. We have been working with
Twitter and Facebook API.
I saw @stuherbert's tweet about developers' rights and think it makes
perfect sense. While "they" provide the service, "we" are the ones who
make the service valuable. There are good and bad services, so there
should be a way to recognize what is what.
I would like to help in discussions, as well as spreading the word.
I'm also happy if there's something else I can help.
Phu
My name is Hoang Xuan Phu (Phu is the given name).
I'm a software developer at multinc.com. We have been working with
Twitter and Facebook API.
I saw @stuherbert's tweet about developers' rights and think it makes
perfect sense. While "they" provide the service, "we" are the ones who
make the service valuable. There are good and bad services, so there
should be a way to recognize what is what.
I would like to help in discussions, as well as spreading the word.
I'm also happy if there's something else I can help.
Phu
Nik Fletcher
May 13, 2010, 1:40:53 PM5/13/10
to devrights
Hi Guys
I'm Nik Fletcher (@nikf). By day I work for a small Mac OS X developer
(that develops a desktop app that interacts with a number of web
services - Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, Google Reader), and by night I
develop an iPhone application called Happening (http://www.happening-
app.com) - an iPhone client for Yahoo's Upcoming service. My
experience with the Upcoming API has been a little, er, rocky -
something that unintentionally garnered the attention of a moderately
well-know tech blog (http://techcrunch.com/2010/04/04/happening-
upcoming-iphone-app/). Since then there's been some more fun and
games, with Yahoo potentially now restricting further the terms of API
usage. Yay.
Having had experiences at the both day job, and side project, with
APIs that twist change and morph, I hope the group can ensure that
companies offering APIs do so with clarity, accountability and
community engagement.
Cheers
-Nik
--
http://nikf.org
I'm Nik Fletcher (@nikf). By day I work for a small Mac OS X developer
(that develops a desktop app that interacts with a number of web
services - Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, Google Reader), and by night I
develop an iPhone application called Happening (http://www.happening-
app.com) - an iPhone client for Yahoo's Upcoming service. My
experience with the Upcoming API has been a little, er, rocky -
something that unintentionally garnered the attention of a moderately
well-know tech blog (http://techcrunch.com/2010/04/04/happening-
upcoming-iphone-app/). Since then there's been some more fun and
games, with Yahoo potentially now restricting further the terms of API
usage. Yay.
Having had experiences at the both day job, and side project, with
APIs that twist change and morph, I hope the group can ensure that
companies offering APIs do so with clarity, accountability and
community engagement.
Cheers
-Nik
--
http://nikf.org
Myron Ahn
May 13, 2010, 11:33:24 PM5/13/10
to devrights
Nice to meet you all!
(1) I'm Myron and I'm part of the Engineering team at factual.com.
<blurb>Factual's mission is to create a platform where anyone can
share and mash open data on any subject. Our goal is to provide the
tools and services to curate high-quality data and make it accessible
everywhere.</blurb>
(2) Currently we're providing numerous APIs to access and improve our
data, and groups like this could be very valuable in developing
standards to help people like us develop rich APIs.
(3) We're keenly interested in the discussion so that we can improve
our API and our general service to the developer community.
(4) We'd love to contribute to the discussion in any way possible!
-Myron
(1) I'm Myron and I'm part of the Engineering team at factual.com.
<blurb>Factual's mission is to create a platform where anyone can
share and mash open data on any subject. Our goal is to provide the
tools and services to curate high-quality data and make it accessible
everywhere.</blurb>
(2) Currently we're providing numerous APIs to access and improve our
data, and groups like this could be very valuable in developing
standards to help people like us develop rich APIs.
(3) We're keenly interested in the discussion so that we can improve
our API and our general service to the developer community.
(4) We'd love to contribute to the discussion in any way possible!
-Myron
Bill Michels
May 14, 2010, 12:15:27 PM5/14/10
to devrights
Hi all -
I'm Bill and I am also part of Factual - see Myron's <blurb></blurb>.
Our ecosystem is just getting started, and in an effort to make sure
we do right by our developers I am interested to see how this
conversation develops, as well as learn if there are any standards
that Factual should be adopting.
-bill
I'm Bill and I am also part of Factual - see Myron's <blurb></blurb>.
Our ecosystem is just getting started, and in an effort to make sure
we do right by our developers I am interested to see how this
conversation develops, as well as learn if there are any standards
that Factual should be adopting.
-bill
Fending
May 14, 2010, 8:35:17 PM5/14/10
to devrights
Design: I'll have a designer take a stab at a logo & a few comps for
your badge concept. We'll have something soon; hopefully others will
do the same to create a breadth of options!
CMS: The Wiki v. Drupal v. WordPress debate was sort of settled (WP)
before it began in another thread and life's short ~ still, I'm
certain there's benefit to be had, so I'm going to build something
awesome out in Drupal anyway. If the you & the group like it enough to
use or adapt, that's all the better. ;)
/@fending
your badge concept. We'll have something soon; hopefully others will
do the same to create a breadth of options!
CMS: The Wiki v. Drupal v. WordPress debate was sort of settled (WP)
before it began in another thread and life's short ~ still, I'm
certain there's benefit to be had, so I'm going to build something
awesome out in Drupal anyway. If the you & the group like it enough to
use or adapt, that's all the better. ;)
/@fending
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