Group formed to promote OpenSocial

A number of groups have pledged support for Google tools designed to boost app portability in social networking sites.

Google's OpenSocial, a service that offers a standard for developers looking to write applications and programs that can run on various social networking sites, has been boosted following the establishment of the OpenSocial Foundation, a non profit body launched to support the service.

The group, which is made up of Google, Yahoo, and MySpace, was announced today with a new web site and a call for developers to participate.

A note on its site reads, "this site intends to be the home for the OpenSocial Foundation, a non-profit entity jointly proposed by Yahoo!, MySpace, and Google. The goal of the OpenSocial Foundation is to ensure the sustainable and open development of the OpenSocial initiative and related intellectual property."

A number of sites are already committed to using the OpenSocial API, including LinkedIn, Bebo, and Plaxo, while it is hoped that others will now join as the tools get more industry wide support.

"Yahoo! believes in supporting community-driven industry specifications and expects that OpenSocial will fuel innovation and make the web more relevant and more enjoyable to millions of users," said Wade Chambers, Vice President - Platforms, Yahoo. "Our support builds on similar efforts with the OpenID community and will expand the opportunity for developers and publishers to benefit from an open and increasingly social web."

"Together with the OpenSocial community we are setting new industry specifications for social web application development," added Steve Pearman, SVP of Product Strategy, MySpace.