Developer Partner Case Study: Box.net Application
Box.net Application Enables Users to Store and Share
All Types of Files—Without Leaving Facebook
The Company
Box.net, founded in 2005, provides secure online file storage and sharing
to over 850,000 registered users. Its platform allows content to be
accessible, sharable and storable in any format from anywhere.
The Application
Box.net’s application for Facebook allows users to publish and share
media without ever leaving their Facebook profile pages.
Box.net
Application
Box.net is a website where users can store files of many varieties—PDFs,
photos, videos—and access and share that data from anywhere via the
Box.net web interface, with no software required. The application it built
for Facebook allows users to do the same—publish and share media
without ever leaving their profile pages.
Facebook has long supported sharing media through its Share feature
but, until now, users had to host the files elsewhere on the web. The
Box application provides an upload tool, file-hosting and file-sharing
functionality directly on the Facebook site.
“We like the
democratic nature
of Facebook, the
way things can be
discovered as your
friends and networks
find them valuable
or interesting. That
allows our app to
spread in a way that
makes sense.”
–Aaron Levie, CEO,
cofounder, Box.net
Screen capture of Box.net Application.
Facebook
Developer
Resources
Several months ago, Box.net realized users wanted to share the data they
uploaded to Box.net, and built tools to enable their users to share their data
with other services.
“That’s when we learned about Facebook Platform. It seemed like an amazing
environment to allow Facebook users to publish files and media the same way
they do on Box.net,” Levie says. “It’s a pretty understandable platform. It relies
on a lot of common functions and standards so it’s easy to dive into.”
Facebook had strong documentation and has a robust developer community.
“We had access to some great tools and code samples,” Levie says. He adds that
Box.net has “only touched on” the potential of Facebook Platform and plans to
add to its Facebook application as it learns more about what users want.
For the Users
The Box application enables users to upload, store and share all sorts of file
types—video, photos, documents. Even better, they can do it all without
leaving their Facebook profiles.
“We’ve provided an upload tool directly within the application,” Levie explains.
“Let’s say you’re putting together an event and you want to upload a PDF
document, a video, or some music. Now you can do it directly on your profile,
without having to leave Facebook for this functionality. We’ve made our app
very flexible to meet the needs of a variety of users and use cases.”
The application is easy to get up and running. It’s just a couple clicks from
seeing the application to adding it to your profile
Why Box.net
Built on
Facebook
Platform
Facebook appealed to Box.net not only because it’s “the leading social utility,”
but, as Levie says, its users are the people Box.net wants to reach. “We see
Facebook as having a very complementary audience and compatible service.
They are a people platform; we’re building a data platform.”
Screen capture of Box.net Application.