App Communication Guidelines

Sending Friends request through API

Siju — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 18:02:31 GMT

Hi Friends,

I need to send friends request from my site using API. Well if both of the users are in my application, I have to give an option to send friend request using myspace itself if they are not friends. Well any idea about this?

Thanks,

Siju George.

myapp invites share

Jenson — Tue, 21 Jul 2009 11:10:18 GMT

Hi friends,

I need myapp invites to share application with myspace friendlist. I need hardcode in externalframe in my website page.kindly help me to get myapp share invites function code or api key( samples).

unable to access myspace apps

Rah — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 16:09:31 GMT

I'm unable to access any of my apps. They are shown on my page but when i click on them it just shows me the app name. For example..when i go to kiss me app to see who kissed me it shows nothin and when I try to go to buy friends or own friends i get nothin as well as my mobster app it wont let me play it just goes to a page that says the app name like all the other ones. does anyone know what i can do or if im doin sumthin wrong. im confused cuz up till about a month ago i could use all these features. I'd appreciate any help u can offer. Here is my profile link http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewProfile&friendID=302824151

Thx again , Rah

Hotties for sale is exempt from the new guidelines?

jimmy — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 05:58:54 GMT

Hotties for sale is still awarding points for sending invites. Is black box media allowed to do this because they are running ads? thats the only explanation I can think of since it would take a brain dead tester to miss a +$30,000 invite tab in the app.

Giving users an option to not send communication in a communication based app

Offbeat Creations — Fri, 10 Oct 2008 20:09:23 GMT

The new guidelines that require an app to offer a user the choice to send a communication need to be reworked. If your app is based on communication, you have just killed that app. The viral loop no longer exists. This is a good example of a solution with unintended consequences. I understand the underlying problem, but the current solution is a bad one. Take any of the apps that involve throwing things back and forth. How do we communicate that now? Home/profile widgets? That's really clumsy, and not all users like to clutter their profile/home page with a bunch of widgets. So now users have to visit each app they have installed to see if they have any activity. What's happening is that apps are working around this by changing the wording of how the app works. They move the user choice to another place that satisfies the rules but makes things even more confusing for users, and doesn't do anything to accomplish the intent of the new guidelines.

There are other ways to handle this. Facebook has it's own methods which work ok. You guys have the application communications channel, why not make better user of that for user to user communications that are initiated by an app? That seems very logical to me.

In our particular case we have a throwing game where you win when the other person does not respond within a certain amount of time. Of course if you want to win you won't want to send the other person a message you just threw something at them. Now some people see that it's more fun to send a message, but the fact that you can win by just not sending a message is always there. It's like a built in way to cheat that takes away from the game.

I'm not trying to come across to strong here, but if you look around at how apps are adjusting to these new guidelines, it's obvious they are getting around it, and not in a way that makes things better for anyone involved, including users.

Cheers,

Chris

Virus

PinkRoses — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 00:31:17 GMT

Are the apps virus' and are they messing up and/or crashing folks computers? I have kiss, bulletin board, suduko, favorite pics. I'm pinkroses67 . Anyway... I have been told that since I have those apps I am messing up peoples computers and that really they are all virus' waiting to attach. Please set the record straight. Thank you Julie

spam

Patty — Sat, 16 Aug 2008 22:52:10 GMT

I am so confused are the people who we don't known that we got from the forum will we lose them. there has been alot of weard things that happenned in some of my games does that mean i am a bad person because it mad me feel pretty good to try to get a little leverage because some of my friends just don't play so should i be in trouble because i used the forum to make my family larger i only came here for fun not trouble

Google Custom Search on Canvas page ?

Anatoly — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 16:54:56 GMT

Is Google Adsense Custom Search on Canvas page allowed ?

Developer guidelines is not clear about that. Please note: Google Adsense Custom Search != Google Search.

thanks

Responding to Users Emails, will it be flagged as spam?

TK's Apps — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 02:14:40 GMT

I have about 100 messages in my MySpace inbox from users asking questions about apps. I reply to a few at a time, but I am worries that if I reply to too many, I may be flagged as a spammer. Is this correct or is it safe to reply to as many people as message me?

Bonus for invites that lead to installs

Behind Blue Eyes — Sun, 22 Jun 2008 17:46:04 GMT

I know the new policy states that you can not give an incentive for users inviting but what about a bonus if a user refers someone and that someone actually installs the application? There will be no statement made to that someone that installing the app will give a bonus to the referring user. It's not done in a spamming fashion and it is somewhat vital to my app.

Application suspended BEFORE 5p.m. DEADLINE

Renkoo — Tue, 03 Jun 2008 16:54:14 GMT

Our application (104463) is currently suspended, way before the announced 5 p.m. pacific deadline on 6/3.

What's the point of giving us these deadlines if you're going to take action far in advance of the announced deadline.

We have already prepared for the deadline and just need to flip a config flag to set up the new app guideline behavior, and were planning to do it this morning (in advance of the 5 p.m. deadline) but now we can't even see the effect because of the PREMATURE SUSPENSION.

Can you please remove the suspension immediately so we can flip our config bit to be in compliance prior to the 5 p.m. deadline?

By the way, other apps with similar content are not suspended - which makes the premature suspension even more upsetting.

displaying a popup before the PostTo popup

TekTaryn — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 21:09:05 GMT

The new guidlines for intiating any communication states:

"It must be very clear to a member what they are sending, when they are sending communication"

I have an app that has a top friend like feature. The user has the option to choose 10 friends from their list of myspace friends. Upon selecting a user to add to their top friend list, they are presented w/ my javascript popup asking them if they would like to send a comment to this friend. In the poup window, the user is given the option to select yes, send a comment, or no. Whether or not the user sends a comment, the selected friend will become her top friend. The act of sending a comment is optional.

Is this okay? I only ask cuz the action of selecting a top friend doesn't make it obvious that a communication channel is tied to that action. Which is why I present the user w/ my own javascript popup w/ clear explanation that selecting the yes button will popup the myspace PostTo window.

Incentivizing Invites

Robby — Fri, 30 May 2008 18:32:31 GMT

MySpace Applications and Application content must NOT:

Incentivize a user to send messages, invitations, bulletins, comments, or any other form of communication to earn points, virtual money, a ranking, or any benefit within or outside the application.

In response to the new guideline listed above... is this guideline permanent? I understand the attempt to clean up the amount of application messages and invites. But realize that by doing so, you severely cripple all applications' ability to grow. Perhaps this isn't a problem for the venture-backed companies who can just pay for their million installs, but for the little guy, it makes it much more difficult. I understand the concept that the application should be free, and I agree, but I believe we should be able to reward the users who are willing to help make our applications more successful. I have several applications on Facebook and Bebo and was starting to look at porting them over to MySpace, but will hold off for the time being based on this new rule.

I do understand the attempt to filter out the applications that require you to send invites/messages to your friends in order to progress within the app. However, I believe you have gone further than necessary by placing this limitation on developers and will see developers drift away from your platform because of it.

Deadline mistake - 6/3 (not 6/2)

Addable! — Mon, 02 Jun 2008 07:03:35 GMT

Sorry about this guys! For any of you that caught my mistake in the blog, the deadline is TUESDAY 5pm PST (not June 2nd)

Sorry about the confusion!

Rhonda

=====================================================================

In two seprate blog posts you put the dead line as June 3rd at 5PST!

POST: Important Reminders for all Live Apps - Please Read Published May 29 2008, 10:22 AM by StephanieBamBam@MySpace

"All live apps must be compliant with these guidelines by 5pm PST on June 3rd - that's next Tuesday night - or risk immediate suspension without warning."

POST: New App Guidelines - MUST READ! Published May 20 2008, 11:54 AM by Kyle

"For those applications that are already live, you will all have two weeks from today – until 5pm PST on June
3rd "

And now all of the sudden on June 1st at 7:30pm you change the date to June 2nd at 12am???

Please respond.

general questions about the guidelines

Sarah — Wed, 21 May 2008 15:03:47 GMT

This isn't application specific, it's just some general questions that came to mind reading over the guidelines last night - and some which I feel may be bought up time & again by developers - so I am broaching them now. I will reference my own application in the process though & if I come in the firing line for pointing it out, so be it :) (my app ID is 380260904)

The "tokens or points for invites" thing is pretty cut & dry - there are other issues I feel need to be clarified though.

1. Apps that rely on viral distribution to work (inexplicit incentivisation)

- Examples: Compare Your Friends, How Do You Rate Me?, Mob Wars

These kind of apps will obviously contain a message like: "Tell your friends to rate you, and see where you stand in your social circle!" or "Invite your friends and watch your mob grow stronger!".

Indeed, for my own application, the more votes a band gets, the more plays they get on the radio station - but nowhere does it link to an 'invite your friends' or 'invite your fans' form. It's definitely an incentive for them to get their fans to add the application & vote - but this is the case with many applications...

Even things like "Send your friend a drink/a gift" could be considered against the new rules, cos maybe your friend doesn't want 500 drinks, if they haven't installed the app.

2. Apps that offer prizes.

- Examples: Lowest Unique Bid (I LOVE THIS APP!), "Skill Gaming" apps.

Lowest Unique Bid is a Facebook App where the owner (who I assume is a Starbucks Employee) offers a $20 Starbucks voucher, redeemable in Canada or the US (boo!) to the person with the lowest unique bid that week. Also Skill Gaming Apps often offer a cash prize each month.

With my app, I had intended on offering vouchers to get free music downloads from the site each month, exclusively to people who had the app installed, but I assume this could also be considered direct incentivisation. However, if I were to offer this prize to people who signed up to the site instead of those who just installed application, in my eyes that'd be even worse - I'm dragging people away from MySpace (and to be honest, we're not exactly going to be ready for that until August, we just want people getting used to the name before then).

3. Profile Bling

I'd also like to suggest something possibly very controversial regarding Tom's objection to profile bling ;)

Until users here get used to applications, maybe guide them through it a bit more - I have already noticed test users uninstalling my application entirely because it doesn't fit in with their profile. And I believe that if I disable the profile surface entirely, then it won't show on any users application at all.

How about either -

- Having "Make this application visible on your profile?" as a separate prompt box, until they get the hang of settings, etc

- Having an option for developers to choose the default install settings for the application (this is where you tell me we already can) [Homepage- OPTIONAL Profile - OPTIONAL / Homepage - YES Profile - OPTIONAL / Homepage OPTIONAL - Profile YES - then a way to link in the application itself to display a box on your homepage]

- Making customisable profile boxes from the user end a whole lot easier (again, this is where you tell me this can already be done - and I truly believe it can - but not necessarily for the 'noobie devs' like me. I am thinking that profile boxes can consist of elements that the user can easily toggle off and on and the settings will remain in tact without us having to store user preference data our end - however, I will be looking at coding this from scratch for future iterations of my app).

Just my input anyway..... maybe we can get an FAQ up and running.

Where can i obtain app guidelines.

Joey — Fri, 30 May 2008 02:08:42 GMT

Where can i get the full list of all application guidelines? I've been looking and i cant find it.

THX

The Future of Hobby Widgets

Byki — Tue, 27 May 2008 21:01:15 GMT

There is a whole genre of applications that the new guidelines do not directly address but are nevertheless wildly popular and quite useful.

Lifestyle widgets remain popular on iGoogle and now MySpace including weather, news, word of the day etc

The basic philosophy of Social Applications and the APIs that allow them to be built is that an application ought to *either* be:

Social (poking, sharing etc)
Self-Expressive

It seems that the majority of the apps that are coming under fire here (understandably) are those that whorishly exploit the social/viral features of the api (and the community members) for their own gain.

My users love my apps, and use them to express who they are, what they like, where they come from, or what they are doing in their free time.

It can also categorically be stated that these apps do *no harm* whatsoever, and are no nuisance to the community.

I am planning on adding functionality including quizzes, games and more, building off of the current content in the apps. Much of the code is written, much of it still being written.

Where these apps may run afoul of the guidelines is that this type of app doesn't necessarily *need* a lot of the opensocial api stuff... they rely on quality content being created and distributed by professionals like us. We could add in social functionality like poking and such, but for precisely the reasons that Tom enumerated in his piece, we choose not to. On other networks we do more with activity streams and so forth, but our feedback from users has been very positive, and they like the combination of having the app on their start (home surface) page, and also opting to have it on their profile or not, that is up to them of course.

Please take this under advisement; unless this type of application is discussed, surely the approval/denial of apps in this genre will be inconsistent and the possibility for future headaches will remain likely.

thanks stephanie,rondata max and everyone else. good luck with this transition.

best,

Christopher

CoolPoints-about first rule

BaPpY — Wed, 21 May 2008 11:18:15 GMT

app Name= CoolPoints

app ID =106907

" No incentives may be given to a member for sending a message, bulletin, comment, or any other form of communication. This includes “points,” “bucks,” increased standing, or even features within the app."

when a user gives or takes points from his/her frnds i want to send a msg to the frnd .

the msg is =" $user took/gave CoolPoints from $frndid for ... $msg. To take/give CoolPoints from $user <a href="http://profile.myspace.com/Modules/Applications/Pages/Canvas.aspx?appId=106907">click here!</a>"

can i use this msg?

How will MS administer contol over existing apps?

Russ — Wed, 21 May 2008 22:05:19 GMT

I am curious as to how/when MS will be informing developers that their apps are in "violation" of the new rules.

Will there be a grace period?

Is MS doing random checks or using network to alert rule infringement?

Thanks!

Applications Communication Channel. "ACC"

CC — Sat, 24 May 2008 15:22:10 GMT

Will Applications Communication Channel. "ACC" be available to opensocial JS API only like POST TO?

What about REST API?

Need clarification on guidelines. Confusing grammar.

eric — Thu, 22 May 2008 00:46:09 GMT

I'm a bit confused. Several of the guidelines in your list on "User Experience/Functionality" seem to be incorrectly worded. In particular, you've stated that "MySpace Applications and MySpace Application Content must not":

be properly formatted to fit the Canvas, Home, and Profile Surfaces (e.g. no excess empty space, no part of the application is cropped);
must not contain broken links;
properly load on all used Surfaces (e.g. the app must properly load when a user without the app visits a profile with the app as well as with users with the app installed);
be properly categorized;
have an accurate description on both the application profile and gallery, including appropriate icons and any app requirements (e.g. third party registration and membership to another website);
use MySpace/OpenSocial API
confirm a user is of the correct age to view any restricted content, using the correct age-verification API (when available): dating applications must check for 18 and alcohol applications must check for 21. Developers must implement their own verification until the age-verification API is released.

Have I read this list incorrectly?

Thanks, Melanie

Posting Guidelines!!! - Questions About New Application Guidelines

Johnny Nguyen — Tue, 20 May 2008 18:58:30 GMT

So by now you probably have seen the new Application Guidelines. If you have any questions, we want to know what they are and answer them! However, we need to make sure that you post your questions in a way that we can quickly answer everybody. So with that, see below for our posting rules for this forum.

Subject Heading
1. Follow this format for your subject heading: "[application name] - [brief summary of question]"

Body of Post (in list format)
1. App name
2. App ID
3. Copy and paste exactly what guideline you are referring to.
4. State your full question.Now let's lay down some courtesy rules.

1. Because every app is different, every app is going to have a slightly different issue. So do not ask for us to look at your app on somebody else's post. Though, definitely feel free to offer advice or insights that you experienced, but if you have issues of your own, start a new post.
2. Give us 48 hours for a follow up.
3. Follow everything listed above. Otherwise your post in this forum will be deleted by day's end (Pacific Time).

Johnny