1.
1
Jukka Huhtamäki
@jnkka // fi.linkedin.com/in/jukkahuhtamaki
Tampere University of Technology
Interactive Media
and Games
Seminar
mediaX at Stanford

2.
About this presentation
• This presentation is a revised version of a
recent presentation at HICSS 2017:
Huhtamäki, J., Basole, R., Still, K., Russell, M., & Seppänen,
M. (2017). Visualizing the Geography of Platform Boundary
Resources: The Case of the Global API Ecosystem.
Available:
http://scholarspace.manoa.hawaii.edu/handle/10125/41804
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3.
Introduction

4.
What is an API?
4https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TbVtliFXOOY

5.
What is a mashup?
johnnycashhasbeeneverywhere.com
5

6.
Why APIs?
• APIs are replacing “traditional” interfirm
relationships
• APIs are lightweight boundary resources that
allow for complementors to create value for
the focal companies
• APIs are artifacts of both lightweight software
development and business strategy
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7.
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8.
API ecosystem
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9.
15/01/17 9Biswarup Ganguly, CC BY 3.0

10.
15/01/17 10Code example: Rob M. (2016)
Tesla Model S JSON API:
http://docs.timdorr.apiary.io/#

11.
Sector View: Games and APIS

12.
12
sectoranalysis.net

13.
13
sectoranalysis.net

14.
API Ecosystem Global View

15.
15/01/17 15
(Evans and Basole, 2016;
Basole, 2016)

16.
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(Evans and Basole, 2016;
Basole, 2016)

17.
We asked
• What is the structure of global API ecosystem
for games?
• Where are APIs located geographically*?
• Is the geographical location of a company
less important in the digital age?
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18.
Method
• Data collection using crawling and scraping
• Data-driven visual network analytics
• Semi-automated data curation process
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19.
Data curation
• 13,366 APIs and 6,271 mashups from
ProgrammableWeb
• Using URIs as identifiers, company location
lookup using Crunchbase
• Mapping the 6,218 APIs with location data to
city-level entrepreneurial regions and global
regions
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20.
API Co-use
• Cf. co-citation analysis
Three resulting connections (here
regions):
Twitter - Twitter Search
Twitter - Google App Engine
Twitter Search - Google App Engine

21.
Geographical global view
1. Where are the APIs available globally?
2. How are APIs co-used between regions?

22.
H
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23.
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Regions connected on
basis of API co-use

24.
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Regions connected on
basis of API co-use

25.
…
Main
category

26.
…
All
categories

27.
Deep dive to games and
APIs

28.
APIs in
Games
category:
two step
egocentric
network
30Interactive: http://bit.ly/gameapivis2017

29.
31
APIs and
mashups

30.
Case Minecraft

31.
Case Minecraft

32.
Minecraft //
Value Co-creation
(Ramaswamy, 2009; Vargo and Lusch, 2004)

33.
Value
co-creation:
Augmented
virtual
reality and
bots
https://github.com/PrismarineJS/mineflayer

34.
Minecraft //
Value Co-destruction
• Search for “Minecraft spambot”
(Plé and Chumpitaz Cáceres, 2010; Echeverri and
Skalen, 2011; Vartiainen and Tuunanen, 2016)
37

35.
Sidenote: Games and Metagames
Cf. Boluk & LeMieux (2016):
“From speedrunning and ROM hacking to virtual
economies and international e-sports, metagaming has
become a dominant form of play, a game design
paradigm, and a way of life not only occurring around
videogames, but all forms of digital technology.”
38

36.
Takeaways
• API ecosystem is highly concentrated to a
few regions
• API ecosystem is particularly flexible for
actors to offer and consume services
• API co-use is not API usage
• Public APIs vs. Private APIs