API Is The Community
DashBuddy: A call to the Tumblr team
This is an open comment to Tumblr dev/community staff - and I’m posting this on my Tumblr blog too.
I understand that you guys are hugely busy, and that in the grand scheme of things API support for community programmers is hardly a priority. We’re all devs here, I don’t think anyone expects constant interaction.
You’re absolutely right — we’ve been letting down our developer community. This is an extremely high-priority for Derek and me, and something that our Engineering team (especially JB) has been pulling extra hours to help with.
We don’t, today, have engineers dedicated to supporting our developer community — something we’re working to change as quickly as possible. You guys have been doing unbelievable work for Tumblr users, and we want to do everything possible to support your efforts.
Thank you so much for the thoughtful note. I’m sorry to let you down.
P.S. If empowering incredible developers is your kind of thing, we’d love to chat.
If you [in the sense of “one”] are going to offer an API, view it as a product to be designed, managed, and supported as a distinct entity; it must work in harmony with the “core” product, but an API that’s a second class citizen in the company is a second class product. [ref: this]
Timely post as I have thought a lot about the challenges faced in supporting API’s and the developers that rely upon these API’s. Whitney is spot on when he says:
API that’s a second class citizen in the company is a second class product.
The Internet only became interesting and useful when a mechanism was created to easily document, access and link together disparate bits of data in the form of documents across the vastness of cyberspace. Thus URL’s and HTTP became the core foundation of this new organism called the Web. HTML become the language to form data into these shareable, linked documents.
In the second age of the Internet, we are now linking not simply documents, but bits of data with context driven by end applications. These applications are talking to each other, and this mass of data that is being shared and manipulated and analyzed has immensely more value than held in any one application or data silo.
That is why API’s are so vital and important. As important as the community of users are for the growth of an application, it is the API that will take a mere application and expose it beyond its own silo out to the community of the Internet. Here it can participate in the creation of ever more valuable data that enriches user content and enriches that user’s experience with the application. Thus, it will not be enough to just foster and grow the user community. Those websites that can understand and grow the community of developers around its API will be just as important for the continued growth and long-term relevance of their service. Those services that get this will become the platforms of the future.
I am glad to see that Tumblr recognizes this. There are many others that are ignoring the API as a mere extension. That is a fundamental mistake. In the early stages it is understandable as you got to develop a solid product and generate user traction. Once you have hit that inflection point however, it is critical to have a strategy in place around the API. Startups that ignore this do so at there own risk. The API is not simply another community, it is THE community.
(via whitneymcn)
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