APIs Give You Magical Superpowers
This post, written by the founder/CEO of Ziggeo, Susan Danziger, was originally posted on September 18th on susandanziger.com
APIs give your site magical superpowers. They make your platform immediately powerful, without having to build any complex part yourself.
What's an API? Think of it like a building block of code. You can attach it -- or cut and paste it into -- your own code so your platform can suddenly do something it couldn't do before.
Take Ziggeo (my own company). It developed a video recording/playback API so anyone in the world can record and submit videos directly to you.
Why couldn't you build your video recording system? You could. But you shouldn't.
Why not?
- It's expensive. Paying an engineer to develop such a complex system that already exists doesn't make sense.
- It's time-consuming. You'd need to spend years of engineering talent to develop a system that's already been tested and re-tested.
- It's painful to maintain. You'd need to dedicate on-going engineering support to make sure the technology works as new browsers and devices are released.
- It's an opportunity cost. Instead of reinventing the wheel, you can focus engineering talent on developing your own, unique intellectual property.