It begins — this is the first pebble announcing the avalanche from Google, the thing that will make everyone realize what kind of doo-doo shorts outfit Facebook really is:

Google has opened up a sandbox for developers where they can try building some new types of iGoogle apps not available to the general iGoogle user population. Most significantly, they can add activity streams (i.e., updates) and friends lists in new navigation panes on the page. Any change in a third-party iGoogle widget will be able to be reflected in the updates pane. (This has actually been a long time coming, since adding activity streams was always part of the OpenSocial plan). And they can also play around with larger “canvas” pages that users can click through to from each widget for a full-page experience. How very Facebook of them.

I’ve written on this before. If I hadn’t had a bottle of vinho verde along with a sweet, sweet chicken dinner tonight, I’d probably write more. But for right now, all I’ve got to say is that I welcome our benevolent masters in this arena even more than I have in others.