Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Facebook Cuts Off Competitor Prisma's API Access (nymag.com)

Posted by msmash on from the smells-fishy dept.

Photo-filter app Prisma, the popular program which makes pictures and video look like painterly art, had its access to Facebook's Live Video API revoked this month. From a report on NYMag:According to Prisma, Facebook justified choking off Prisma's access by stating, "Your app streams video from a mobile device camera, which can already be done through the Facebook app. The Live Video API is meant to let people publish live video content from other sources such as professional cameras, multi-camera setups, games or screencasts." This is the implied aim of Facebook's video API, the technical entry point for producers to pump video into Facebook's network: The API is meant for broadcasting setups that are not phone-based. The problem is that none of this is explained in Facebook's documentation for developers. In fact, it states the opposite. Here is the very first question from the company's Live API FAQ: "The Live API is a data feed and the "glue" needed to create higher-quality live videos on Facebook. It allows you to send live content directly to Facebook from any camera."

2 of 65 comments (clear)

  1. Re:FU, we're Facebook by Archangel+Michael · · Score: 4, Funny

    I think the correct phrasing is ..

    " I am altering the deal, pray I don’t alter it any further."

    --
    Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
  2. I Miss the Open Web by RobotRunAmok · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Facebook can do whatever it wants. It built and maintains the walled garden. They have spent millions in tech and marketing, and I don't begrudge them flexing their muscles and blocking whomever they feel threatens them. I wish industry had moved in a different direction (more and more companies aren't even building websites anymore, they are relying solely on social presences), but so it goes. There will one day come a reckoning and a backlash, but I don't think it'll be anytime soon. You've got a full generation of Marketing Chuckleheads who learned FB and Twitter as "The Way" at university, and it'll take a while for them to be convinced enough to unlearn everything their parents paid north of $100K for them to study.