tags:

views:

44

answers:

1
Q: 

Social Data API

I'm wanting to build an app that lets you input your name/date of birth/location, and searches the web for public data of others who have something in common with you. The idea is to then create an infographic with this data, i.e. Average Age of John Smith: 48

Any suggestions as to what api's/techniques I could use to do this?

+2  A: 

This might be of help:

http://code.google.com/apis/opensocial/

In addition, the more major sites out there tend to have an API.

scunliffe  2010-02-04 19:14:35
Hmm thanks, but looks a bit hardcore for what I'm looking for. I'm not wanting to build a full-scale social app, just something that if I type in a name it returns whatever data, hcards, etc it can find attached to that name.
Chris Armstrong  2010-02-04 22:53:17
@Chris Armstrong, I think what you're planning is *way* more hardcore than the nice, structured, documented APIs you've been presented :) If you don't want to tap into those, you'll have to sift through the whole web.
Pekka  2010-02-04 23:46:36
@pekka hmm yeh could be wishful thinking on my part
Chris Armstrong  2010-02-05 00:02:43
@scunliffe excuse the newb question, but how complicated would it be to use OpenSocial for what I'm wanting? Can I put a search in for a name with php or js and have it go through several social networking sites and return results or is it quite a bit more complicated than that?
Chris Armstrong  2010-02-05 00:13:30

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