Has Facebook Lost Its Thunder?

Not too long ago, the hot company everyone couldn't stop talking about was Google. Then, Facebook stole their thunder. How? They opened up their social network and allowed people to build applications for their site. It was genius and made Facebook the best social network on the net.

With over 5000 applications written for it's network, Facebook was creating a barrier to entry for any other social network. Simply put, No programmer would bother learning how to write apps for smaller social networks when everyone wanted and used Facebook Apps.

Did anyone really expect Google to accept this status quo? Thus they just announced their OpenSocial Platorm. It's a platform that will create "a common set of standards to write software for social networks". Now all they need is partners. Poof... They have it. All the other social networks are joining this alliance (Myspace, Bebo, Google's Orkut, Friendster, LinkedIn, hi5, Plaxho, Ning, and more).

Could this be any worse for Facebook? Will they join this alliance too (maybe eventually)? This alliance already has way more members than Facebook. Personally, I think Facebook is way over-rated.

Granted, the social networking thing is here to stay and is not just for college students, but I really think smaller more niche networks will outpace the larger networks easily. LinkedIn is great (even if it could be way better), but my guess is that smaller networks will appear in a few years. I would join an advertising network in a minute. How cool would that be. Ad people are super creative and an online social network wouldn't just let people meet. It would foster creativity and be a great tool for inspiration.

Just watch... this OpenSocial Platform will hurt Facebook and foster growth in smaller networks.