Media companies - the next google?

While the rest of the world looks at how or why it should want to integrate the new Google SOAP API into whatever type of application comes into mind - just shift gears for a moment and take a look at what other companies have to offer in way of "services". Services that are just lying there - waiting to be made available to the outside world.

Being somewhat of a Formula 1 racing fan (until this season came around which is really boring so far) I was particularly interested in the F1 database that RTL Germany offers. RTL is one of the largest media companies in Europe (in case you happen to be on the other side of the pond).

From what I have found so far RTL is running a MySQL database and using PHP (open source fans - take note) to serve up the information. At the moment - as far as I know - only inside their own Web site. Just as they have a database for Formula 1, other media companies have the same thing for Soccer (Football to you and me), Tennis, Baseball - you name it. All that information just waiting to be requested.

Up to now RTL does not provide the data in an XML format - or via REST/SOAP/XML-RPC whatever. Why not? Imagine sitting Cocoon in front of the database and serving the data up in whatever format you need - HTML (of course), WML, PDF ... Or use the Cocoon XML portal and build the sports portal combining the XML feeds of various databases.

Opening up data-sources such as sports databases via XML would be another interesting step on the way ahead. And then there's movies, TV-schedules, ...