I must say that I did not see this one coming: MySpace and Google are working together to launch OpenSocial which officially launches tonight!

Official Statement:

“MySpace, the world’s largest social network, and Google, Inc. (NASDAQ:
GOOG) today announced that they are joining forces to launch
OpenSocial— a set of common APIs for building social applications
across the web. The partnership spearheads an initiative to standardize
and simplify the development of social applications. Today’s
announcement underscores MySpace’s commitment to supporting standards
that foster innovation in an increasingly social Web.”

They are not the only founding partners in this. Others include: Friendster, hi5, Hyves, Ning, LinkedIn, imeem, Engage.com, orkut, Plaxo, Salesforce.com, Six Apart, Tianji, Viadeo, and XING. Six Apart also owns Typepad, LiveJournal, MovableType, and Vox.

So what happens to Facebook? Will they join MySpace? Will the unholy Facebook/Microsoft alliance do battle with Googe/MySpace?