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Paid Twitter wannabe App.net hits $500K target with time to spare
Paid Twitter-style service App.net has achieved its self-imposed $500,000 funding goal with almost two days still left on the clock. The social platform is the brainchild of Dalton Caldwell, who said he wanted to spawn a service dedicated to users instead of advertisers. It was originally pitched to Facebook, but the two companies came to loggerheads when it clashed with the social network's own App Center -- inspiring Caldwell's Kickstarter-style campaign. Though the software is still in alpha, over 10,000 backers have paid $50 for an annual membership or put down $1,000 for support, developer tools and a meeting with the founder. The company will now start working on its terms of service, letting users offer feedback and discover new features -- and if you wanna be @John instead of @JohnFDoe99427 on the new service, you may want to pony up, quick.
Google named official social platform of 2012 Republican National Convention
It's no secret that Big G's tight with the federal government, whether it's White House staff hanging out on Google +, or the company giving us all a personal tour of Obama's abode. This time around, though, Larry Page & Co. have announced a partnership with the GOP which makes Mountain View the official social platform and livestream provider of the upcoming Republican National Convention. Essentially, this means Republicans at the gathering will use sites like YouTube and Google+ to stream live events and pop in at the occasional Hangout. That said, it wouldn't surprise us if attendees dabbled in that other social network, as it's no stranger to politics, either. Too bad Santorum's not around to try on those snorkeling goggles...
OpenFeint announces version 2.4, now in Fieldrunners
The guys over at OpenFeint have released version 2.4 of their social gaming platform, and they've also corralled one of the biggest games on the App Store into using it: you can find the brand new version in the popular Fieldrunners app. New features of the software include a simplified UI, a completely revamped "Discovery" section (popular among developers for recommending games to users, but good for users as well in terms of finding new things to play), and a new "Forum and Fan Club" system which allows for discussion about games and between devs and customers right inside the app. Other improvements include a new geolocation leaderboard (so you can see where people are nabbing the high scores), and tweaks on other social features like the "presence" system, which features Xbox Live-style announcements when friends come on and offline while playing. It's interesting how this sort of sub-culture is burgeoning simply inside individual games, completely unofficially, on the App Store. You have to wonder if Apple is watching any of this -- certainly there's a call from both devs and players for social connections like this, and it would be interesting to see a system that worked App Store-wide, perhaps even with current iTunes accounts. OpenFeint and the other folks working on their own social networks are doing a lot of interesting things already, but I have to wonder what it would be like if Apple got involved.
OpenFeint 2.0 brings social discovery to the iPhone
The Aurora Feint folks are at WWDC with the rest of the Mac development world this week, and while out there, not only are they having a party, but they sent out an announcement: OpenFeint 2.0 is out now, and it has some "social discovery" features now included. Their open platform already supported doing things like leaderboards and profiles from directly within iPhone applications and games, but now the new release will also allow users to bring their friends lists in from Facebook and Twitter, update profile pictures of themselves, and both find their friends and figure out what they're playing. The system is free to integrate into iPhone apps and games, and there's a user-based model that costs more at higher levels.OpenFeint isn't the only system attempting to do something like this (be a sort of Xbox Live for iPhone games), but they are certainly the biggest, with more developers jumping into their boat every day. And as is the way with social networks, sometimes being the biggest is just as good as being the best. Look for their features in an iPhone game near you.
OpenFeint announces iPromote, readies to take over iPhone gaming
During our interview with Danielle Cassley of Aurora Feint, I talked with her about OpenFeint, the code backbone for a social network that iPhone developers can use in their apps. Since then, a number of developers have added the interface to their apps, perhaps most notably Pocket God, which has used the tool only to create the barest of online leaderboards so far. Now the crafty folks at Aurora Feint are revealing another trick up their sleeve: something they're calling iPromote. It sounds like more or less a crosspromotion deal for various apps and games in the OpenFeint system -- certain apps will give their users a chance to pick up other paid apps under the OpenFeint umbrella. While the press release is fairly vague about exactly how it works (they say there will be "a revenue sharing model for sales that occur through OpenFeint"), it'll probably show up in the user's interface as links or promotions for other apps.There are quite a few of those apps -- Aurora Feint lists over 20 apps that have already integrated OpenFeint, and there are more on the way, including some high-profile apps from Chillingo. Even our friend Steve Demeter, who was working on his own community platform called Onyx, has abandoned work on that to join up with OpenFeint. There are at least a few other such platforms like this that were vying for widespread acceptance on the iPhone, but it looks like OpenFeint is primed to take the top spot. Which means we'll probably be seeing lots of it in applications near you very soon.
