OpenKapow.com - Build a Mashup in Minutes

Openkapow lets users create and deploy robots, or web services, to mashup anything you find on the web. Basically, the company allows anyone use it´s Robosuite to program and share bots that make RSS feeds and web clips to facilitate all sorts of web mashups. This does employ some technical know-how as the site takes up parts of web pages and lets the user redeploy them for different effects. By using OpenKapow, programmers can save time as the Kapow scrapper turns web pages into structured data, which otherwise would need to be done by hand coding. Kapow fosters mashup development so that a large community can generate such sites freely. Kapow´s bots are free to use, as is downloading and hosting.

“Openkapow.com is an open service platform, this means that you can build your own services (called robots) and run them from openkapow.com, all for free. These robots accesses web sites and allows you to use data, functionality and even the user interface of other web sites in a whole new way. No longer are you limited by what public APIs or RSS feeds that are available, instead you can build your own in minutes. You can then use those services from within your own mashups, code, Yahoo! Pipes, Google Gadgets etc”

Creating API´s with OpenKapow, for one, is supposed to be much easier. It allows access to data as people know it, ie from web browsers. Users get full control over the process flow; they get the use of powerful data extractors, and they can create Rss feeds, REST services or web clips from any web site.

The site is really only of interest to programmers who happen to be interested in mashups. Mashups are continuing to grow but there are questions about monetization, support and lack of tools. There is a learning curve; you have to spend time to really get to know how to use the siteâ€"will people be up to the challenge?