November 15, 2015Some companies may open up their API to third party developers without an API license agreement ('going naked'), however this can cause problems and lead companies to later need to create a license and restrict what developers are doing.
November 14, 2015When drafting an API licensing agreement, it may be prudent to consider that the less one-sided the restrictions are, the more the API will attract innovation by open source developers.
October 11, 2015Since Twitter will no longer be selling its firehose data (full, unfiltered stream of tweets available from the service) to third party sellers, but will license the data to users of its API, it is important to be a licensee/subscriber to Twitter's API set in order to access the huge amounts of real time-data that Twitter has to offer as a social media giant.
October 10, 2015Controlling the license of the brand is important for both the licensor and the licensee. An API license allows a licensor to increase its brand recognition.
October 08, 2015If a social media site wants to attract attention or encourage community participation, it may consider giving API licences to third parties. This way, passionate members can transform their ideas into reality and benefit the application.
October 06, 2015Compliance with the privacy policy of the API licensor is an important term and condition of using the API. If the licensor is bound by privacy rules and is not allowed to retain private data, then the licensee should be prohibited from retaining data as well.
October 01, 2015An open source API will allow developers to attach services to the software platform that they are using. This can help even on platforms that emphasize security and confidentiality.