OpenSocket will take an Open Social or iGoogle Gadget you have written and convert it into your own Facebook Application.

OpenSocket provides the functionality built into other Open Social sites such as Myspace, Hi5, Orkut, and iGoogle. When it comes to making Open Social calls to get friends information, Open Socket translates between those Javascript calls and the equivalents on the Facebook Platform. Think of it as an emulator.

Since it is pretty easy to try out, the best thing is to find out for yourself! All of the Open Social functionality will be available, but remember that the Facebook Platform is more complex. Native Facebook applications will be able to make more use of the deep hooks into Facebook that the platform allows.

But for a great many developers, OpenSocket will provide enough functionality that they never need to get their hands dirty with the Facebook-specific functions.

Anyone who has built an Open Social gadget and also wants to reach Facebook's audience, but who doesn't want to have to write another separate application using the very different interface provided by the Facebook Platform.

Moreover, Open Social does not require you to run a server, whereas native Facebook applications can bring heavy traffic that you have to handle yourself. So OpenSocket is great for anyone who does not want the burden of setting up and running hosting!