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who is the customer for Embed.ly? I imagine this is useful for people who make mashup style apps that plug into various different services, but is that a big e
by fookyong 16y ago
who is the customer for Embed.ly?
I imagine this is useful for people who make mashup style apps that plug into various different services, but is that a big enough market size?
If I'm just plugging into one service, it's better to use the direct API than go through a middle man. If I'm using a dozen different services, I see the point of Embed.ly, but I don't see a huge business opportunity. Perhaps I'm missing something?
- ai09 16y agoI use Embed.ly for a side-project site I hacked together quickly (www.senioritis.com) and I love it. The beauty of Embed.ly is that users can submit a link, my site calls out to Embed.ly, and Embed.ly returns HTML for embedding in the page. In my quick hack I don't even check whether Embed.ly can handle the link, etc. but just embed the HTML if the response isn't nil (though I understand the XSS risks and need to fix it). Parse the JSON response of: Net::HTTP.get(URI.parse("http://api.embed.ly/v1/api/oembed?url=#{self.web_link}) http://api.embed.ly/v1/api/oembed?url=#{self.web_link})) and you're set. I love how simple it is. One thing re Embed.ly, their server sometimes takes some time to respond and so I recommend using DelayedJob. Right now my horrible hack just uses an after_create hook in rails to call the Embed.ly server in the same thread but sometimes that times out or has a noticeable delay.
- seancron 16y agoIt can also be useful for very useful for aggregators. Hmm...HN + Embed.ly + Userscript?
- fookyong 16y agoI totally see that. I guess my point is - are aggregators and their ilk going to make for good paying customers? there's not much money to be made in aggregating since the barrier to entry is so low (because tools like Embed.ly exist!).
- blaix 16y agoI think the biggest use for this would be when you don't always know the source of the video. Like with user-submitted stuff.