Google’s “Maka-Maka”
After getting outdueled by Microsoft in getting a stake in Facebook, Google is hardly in a mood to roll over and deal with it.
Their new social networking idea is in the works and it goes by codename: Maka-Maka. While this sounds like the name of a remote South Pacific island, it is Google’s answer to the likes of Facebook and MySpace.
What do we know so far? Google is planning to make their social network even more open than Facebook. In early November, they will announce API’s for developers to use to work with their existing social network, Orkut and iGoogle (aka Google Personalized Start Page).
Later, API’s will be developed for other other Google services, like Gmail. There is also talk that some of the lower-ranked social networks, like Friendster (remember Friendster?) will give their user info to developers of Maka-Maka API’s.
It will be interesting to see if the social network part of it (assuming Maka-Maka will have an interface like MySpace, Facebook) will allow for your own domain names, like with Google Apps.
The possibilities here of combining every Google app into a cohesive network that runs across the entire web is intriguing. While MySpace, for example, is a fairly closed system, the vision for Maka-Maka is to bring all of your social networks, your Gmail, and your Google Apps all together into one communicative unit.
Technorati Tags: google, maka-maka, igoogle, facebook, orkut, google apps, facebook, myspace
