Photobucket opens its API to developers

At the Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco today, photo sharing site Photobucket announced that it is opening its API to developers, with the hopes of generating new applications based on its Web services.

The API allows applications to be developed which access a user's account, create and edit albums, upload, search and share content, and update metadata of media files.

Though Photobucket proudly shows off many examples of what can be done with the site's API, it appears this afternoon that the link provided to developers has proven a bit unreliable, with several users complaining of the API's inaccessibility.

The high traffic on the developers page could be attributed in part to today's simultaneous announcement from San Diego company Intercasting. That group announced a mobile Photobucket app built upon its ANTHEM mobile-to-social network platform that allows users to upload photos from their mobile phones directly to the site.

This mobile upload capability provides a complement to Photobucket's collaboration with Wi-Fi SD card manufacturer Lexar/Eye-Fi, which supports practically every other photo sharing site.

Other partners utilizing the API are Adobe which provides video editing tools for the site; FotoFlexer, which provides the site's built-in photo editor; and TiVo, which allows users to view their Photobucket contents on broadband-connected TiVo DVRs, AOL, RockYou, Slide, Snapvine, Flektor, and Blurb.