Facebook Comes up with Two New Twitter-Like APIs for Media Partners

Twitter seem to have become the de facto source of real-time social conversation and definitely Facebook does not seem to be happy about that.

The company has announced the addition of two new APIs this week that will be available for a limited group of media partners. API will let those companies tap in to the real-time conversation that happens on Facebook.

The Public Feed API will include a real-time feed of public posts about a specific word. For example, CNN which is one of the first partners could begin to show Facebook status updates that mention “Syria” if wanted, much like the way it shows tweets.

The Keyword Insights API will aggregate all public posts that includes a specific term and comes with results anonymously including gender, age and location information. With this CNN could show viewers how people in different parts of the world of different ages feel about Syria.

Justin Osofsky, Facebook’s VP of Media Partnerships wrote earlier this week:

“We are committed to building features that improve the experience of discovering and participating in conversations about things happening in the world right now, including entertainment, sports, politics and news.”

Facebook’s launch of hashtags, and its ongoing tests of how to display and encourage hashtag use are part of this same overall effort. Facebook has also touted recent studies that suggest a correlation between Facebook activity and TV viewership.

The reason behind it is income. A lot of advertising income can be made by being a part of the real-time social conversation and tying to major media outlets and big time news events.

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Akshay Agarwal

Entrepreneur,Life Learner Husband and Father.Proven leader in digital strategy, marketing, attribution and marketing analytics. Passionate believer in user experience and the building of community.