CivicActions

When I learned to ski, it was difficult to 'get' that when I wanted to slow down...I needed to lean down the hill. That was just plain scary.

In the early days of the net, it was similarly difficult to learn that to build bigger networks meant that I had to let go of more control. As a business person, I've had years of conditioning that 'control' was the biggest key to success. Perhaps it's the nature of the network protocol itself that rewards openness.

Four of the top social websites, Digg, YouTube, Facebook, and Flickr have all recently opened up their API's (Application Programming Interfaces). This gives developers and other businesses an opportunity to reach into their data and create new applications (and business opportunities). It's a bit scary to do for the traditional control freak - because it's possible that your competition could reach into your community and 'steal' it (if you're into old school thinking and a belief system that that equates these relationships to property).

From MuhammadSaleem.com:
social networking: facebook - launched their api or rather the f8 development platform on may 24. in less than 3 months, there have been thousands of facebook applications developed, which integrate the the smallest to the most established sites with facebook. this move has caused the site to grow almost 4-times as fast as myspace and has increased the site’s valuation 3-fold.

If you want to speed up...lean into the hill;)
If you want to grow your network...open it up!