Brij’s One More Idea

Cloud computing is all about shared responsibility! API based development model is declarative syntax of cooperative spirit. You share services, you share the burden of keeping alive underlying user experience as well.

Twitter ecosystem is a best example of that model and if you want to see the future of software development then just follow Twitter. Robust API, hundreds of clients, open attitude (as against open source - too many colors there!) and in general good karma. All people talk about is the lack of stability in Twitter infrastructure, but bigger story around extensive third party application support. Are we seeing next generation infrastructure in the way Twitter is evolving? Shaky, error-prone in the begining but serving the non-consumption market? Classic Christensen case study? Who knows? I like what I am seeing in Twitter ecosystem.

LiveSide’s quote by Ray Ozzie is in some ways defining Twitter’s (accidentally, I doubt they planned it) evolving messaging architecture -

“The operating system as it would be designed for today’s multi-PC, multi-device, work anywhere, web-based world. Enabling you to login using any of your service-based or enterprise identities. Deploying software automatically and as appropriate to all your devices, and roaming application data and settings. Permitting seamless access to storage across all your PCs, devices, servers and the web”

At MessageDance we are obsessed about connecting email messages with emerging cloud architecture in new ways. That includes adhoc store-and-forward transient persistence as well. For example if Twitter goes down ( they have a planned maintenance window later in the evening), you can still use Twitter from MessageDance! If you are using Twitter via MessageDance (more details here), you can configure all your tweets to be stored in MessageDance during Twitter downtime. Next time Twitter comes back online, MessageDance will publish your posts to Twitter. We restore your Twittering experience.

I believe we will see more and more of this model where all API users share the responsibility of ensuring consistent user experience across cloud. Tribler looks very interesting as a startup pursuing this vision.