API Spam – or The API Virality Patterns

I recently received a link to see what type of lover I am. I jumped to the gun immediately, as expected. I mean, who isn’t curious about those big issues in life. So, after filling out an extensive 5 question quiz that comprehended issues such as my favorite time of the year, I submitted my answers and eagerly expected my answer. It was then that the application asked me to send the quiz to 15 friends in order to see my answer. And that’s what I did. It was only then that I realized that I received the quiz via the same mechanism – somebody wanted to see what type of lover they were and innocently forwarded the quiz to 15 unsuspecting victims.
The truth is that the Facebook system for applications is ground-breaking in many senses – it allows companies and individuals to create applications related to certain content and that engage with the users to a certain extent. But they only work if the users have an incentive to push the application onto others in their social network. Therefore there are two ways – either the application is that good or there is a mechanism that makes the user has to send an invitation.
And thus API Spam is born.
API Spam isn’t, by any means, an official term to this phenomenon. Spam can be defined, to those who want to actually understand the term extensively, as

the abuse of electronic messaging systems to indiscriminately send unsolicited bulk messages

Spam in Social Networks isn’t new. The thing is that it has followed the same rules as it ever has – sending messages in forums, message boards and individual e-mails indiscriminately to advertise a product or service. Nothing new there. But in the API Spam, there is a specific and interesting methodology involved – the ones who push the advertisement are the consumers themselves driven by the mechanisms built into the application itself. We can already see 4 distinct patterns in those mechanisms at this early age:

- Receiving the results only if you send the application – Curiosity related;

- Accessing exclusive content if you send invitations – Exclusivity related;

- Gaining extra functionalities if you send invitations – Gamer related;

- Being listed as high priority if you send invitations – Social Network related (it is mostly related to semi-dating Applications in Facebook).

The fact is that Facebook was ready for this – in a previous post we mentioned that Facebook has an automatic functionality when you reach 40+ applications on your profile to hide some of them so you can organize your account. This breaks any limitations to the extent that a Facebook profile page might have. Pages do get a little slower as you build up applications, but that’s up to the user to decide. Truth be told, who can refuse an invitation to a brand new quiz or a good karma sending by your closest (or not) friends? API Spam is consumer-driven via built-in mechanisms in the API and it might just redefine Spam. Is it good or bad? I’m not absolutely sure. But one thing’s for sure – it is an opportunity for Marketeers to develop new ways of engaging the users and convincing them to actively advertise the Brand via the use of the 4 basic (I say basic because its still to early to already begin narrowing them down to smaller categories) patterns.
Oh, and by the way, I’m the “Student” type of lover.