X.commerce is the new brand for the developer commerce tools that include the eBay API and PayPal API. The first conference under this new brand is coming in October to San Francisco. As a media partner, we have a promo code, as well as a little more information about how the company is looking to create a sum greater than its parts with the X.commerce platform.
E-Commerce covers a broad range of inter-connected processes which eventually leads to a transaction between two or more parties. Recent enhancements in technology, specifically social interactions on the Web, have increased the complexity in analyzing these processes and describing E-Commerce as a whole. And, to be honest, there is a lot of confusion within the terminology of “E-Commerce” itself. The exact definition of E-Commerce varies depending on your source, and you might hear words like e-business, e-retailing, and online shopping all used interchangeably. Mind you, they all have different meanings.
There’s always been a little annoyance on the end of affiliate APIs, those that pay developers money for referring buyers. In exchange for a potential sale, developers have to send their users to the company’s site to complete the transaction. In the future, many of those purchasers will be able to remain using the developer’s application for the length of the sale. We’re a step closer to that future with a new release from API management company Mashery (a ProgrammableWeb sponsor). Mashery customers can now process transactions through their APIs, which means the potential for applications with lower barriers between a customer and a sale. And yes, that little annoyance at the end of affiliate APIs could be going away.
First, a close friend loses everything in a house fire. Not long after, close family members are rocked when a flood destroys their belongings. What can be done in the face of tragedy and loss? For the noble minded the only thing to do is to work to better prepare your friends and neighbors for the next catastrophe to strike. This was the story told by Jennifer Morehead, CEO and founder of Lockboxer, a site to track your stuff that makes a refreshing use of shopping APIs to find out how much your stuff is worth.
MyBantu is an interesting little mashup, available as an iPhone app, an Android app, and a website. Its goal is to make shopping for anything, especially restaurants and movies, easier and more social. It uses Yelp API, Netflix API and various others to make it happen. It’s very similar in idea to Siri, the “ultimate mashup” that Apple later gobbled up in the largest mashup acquisition ever.
Google may not have landed Groupon in its quest for traction in daily deals. Instead, it acquired The Dealmap, an aggregator of local coupons. With the purchase by the search giant, we now list 89 Google APIs in our directory, with The Dealmap API now part of the Google arsenal.
Bitcoin, the anonymous, peer to peer virtual currency, has been getting a lot of press lately. From the severe inflation to the hacks and the big heist, not all of it has been good. However, it’s certainly an interesting system, and there are a few good trading services such as Mt.Gox and Tradehill aimed at making Bitcoin more available and more usable for the average person. Today we’ll take a look at the Mt.Gox API and Tradehill API.
APIs are giving more leverage to small independent players. Whether it’s a single developer, or a small web development team, each quality API that is produced gives them another leg up. There is a wonderful varied ecosystem emerging here with many highly specified niche players. TinyPay.me is one such player, offering e-commerce services with focus on simplicity and product placement. The TinyPay.me API gives developers a unique online storefront option.
Sometimes we forget what the real purpose of all this fancy technology is. And what is that? To make our real lives easier. Mashups often help with that, allowing us to do such simple things as find a good beer, our favorite music artists, where the streetcars are, or where a park is.
With Lemonade Stand, users can search for things to buy in a location-based manner, or add their own listings of things they wish to sell. The application is currently available as a client for Android, with a possible Windows Phone 7 version on the way soon as well, from a 3rd party developer that released an early version. Its Lemonade Stand API allows other developers to either code their own clients or use it in mashups.
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