hi5 Platform enables third-party developers to deeply integrate, promote and monetize their OpenSocial applications within the world’s 8th most-trafficked website. Applications offer hi5’s 80 million registered members new ways for social interaction and self-expression. hi5 Networks, Inc. will help establish the OpenSocial Foundation.
Now, third-party developers will be able to leverage a suite of common APIs, including those of OpenSocial, to create social applications for members of hi5, which is ranked as the #1 social network in over 20 nations. The hi5 Platform also provides ways for developers to deeply embed, spread and monetize their applications within hi5. With less than 25% active user overlap with any of the other leading social networks, hi5 presents a significant growth opportunity for developers’ applications.
In addition to launching its developer platform, hi5 Networks, Inc. is also joining as a founding member of the OpenSocial Foundation, a new non-profit organization jointly proposed by Yahoo!, MySpace and Google last week.
“From the very beginning, hi5 has played an active role and contributed significantly to advancing the goals and technical specifications of OpenSocial,” said Joe Kraus, director of product management at Google and another early contributor to the OpenSocial initiative. “I congratulate the hi5 team on the launch of its platform, and am excited that developers now have a cumulative potential audience across the OpenSocial community of hundreds of millions worldwide.”
In total, there are now over 7,700 commercial and independent developers from around the world who have registered to build applications for hi5’s membership. With registration, they gain access to the hi5 Developer Console, which enables them to add, edit and manage their hi5 applications right from their hi5 profile.
The hi5 Platform is also the first OpenSocial-enabled platform to launch with numerous user distribution channels for developers’ apps, including notifications, invites, messages, friend updates and more.
