Here is the first of a two-part series about the rise of APIs at SXSW this year. It consists of five interviews: Oren Michels of Mashery, Mike Maney of Alcatel-Lucent, John Musser of Programmable Web, Sam Ramji of Apigee and Matt Galligan, chief strategy officer at SimpleGeo.
I fashioned a new video tool with an old fishing rod for the interviews. It helps extend the camera and keeps it steady. I used my bike pant ties to attach the camera to the pole. It gets attention as you will see in the interview with Oren.
In the first two interviews I talk with Michels and Maney. In the convention center, Mashery and AppCircus created “Circus Mashimus,” where app developers competed and did demonstrations for SXSW attendees.
At the Hilton, Alcatel-Lucent hosted the ELEVEN API Lounge, a place for developers to hang out and compete for prizes including a live action game of Angry Birds.
Both lounges were packed with people when I stopped in. It points to the changing interest in APIs. The suits arrived this year. And they want to invest in APIs as a way to unlock the data that they have in any number of data silos.
Disclosure: Both Mashery and Alcatel are ReadWriteWeb sponsors. Spiceworks paid for Alex Williams airfare and hotel to attend SXSW.
Here are the interviews:
Oren Michels
Mike Maney
APIs are now far more than a curiosity. They are essential to understanding the information economy. It’s apparent at SXSW that large companies recognize this fact and want to program their infrastructures for this new data universe.
