Will Facebook Platform Be The New Arbiter Of Web 2.0?

Facebook Platform is already having a huge impact on the crowded and competitive Web 2.0 start-uplandscape, most notably in the social music category, i.e. applications that allow users to share with others what songs they listen to and to discover new music by seeing what their friends and others in their network are listening to.

The big winner so far has been iLike, which rocketed from 1,000 Facebook users on Friday to 180,000 yesterday (via VentureBeat). iLike has been so success that it’s now desperate hunting for more servers. In contrast, popular social music list Last.fm was nowhere to be found on Facebook Platform, and it fell to a Facebook user (Jeff Jarvis’ precociously talented son Jake) to fill the void.

It’s becoming clear that Facebook Platform will be a powerful force for growing the user base of Web 2.0 applications through viral sharing mechanisms that show users what applications their friends are using and highlight the most popular applications. Many Web 2.0 apps have battled it out in relative obscurity among TechCrunch readers and other early adopters. Now that they have instant access to Facebook’s millions of mainstream users, it will be very instructive to see what the real drivers of mainstream success are for Web 2.0 apps.