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June 4, 2008
We’re excited to announce the public release of the Address Book API. I say public release because while the API is newly launched here on YDN, it’s been up and running with some of the most contact-aware applications on the Internet, including Plaxo and LinkedIn.
It’s been a long time coming, both for us and for all of you. Yes, we see the question come up often on the ydn-mail: Developer Community group and we’re pleased beyond measure to finally be able release the API.
This new API provides access to one of the largest collections of address books on the Internet--the contact system behind Yahoo! Mail, Yahoo! Messenger, and Yahoo! Go. This means your applications already have a built-in audience. The Address Book API supports a wide range of third-party apps, such as sending invitations to seed social networks or social apps, looking up postal addresses for shipping services for online retail, and providing address "auto-complete" for messaging apps.
The API has extensive search capabilities. Once a user authorizes your application, you’ll be able to easily access that user’s address book and look for specific contacts. If you want to see which contacts are new, you can ask what’s changed since the last time you accessed the API. More details are available in the documentation.
Here are some highlights of what you can do with the API:
While we are excited about what the Address Book API can do, we are just as excited about how it works. Today, the new API provides access to a user’s Address Book via BBAuth (our browser-based authentication). Users authorize your application to access their address book data through the Yahoo! login process. Access to their address book data is done safely.
What about OAuth? Support for OAuth is coming, my friends, in due time… Seriously. At Yahoo! we’re already doing a lot with OAuth (think Fire Eagle) and it’s a big part of our plans.
The new Yahoo! Address Book API unlocks the relationships that Yahoo! members have developed on Yahoo! and makes them easy to tap into on your site. We hope you love it as much as we do and we can't wait to see what you build!
Charles Wu
Product Manager, Yahoo! Address Book platform
Posted at June 4, 2008 9:00 AM
This is great news! Very exciting. Folks may want a link to the main Address Book api microsite, too: http://developer.yahoo.com/addressbook/
Posted by: Bryce at June 4, 2008 10:51 AM
congrats to Charles & team. great stuff :)
would be even more useful if you can take this just 2 baby steps further, by enabling filtered access to contacts as follows:
1) prioritized by messaging frequency (how often i contact them)
2) prioritized by keyword relevance (show me who i email about 'frisbee')
3) combine both of the above, and let me constrain to top X most relevant contacts
while this may seem like a rather detailed set of requested enhancements, by providing these basic filters you can actually simplify the user experience dramatically, and greatly enhance the utility by 3rd-party developers.
in short, what i want isn't the ability to access my list of 1000-2000 contacts, but a quick & easy way to popup a list of 3-5 contacts who i share an interest with.
example:
* show me top 3 people i share interests: "children" & "preschool education"
* show me top 10 people i share interests: "science fiction" & "iron man"
* show me top 5 people i share interests: "new car" & "toyota prius"
these could be used to let people share information, do a group purchase at a discount, or send a more constrained (& less spammy) invite to join a new site / service.
more details on these concepts in post below:
Memo to Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, & AOL:
How to Turn 500M email logins into Facebook Platform & a Crapload of Revenue
http://500hats.typepad.com/500blogs/2008/05/memo-to-google.html
(apologies in advance for profanity & ransom-note fonts ;)
regards & keep on truckin',
- dave mcclure
Posted by: dave mcclure at June 4, 2008 10:57 AM
This is excellent news -- have been waiting for this for a long time and now I actually have a reason to use it!
Posted by: Jeffrey McManus at June 4, 2008 11:07 AM
Keep up the great work team! I've always been impressed with the innovations coming out of your teams, Charles.
Posted by: Greg at June 4, 2008 11:27 AM
Congrats Charles and team! I'm so excited to see this finally get out. [This is good]
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Posted by: pker at August 20, 2008 6:51 AM
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