I blame Twitter. It's not enough to be a website anymore. Oh no. You must be a platform. Have an API. Court developers. Build an "ecosystem." Whatever. You know what an application programming interface really is? An admission that you're too poor, cheap, or uncreative to build all the features your website needs. Pownce is the latest to 'fess up to its shortcomings. The file-sharing and messaging site has released its own API. Incomplete, naturally. Maybe they can release an API for their API and have someone else finish it for them.

What the company forgets in introducing the API is that we didn't come to Pownce for its features. We came to hang out with its founders — Kevin Rose and Daniel Burka from Digg, and Valleywide crush object Leah Culver — as well as their equally hard-partying friends. Where's the API for that?

Contact information for this author is not available.