Where did the second parties go?
We were chatting at lunch the other day about 3rd parties building solutions on the audio engine.
One of the people in my group asked "Why do we call them 3rd parties?"
It's one of those "things that make you go hmm".
There's general consensus in the business world that the people/companies who build a platform are first party developers (it doesn't matter if the platform is Windows, Photoshop, or Quake III).
There's also general consensus that the people who build solutions ON those platforms (so applications on Windows, Photoshop Plugins on Photoshop, <pick your favorite game> on the Quake III engine) are called 3rd party developers.
So we've covered 1st and 3rd party developers, what about the 2nd party developers?
Wikipedia's definition for 3rd party developers is consistent with mine, but they describe 2nd party developers as developers operating under contract to 1st party developers -but they also say it's not a part of standard business practices.
So my question is: "Whatever happened to the second party developers? Where did they go?"
Bonus question: From Microsoft's perspective, Adobe is a 3rd party developer, even though they build a platform. If I'm a developer working on a Photoshop plugin, am I 4th party developer from the eyes of Microsoft?
Comments
Anonymous
March 30, 2007
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March 30, 2007
I think it's just the same logic as first-, second-, and third- person, with the idea that Microsoft is the speaker. Microsoft is the first party, the customer is the second party, and other vendors are the third party. Google found this, which says that Apple agrees: http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=300662Anonymous
March 30, 2007
There are no second party developers, because the second party is the customer. First party - Me, Microsoft Second party - You, the customer Third party - They, other developersAnonymous
March 30, 2007
My guess would be that you are the first party, your customer is the 2nd party, and the other guy is the 3rd party. No?Anonymous
March 30, 2007
I'd always assumed that the second party developers were the end-users. So when I buy Windows, and write apps/scripts for it, I'm a 2nd party developer, when I buy Acrobat I'm buying 3rd party software.Anonymous
March 30, 2007
I've always assumed the 2nd party in that situation was the user. The 1st party is always YOU, irrespective of your actual position in the pecking order. It's like 3rd party insurance insurance - the 1st party is YOU, the 2nd party is the insurance company and the 3rd party is everyone else.Anonymous
March 30, 2007
I think of the party stuff as being from the point of view of the person or company buying the application. So if my department needs a Windows app, the second party is me -- the option of building in-house. Certainly that's how it's used in speech -- gee, looks like Microsoft doesn't have a solution for this, so should we build in-house or go third-party? Put another way, the second party is the user community.Anonymous
March 30, 2007
I always thought that (for this example, at least) Microsoft is the 1st party, the user is the second party and ISVs are 3rd parties. JoeAnonymous
March 30, 2007
I've always considered the "second party" to be the consumer. The "first party" is the supplier of the primary tools used by the customer: Operating Systems. The "second party" being the consumer who's written new tools or modified those tools to suit their needs. This would be the Applications to run on those Operating Systems. The "third party" supplying code that's neither the primary vendor's responsibility, nor capable of being written in house. Most software these days doesn't have an active "second party" at all. But back in the day, when you bought your Big Iron, your computer came with a program loader and batch language cleverly marketed as an Operating System. You then had to write your own applications to run on it. If you wanted to skip that step and buy software to run on your system, you talked to a third party supplier.Anonymous
March 30, 2007
Silly idea, this: First party software is written by a company for their own use. (This can be extended to platform once you look at "Third Party") Second party is when a business (first party) contract to someone (a second party) to create software for their own use. Third party is when a developer (first party) creates software for use on a platform created by another developer (the second party) to be sold to an end user (the third party) Technically, since Windows is written to run on top of a hardware platform wouldn't that make MS a third party vendor to Intel and AMD. <grin>Anonymous
March 30, 2007
An off-the-cuff analysis inspired by my English Lit classes follows... I am the first person. You are the second person. Everyone else is the third person. Now, in terms of selling a platform to a consumer, the platform writer is the first person. The consumer is the second person, and everyone else is the third person. When the platform writer makes software, it's first party software. When "anyone else" makes software, it's third party. What's second party? When the consumer makes their own software. Second party software is open source! Sure, it's probably not historical or accurate, but still interesting, no?Anonymous
March 30, 2007
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March 30, 2007
RyanBemrose: You got it exactly right (and said it well) before I even had a chance to try. You&me are 1st&2nd, everybody else is 3rd.Anonymous
March 30, 2007
Actually, Ryan, that's what I always thought it meant.Anonymous
March 30, 2007
I always thought the second-party was the customer. First party - manufacturer, second party - customer, third party, someone unrelated.Anonymous
March 30, 2007
<i>Bonus question: From Microsoft's perspective, Adobe is a 3rd party developer, even though they build a platform. If I'm a developer working on a Photoshop plugin, am I 4th party developer from the eyes of Microsoft?</i> If you write about it, are you part of the fifth estate? ;-)Anonymous
March 30, 2007
@RyanBemros, I agree that the "second person" is the end user. Of course, end-user software may not be open source, or even distributed. I think enabling second-person development is important -- for example, those little customizable toolbar buttons linked to macros in MS Word was pretty much my introduction to programming. You get some little itch, the platform offers an easy way to scratch it, and everybody's happy.Anonymous
March 30, 2007
Yeah, I think the owner of the computer is the second party. Holdover from when you had to input all of your own programs each time you ran. :)Anonymous
March 30, 2007
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March 30, 2007
Ryan's right. The customer is the second party.Anonymous
March 30, 2007
I always thought of it as the customer and the main application producer being involved in a two-party transaction, and anyone else writing add-ons for that main application is a third-party to that transaction. I've never used nor seen the term "first party developer" before.Anonymous
March 30, 2007
@Ryan, I followed you right up until the "open source" statement. Writing software for myself doesn't make it open source. Making my own software doesn't automatically indicate I'm ready to share it with anyone, much less provide the source code. And, your interpretation gets even more confusing, because, if I write software and sell it, then I'm a 3rd party to Microsoft and their customers. But, since I use Windows and can make software strictly for my own use, I'm a second party. Truly, I have a dizzying intellect! Just wait until I get started! Where was I? Oh yeah... I like Larry's interpretation as it applies to the technical world. But, I can honestly say I've never used the phrase "2nd party" to refer to a contractor. How about this: The first party the creator of a widget and the 2nd party is the consumer of that widget. Someone who enters into the party with another role is the 3rd party, but only if they also another widget based on the original widget. :-)Anonymous
March 30, 2007
The definition from wiki makes some sense if you consider the legal definition as the origin of the usage. The first two parties are in a business relationship/agreement and third parties do not have that relationship intact. So Microsoft could have been the 2nd party to IBM when they were developing OS2 v3?Anonymous
March 30, 2007
My understanding was always the same as Ryan's. The second party is simply the customer of the 1st party, who may help himself to some 3rd party software if the 1st party has partied too much instead of developing the code the 2nd party wants. Or something like that...Anonymous
March 30, 2007
Perhaps it's like the First-world and Third-world system; Second-world referred to the communists, but they're not really around anymore, so there really isn't a "Second-world" anymore. I wonder how many other situations there are where there were three main categories, but the second one has since disappeared? Sounds a bit like a job for the folks over at the Language Log!Anonymous
March 30, 2007
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March 30, 2007
And while Larry is fascinated with terminology, I wonder how many people will post exactly the same thing without even reading previous comments? That surely says much about their self-esteem.Anonymous
March 31, 2007
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April 01, 2007
"And while Larry is fascinated with terminology, I wonder how many people will post exactly the same thing without even reading previous comments? That surely says much about their self-esteem." Igor, it's because the comments to this blog are moderated and sometimes appear several hours after they are originally written. Most or all of those people didn't see the previous posts because they weren't published yet.Anonymous
April 02, 2007
@Aaron: "those little customizable toolbar buttons linked to macros in MS Word was pretty much my introduction to programming. " Wow. Now I really feel old. My introduction to programming involved Microsoft BASIC on a computer with about as much memory as is consumed by the bitmaps on the MS Word toolbar buttons.Anonymous
April 02, 2007
Your brother used to live in Japan, right? He should have been able to answer that question. The first party involves eating and drinking, and usually ends around 10 p.m. The second party involves drinking only. After that, non-geeks surely have a third party of the type that geeks can only dream about. However, what can we geeks go after the second party other than go write third party code?Anonymous
April 03, 2007
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April 03, 2007
Monday, April 02, 2007 1:02 PM by Tim Lesher @Aaron: >> "those little customizable toolbar buttons linked to macros in >> MS Word was pretty much my introduction to programming. " > > Wow. Now I really feel old. My introduction to programming > involved Microsoft BASIC on a computer with about as much > memory as is consumed by the bitmaps on the MS Word > toolbar buttons. OK. My introduction to programming was in Fortran. Later I wrote part of a Basic interpreter, but not a complete one, because I stayed in college. At the time, no one guessed it would become more useful than a toy. Then someone else dropped out of college and wrote a complete Basic interpreter with two other programmers.Anonymous
April 03, 2007
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April 11, 2007
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