One piece of news has been vibrating through tech blogs the past couple of days- Google, apparently, is basing future API plans on the competitive threat that Facebook poses. Michael Arrington says that Google will “out-open” Facebook and, in doing so, maintain its market position while increasing its stake in the social media sphere. Who knows if it will work. Underestimating Google is never wise.

However, Facebook’s competitive advantage isn’t just in its openness or social user base. There’s something more intrinsically valuable about its model for serving ads- click fraud is a relative non-issue. As Google continues to be plagued by problems of click-fraud accusations, Facebook will stay a relatively safe place for advertisers. That’s another card the company has in its favor. No matter how much Google “opens up”, it will still have to spend significant financial, technical, and public relations resources convincing advertisers that it is “closing down” a growing problem.