Amazon has the most useful APIs out there. Don't copy them though.
So many small companies put out giant behemoth APIs with crazy security hoops because that's what Amazon does and Amazon's stuff is really cool. As a result, nobody outside the dev team can figure out how to authenticate, so nobody actually uses the API.
Check out Twiddla's API (http://www.twiddla.com/API/) for an example of how to keep things lightweight. 2 POST endpoints and an IFRAME syntax. Only the bare minimum security, and a huge emphasis on getting your thing up and running without having to sweat the API.
So many small companies put out giant behemoth APIs with crazy security hoops because that's what Amazon does and Amazon's stuff is really cool. As a result, nobody outside the dev team can figure out how to authenticate, so nobody actually uses the API.
Check out Twiddla's API (http://www.twiddla.com/API/) for an example of how to keep things lightweight. 2 POST endpoints and an IFRAME syntax. Only the bare minimum security, and a huge emphasis on getting your thing up and running without having to sweat the API.