A lot of people have spent time talking about the value you can get by providing an API (Application Programming Interface) for other people to use and build with. Basically it provides a managed route for people to utilise your data in their own creations, and can have big implications – such as the success of 3rd party applications in helping Twitter to grow, as an example.

A nice example of going further than simply creating and releasing an API has been announced by Etsy, the community of makers and sellers of all sorts of items. They’re offering a free four-week class on basic web programming, which doesn’t require any experience, and handily will use the Etsy API to demonstrate topics such as displaying Etsy listings on your site, searching listings via the API and adding special effects to a web page. The lessons and homework are available at codelessons.com, and the first class begins tonight.

Benefits for everybody:

It’s a nice bit of work which I hope succeeds, as it has benefits for everyone involved. Etsy obviously benefits if more people use better ways to share great purchases, website owners benefit from not only being able to better integrate and display items – but also get knowledge which can help them with APIs from other sources, and the general web user benefits from a better experience from a number of websites.

And knowing how to utilise and implement feeds from APIs is an increasingly important skill for a huge number of professions. Data feeds of all formats are more important than ever for journalists, marketeers, bloggers, etc as much as for developers and programmers, as more and more large data sets are becoming available to be used to create great content and applications.

Pipework by Matius Kalisky on Flickr (CC Licence)

One of the things which you could post-rationalise as a characteristic of a successful digital company is how they use data – Google, facebook, Demand Media, OKCupid etc, etc. All supply examples of how data can be used in a marketing, advertising or promotional context.

Or from a journalistic point of view, look at Wikileaks, Ushahidi, Police.uk, etc.

Understanding and Acceptance:

I’m not suggesting that we should all sign up to free classes like those using the Etsy API and within weeks we’ll be coding ideas to rival Google and Facebook.

But I’m suggesting that those with even a passing interest in digital should sign up to these types of classes to force themselves into understanding more about what is possible, and what opportunities they might have…

(On a similar note, meetups like Hacks/Hackers London are going on all the time for little or no cost. Or indeed Digital People in Peterborough)