Of battles and humility

I just finished reading the rather lengthy (but excellent) post by Chris Messina on the battle of the future of the social web regarding the Facebook and Google showdown

We previously wrote about how open data is a massive blue ocean of possibilities for value creation online. Chris basically says the same, but goes a big step further, he challenges Facebook and Google to make a truce get over their differences and together create a larger pie even if you have to share more.

Varian & Shapiro in their enlightened book Information Rules (1998) put it this way:

An agreed-upon standard may lead to a far bigger overall market, making for a larger pie that you can split with your partners. Don’t be proud; be prepared to cut a deal even with your most bitter enemy.

So in this case humility from both Google and Facebook will increase the value for all users and maybe as a reward increase the wealth for Facebook and Google?

What do you think?

(BTW The image is a ironical, we are so romantic as to believe and hope Facebook and Google will find a truce in this.)