What Facebook Really Says About You

What does your Facebook or My Space page say about you? Maybe more than you realise.
Social networking sites soared in popularity

Research has found users of social networking sites fall into one of five distinct types of people - which may reveal more about you than the rest of your profile.

According to a study users fall into one of the following categories:

Alpha socialisers: Mostly male, under 25s, who use sites in intense short bursts to flirt, meet new people and be entertained.

Attention seekers: Mostly female, who crave attention and comments from others, often posting photos and customising their profiles.

Followers: Males and females of all ages who join sites to keep up with what their peers are doing.

Faithfuls: Older males and females generally aged over 20, who typically use social networking sites to rekindle old friendships, often from school or university.

Functionals: Mostly older males who tended to be single-minded in using sites for a particular use.

The study found three types of people who would not use social networking sites.

They were those concerned about safety, those who were technically inexperienced or people who consider it a waste of time.

The research, by communications watchdog Ofcom, also found nearly half of all children with access to the internet had their own personal profile on a social networking site.

A total of 49% of eight to 17-year-olds had their own profile, while 22% of adults also used such sites.

But it was more common for adults than children to have profiles on more than one networking site.

news.sky.com

Facebook & Myspace For Online Dating

Why You Should Use Facebook And Myspace For Online Dating

by Victor Williamson
http://ezinearticles.com/?expert=Victor_Williamson

With millions and millions of users now joining social networking sites such as Facebook and Myspace, it is not surprising that some of those users are using these social networks to meet and date others. The first question that probably comes to your mind is “Why would you use Facebook or Myspace to date?”

There is actually a lot of reasons why you should use these social networks! I will list just four of the top reasons that you should use Facebook or Myspace to meet others.

1. Time Commitment - As with other online dating sites, you can meet others on Facebook and Myspace while working around your daily activities and schedule. Not only can you work around your schedule but it takes very little time to communicate and get to know others over the internet. These two benefits makes social networks a very convenient and efficient way to meet members of the opposite sex.

2. Member Base - The user base of social networks are in the millions and are continuing to grow. This massive growth makes Facebook and Myspace the perfect place to meet other singles since the dating pool is so large.

3. Social Tools - The third reason why you should use social networks to meet others is the tools these networks make available. As social networks, Facebook and Myspace have tons of tools built into their systems for people to interact and these very same tools can be harnessed for communicating not only with friends but with singles.

4. First Impressions. The last reason I would give for this dating trend is the information available on these networks. Facebook and Myspace both display user profiles which will allow you to not only see pictures of the person you are interested in, but also get an idea of their interests, hobbies, values, and other useful information that may help you to make a better match. These sites give you a much more informed first impression.

So are you a member of a social network? Are you Single? Then why aren’t you using these social networks to meet members of the opposite sex? If you want more reasons, tips, and advice for meeting people using these social networks go check out www.datedemon.com To sign up or check out these social networking sites go to www.facebook.com or myspace.com
___________
Victor Williamson is a dating advice author for www.datedemon.com

AOL buys social network Bebo for $850 million

In an unexpected move, AOL has acquired social-networking site Bebo. The price tag: $850 million in cash.

Rumors had floated over the past few months that Bebo, which has over 40 million members, was up for sale. Reports suggested a $1 billion price tag, but there were few hints as to potential buyers. Though Bebo had already partnered with AOL's AIM messaging client to facilitate friend-invite interoperability between the two services, even the most creative blogger speculation didn't seem to point to AOL eventually buying the social network.

Ironically, AOL itself has been talked about as an acquisition target. Jeffrey Bewkes, CEO of Time Warner, which operates AOL, has spoken recently about plans to spin off or sell divisions of the company.

AOL has made it clear that buying Bebo is a move geared toward international growth, as the youth-oriented social network is wildly popular in the U.K., Ireland, and New Zealand. AOL reported that it has launched "17 international web sites over the last year and has plans to expand to 30 countries outside the U.S. by the end of 2008," as well as international versions of its home page and some services. Bebo, meanwhile, plans to launch five localized versions of its service this year (France, Germany, Italy, Spain, and the Netherlands), and AOL will make it a major part of the company's international expansion strategy.

"Bebo is the perfect complement to AOL's personal communications network and puts us in a leading position in social media," said AOL chairman and CEO Randy Falco in a statement. "What drew us to Bebo was its substantial and fast-growing worldwide user-base, its vision of a truly social web, and the monetization opportunities...This positions us to offer advertisers even greater reach and marketers significant insights into the desires and needs of consumers."

Additionally, despite the fact that performance monitoring firms have pegged it as sluggish, Bebo's technology was likely appealing to AOL. The social network's developer platform supports both OpenSocial and Facebook applications; it also has an "Open Media" platform for audio and video content from big-media names like CBS and MTV as well as online production outlets like Next New Networks and Ustream. AOL, meanwhile, has opened up AIM to developers.

In a conference call on Thursday, Falco and Ron Grant, AOL's president and COO, as well as Bebo president Joanna Shields, said that integration between Bebo and AOL's AIM and ICQ messaging properties will be crucial. Combined, they said, AOL will own a "social graph" of 80 million people, bigger than the 67 million that the independently-run Facebook currently counts but still significantly smaller than News Corp.'s MySpace.com.

"The distribution aspect of linking up with AIM and ICQ is an extraordinary opportunity for us," Shields said in the conference call.

Still, at the core, the Bebo acquisition is all about the advertising. It comes at a time when AOL is still struggling to make the transition to a leader in online advertising after amassing nearly $1 billion worth in acquisitions--Tacoda, Buy.at, Quigo, and AdTech, to name a few--into its Platform-A ad network, as well as social-media buys like Goowy. Bebo, like most other social-networking sites, relies on ad revenue, and as projections claim that social-media ad buys will keep rising (eMarketer predicts 75 percent year over year), AOL undoubtedly wants a piece of the pie.

But it's still an uphill climb for AOL. Just this week, the company confirmed that Platform-A president Curt Viebranz was departing the company amid a management shakeup.

Joanna Shields, president of the San Francisco-based Bebo, will continue to run the social network and will report to Ron Grant. The deal was brokered on AOL's side by Bank of America Securities and Deutsche Bank Securities. Bebo had hired investment bank Allen & Co. when it opted to put itself up for sale.

Grant estimated in Thursday's conference call that the deal will ideally be complete within a month.

Is social networking a waste of time?

timesonline.co.uk

There has been much fuss of late over the loss of productivity brought on by employees multi-tasking between actual work and social networking. One estimate puts the cost to British industry at £6.5 billion per annum in lost productivity and questionable bandwidth usage. Another survey estimates that Britain’s social media fanatics are spending as much as 12 hours per week on these sites, no doubt eating into valuable work time.

But what is the impact of this collective Facebook/MySpace/Bebo addiction on high school and university students, our bright future? A new survey this week by IT specialists Global Secure Systems, (the ones who took a look at the impact on businesses and arrived at the £6.5 billion figure), says students are also guilty of sneaking in a fair bit of social networking during the school day.

In their survey of 500 English school children between the ages of 13 and 17, 51 per cent confess to checking their social network profiles during lessons. Over a quarter admit their in-school daily social network fix exceeds over 30 minutes each day.

If this sounds surprising, you haven’t been to school lately. Laptop-toting school kids are the norm these days, as are Wifi-enabled campuses. And when the laptop is in the locker, there are net-enabled smart phones at the ready. Add to the equation the rocket-fast texting ability of your typical 16-year-old and you get an explosion of social networking opportunities at the most unlikely points in the school day.

No educator would knowingly allow such a distraction in their classroom, and yet it appears to be happening right under their noses. It’s hard enough getting the PlayStation generation to focus for even a half-hour on a lecture of, say, King John and the Magna Carta. Try competing with the latest lunchroom gossip being broadcasted to mobiles, Facebook and Twitter. The significance of establishing modern-day democracy pales in comparison.

Before you shake your head and mutter something starting with the phrase “In my day…”, admit it – how many of you have shirked off work on an important business project to tend to a personal email, text or, these days, a Facebook query? How many of you have done it today? How many of you are doing it now?

We adults might regard tidying up our profile, sending messages to friends or contacts, joining the odd (or oddball) group or participating in a movie knowledge quiz to be a harmless distraction, the kind of thing that keeps us sane during the workday. (While writing this column, I have been twice drawn to my Facebook profile to attend to small matters, but that’s it. No more for me today. Okay, maybe after lunch.) But teens are deadly serious about social networks. For them, failing to attend to these duties could end friendships, sink reputations and mean missed opportunities to climb the fickle and precarious social ladder of young adulthood. I say we ought to go easy on them if they are neglecting some of their responsibilities while they fuss around with their online persona.

As a university lecturer at John Cabot University in Rome I encourage my students, all in their early twenties, to embrace social media and every other Web 2.0 application out there. Yes, posting photos of you and your semi-clad friends boozing it up late at night could sink your chances with a prospective employer, who will no doubt be snooping around for this very type of incriminating evidence. But the good far outweighs the bad. I encourage the students to be creative, to promote our online student newspaper, which just over a year from launch is pulling in steadily rising traffic. No doubt all the blog, Facebook and MySpace mentions are helping. I’ve had students who use social networking sites to build and promote projects on fighting poverty and eradicating hunger, organising music gigs, art and photo exhibitions, plus coordinating meet-ups for political rallies.

I admire the growing number of young students who dedicate hours to designing complicated widgets and applications too. Yes, they’re probably neglecting their history paper to complete it, but the end product is a far more valuable lesson learned in creativity, courage and computer coding. When I look at all the creativity, the collaboration and the activism being generated in these networks, I am hopeful for the future. Perhaps it is we educators who need to learn how to harness this power into our everyday classroom lessons.

_______________

Bernhard Warner, a freelance journalist and media consultant, writes about technology, the internet and media industries.

The Future of Social Networking

0. Introduction.

Almost three years ago, I started the Appleseed Project as a way to start experimenting with the idea of distributed social networking. Armed with enough hubris and naivete to think I could build it alone, I coded and coded until I got to the point I am now: With a project that stands at around 75% complete, it functions as a sort of proof-of-concept for distributed social networking in general. I've learned a lot, however, about the technological hurdles and impact that a truly open and distributed social networking platform could provide.

I'm writing this as a way to present my ideas and what I've learned in the hopes that an open and distributed solution becomes the direction that social networking takes. Although I would be happiest to see Appleseed succeed, I'd be excited to see any open and distributed social networking solution be adopted and replace the walled gardens that currently dot the internet landscape.

1. The Problem With Walled Gardens.

The current crop of social networking sites (Myspace, Friendster, Facebook, etc) all operate as "walled gardens", where content is exclusive to the site, and most importantly, the sites provide very little interaction with the outside internet. A user on Myspace has no way to interact with a user on Facebook, despite the design of the internet having historically favored the concept of interaction between internet locations. There is no technological reason for why a user on Myspace wouldn't be able to add a user on Friendster or Facebook to their friends list. At the very least, there is no reason why the same Myspace user couldn't send a message to that same Facebook or Friendster user.

While building Appleseed, I realized just how simple it was to get two "nodes" to communicate. It became a matter of a simple behind-the-scenes request which returned a small XML file. It became apparent to me that the reason that we don't have communication between social networking sites had nothing to do with technological constrants, and was a purely economic decision on the part of existing sites. Almost all major social networking sites business models are centered on having the largest userbase possible, and user lock-in is a major part of that. By restricting your ability to interact with outside sites, they also restrict your ability to choose another site and still maintain your relationships and ability to contact your friends.

The whole situation we're in makes no sense in the context of the way the internet was meant to operate. Concentrating user bases into centralized locations and locking them in seems more like the early 90's and the way Compuserve, AOL, and the like attempted to use walled gardens to monopolize the internet. The natural evolution is an open, distributed standard. A sort of SMTP for social networking, which allows any node to fully connect to any other node. Would people put up with an email address at gmail.com which could only email other gmail.com users? Of course not, and the same standard should be applied to social networking.

2. Why "glue" doesn't work.

One of the solutions proposed is to use aggregation services which act as "glue" to hold together the current systems. This is a fundamentally flawed solution, because it ultimately relies on no single standard for communication between sites. Site A, B, and C might work with the aggregation service, but brand new Site D will require that the aggregation service supports their system. And what happens when sites change their format? The result becomes a constant process of modifying and extending the aggregation service when new sites and formats arise.

Oddly enough, when it comes to making sense of multiple walled gardens, the best we've come up with is to glue them together and hope it holds. But this is hardly a solution, and really shouldn't be advocated by those who want to see social networking properly evolve.

3. The Distributed Solution.

The solution is actually pretty simple. Especially considering things like OpenID already solve the problem of distributed logins. A user has a home node, which provides them with a social networking address, much like an email address. I'm currently 'michael.chisari(@)appleseedproject.org'. This also becomes their OpenID identity, and allows them to log in to other Appleseed (and potentially any OpenID site) nodes. Communication between sites exists as a simple http request from one node to another. Friend requests, messaging, all types of interaction between users becomes easily distributed while functioning seamlessly as far as the end user is concerned.

The result is that instead of having one Myspace or one Friendster, each with millions of users on it, we have thousands of sites which range from a few dozen to hundreds of thousands of users. Except they all exist in a network of nodes which communicate between each other.

The importance of distributed social networking can be outlined in the advantage that the user gains: Freedom to choose between any compatible node without losing access to their contacts.

4. Privacy And Trust In A Socially Networked World.

It's a whole new ball game when you're dealing with a distributed social networking model. No longer provided the protection of a walled garden, it's important to think of the system from the ground up in terms of "Privacy" and "Trust."

Privacy means that the home node of a user should never give out any information that isn't explicitly stated to be publicly available. Because nodes are querying other nodes about information about users, the assumption is always on the side of privacy, lacking any further data otherwise. Although you cannot achieve full privacy in a socially networked world, most social networks today function as unlocked glass houses, providing very few, if any, privacy options for the user. In a world that is increasingly socially networked, where social networks will very likely include one's boss, parents, landlord, and more, it's important to be able to provide strong mechanisms for restricting access. Tthe user should have as much granular control over who in their immediate network can see what as practically possible.

Trust is the concept of utilizing social networks to determine relationships with strangers, much like in the real world. If you sit alone in a public place, and a stranger comes up and begins talking to you, you have very little trust between you and that person. However, if you sit with a good friend, and that good friend introduces you to that same stranger, a trust relationship has been established. Social networking must recognize this basic aspect of human social interaction, and find strong and intuitive methods for implementing it on a software level. This not only can help with the random friend requests that many on MySpace get, but also can help to eliminate spam, and even possible provide for a social network where everyone can participate as safely as real life, using their trust networks to evaluate new relationships.

5. Technological Hurdles And Considerations.

Most importantly, it must be stated that social networking works best when the concerns of the users are considered to be greater than the concerns of the developers. Many open source social networking solutions break too much from the current social networking convention in what may be interesting technologically, but can be off-putting to users who have grown accustomed to sites such as MySpace. Being at the birth of a new paradigm provides a lot of opportunities to experiment technologically, but when this is done without usability kept in mind, or when it solves a problem that only really exists for the developer, it serves as a deterrent to building a large userbase, which is the only real purpose of social networking.

Balancing this consideration with the technological problems that distributed social networking creates can be very difficult. For instance, the issue of spam messages, while easily guarded against from within a walled garden with active administration, becomes a much more difficult task during decentralization. One of the solutions that Appleseed has used is a simplified version of the IM2000 protocol (www.im2000.org), which is a sender-stores system, as opposed to the receiver-stores system of SMTP. This provides the most important protection against spam: Accountability. In order to send a message, your node must maintain it's existence and identity on the internet until the message is "read" (downloaded). Without going too far into this idea, the balance between this system and the previous concern of usability is that users will be reluctant to adopt this new system unless it feels incredibly similar to a standard email application.

Other hurdles include scaling outward (as opposed to upwards, like current walled gardens do), and how to perform searches in such a distributed environment. Maintaining that distributed system, from a development and API standpoint, is probably the most difficult task. Error checking for downed nodes, allowing for variable speeds in response times, etc., all become huge issues, and unlike a walled garden, a social networking node cannot control anything outside of it's own server. Fortunately, these are issues inherent in the distributed nature of the internet, and have been solved in varying degrees plenty of times before. The issue is simply to apply those solutions in the best manner possible.

6. Conclusion.

Eventually, Myspace and Facebook, no matter what fancy features they may add, will seem as archaic as Compuserve and Prodigy do now. The acceptance of a distributed social networking model is, as the internet has shown, an inevitability. All proprietary walled gardens have given way to distributed models, and social networking is the next frontier. And just like open, distributed protocols before it, social networking requires an open API in order to function properly. Since many walled gardens are based on amassing as many users as possible, in order to maximize ad revenue, adopting a distributed model goes against their business plan. Therefore, it's up to the open source community to come up with a real distributed social networking solution.

Michael Chisari
appleseed.sourceforge.net

Social Networks Still Growing Strong

Stats to be released tomorrow by comScore show that traffic to most of the top social networking sites is continuing to increase in the US, although the amount of time users spend on such sites is leveling off. For example, while MySpace is showing 11.6% year-to-year growth in unique visitors and Facebook is up 78.6%, the amount of time the average user spends on each site is down 10.4% and up just 1.1%, respectively. Further, the average time spent on Bebo is off 63.6%, though the US is only a small part of that social network’s user base.

Looking closer at the engagement metrics, it’s notable that MySpace users still spend the most time on the site versus users of other social networks. In January, the average visitor spent 203.9 minutes on the site (a 13.7% month-to-month increase), while the average Facebook visitor was logged on for 172.1 minutes (a 1.6% month-to-month increase, but notably down from a high of 199.9 minutes per visitor in February ’07).

The decline in minutes per user on Facebook certainly adds more credence to the theory that interest in applications is starting to fall off. Meanwhile, a few Facebook-like additions such as a friend news feed and improved photo galleries seem to be keeping users on MySpace as the top social network prepares to launch its own developer platform to users next month.

A few other notable numbers from the report:

* YouTube unique visitors more than doubled in the past year, to 61.3 million visitors in January. Page views were up 277%.
* Flickr unique visitors were up 88.5% to nearly 14 million. Page views were up 266% year-over-year to 340 million in January.
* Yahoo 360 unique visitors plunged 53.4% to 2.2 million. Page views were down 54.6% to 52 million.
* Unique visitors to Facebook fell 2.3% from December. They are essentially flat since August (33.7 million, versus 33.8 million for January).

Clearly, YouTube is benefiting from being acquired by Google and integrated into search results, while Flickr is continuing to grow under the Yahoo umbrella. As for Yahoo 360, its demise probably doesn’t come as a huge surprise given Yahoo’s ever-shifting social networking strategy.

mashable.com

Social Network Software More Popular Than Ever

Social Networking websites can be found on every corner of the internet. Virtual communities, offering community software to help people to keep in touch with each other, have been popular since the first networking website was developed in 1995. From Classmates, LiveJournal to MySpace, social networking software is available to anyone who has access to the World Wide Web.

Online social networking began to grow in 1995, following the development of Classmates. This virtual community was designed to give members the community software tools they need in order to network with old friends they went to high school with. Classmates set the way for many other social network software providers to create web communities, to help people network with groups of people of their choice. Some popular online networking communities include:

1. MySpace
2. Blogger
3. MSN Groups

Social networking, in basic terms, is one way for a person to easily keep in touch with a group of people. With online social networking, community software is often available for any registered member of the virtual community. Most social network software will include:

1. an email box
2. a place to set up a user profile
3. instant message capabilities
4. photo sharing
5. public message sharing
6. private message sharing

These are not the only features included with some social networking software, but they are the most common features offered.

A major factor that contributes greatly to the growth of social networking online is the convenience and ease that the community software provides. It has never been easier to leave messages for a group of people, or locating people with the same interests and overall goals. Community software tools also enable picture and file sharing with ease. Private messages, as well as public messages, can be left with a few clicks of the mouse! Convenience and ease are proven factors that are aiding in the growth of online social interaction, as well as the increased use of social networking software.

The increased use of the internet is a contributing factor to the popularity growth of social network software. A great number of households have a least one personal computer, pocket computers, and cell phones with internet access as well. This is not to mention that almost every business has a website, and offer their products and services online. The popularity of the internet itself is helping the popularity growth of online social networking, as well as the software, that these virtual communities offer to their registered members.

MySpace is currently ranked the most popular website offering social networking software with membership, with over 38 million registered users who are unique. This means that MySpace has over 38 million "different" users, as opposed to having many of the same users creating different accounts. Although MySpace has come under scrutiny on many news stations, the popularity of the social networking software they offer continues to grow at a very high rate.

Blogger is another very popular social networking community with over 18 million registered unique users. Social network software on this website enables the member to publish entries in his or her "blog" as often as desired. This is only one feature included with the community software tools available with membership to this website. With an 80 percent year to year growth statistic, it is predicted that the popularity of Blogger will continue to rise.

Finally, Facbebook took the college demographic by storm, growing the site into a billion-dollar company in just a few years. The site, originally developed by a student from Harvard, catered to individual colleges. It has since expanded to high schools, and other networks, and has added many new features including classifieds, games, and a developer tools.

In recent years, social network software has begun making its way in an affordable form to the average small business or individual. These powerful and low cost solutions allow individuals to start their own social networking site, with the potential of becoming a huge success. What used to cost tens of thousands of dollars to develop in the early 2000s, now costs only a few hundred dollars, with setup being done in a matter of days. The rise of these sites run by individuals will cause a huge influx in the number of people running and accessing the various types of social networking sites out there today.

In conclusion, it is safe to say that social networking software will continue to grow in popularity. Because of the ease and convenience of community software offered by different virtual communities, many people will continue to take advantage of their use.
_________________

Ron McNeil promotes social networking software to start your own MySpace clone, FaceBook clone, and run your own community site powered by WebScribble software located at webscribble.com/products/webnetwork/index.shtml

Is Affiliate Marketing Safe For Social Networks?

Social networks, like YouTube, MySpace, and Flicker have taken the internet by storm.

One of the greatest challenges for most individuals and businesses is how to harness the enormous amount of traffic these sites are receiving and monetize it, either by growing their business through lead collection, or promoting either their own products, or affiliate products where they receive a commission.

Because of the social nature of the networking sites, the user community tends to frown upon promotion methods and many of the social network sites have included restrictions prohibiting promotion on their member pages.

However, there is one social network that is growing in popularity with business and individual internet marketers. This site is Squidoo.com, a simple concept similar to a blog, originated by author and speaker Seth Godin.

Squidoo is unique among social networks because it actually encourages members to use the site to promote products. Additionally, Mr. Godin actually recommends members to create multiple pages, called lenses, to promote anything they want.

Members of Squidoo have the option of either earning a revenue share of the revenue generated by their lens or they can donate the revenue to a charity of their choice.

Besides earning revenue through the ads shown by the Squidoo network, some members have also used some advanced html to include their own advertisements and subscription offers.

Copywriter Tiffany Dow started out on Squidoo.com just promoting her writing services. She is now considered one of the leading authorities on how to use this service to promote your services and affiliate products.

Tiffany had this to say about marketing on social networks:

“In a nutshell, Web 2.0 is centered around socialization on the ‘net, but as you probably already know, the biggest social giant site to date (MySpace), bans the practice of marketing, leaving entrepreneurs scrambling to play hide and seek with their customers without the risk of getting banned.

I started using a website called Squidoo to promote my writing services but once I realized how powerful it was, I started using it to market my own products and affiliate items - with amazing results that turned me into the Internet’s residential expert on Squidoo by accident!”

Tiffany has documented her success in a popular ebook called “Social Networking on Squidoo”. As a result of the 30 day challenge, an updated ebook is being developed, documenting the techniques used within the challenge.

Whether you are an individual, or a small business, Squidoo.com is a very powerful resource to promote your business. The ebook Tiffany created provides a blueprint to a successful promotion on Squidoo.
___________________

Kevin Davis has been marketing online for 3 years. For more information about Kevin, the services his company provides, recommended products and more, visit his blog at kevinhdavis.com.

Currently, Kevin is the leader in Tiffany Dow’s Squidoo 30 Day Challenge. You can check out his Squidoo lens at squidoo.com/internet-marketing-strategy. (February 4, 2007)

Good Night,
Kevin

Business Social Networks: For the People, By the People

Niche Social Networks have been a hot topic on this and many blogs for a few months now. Their popularity has been increasing exponentially to the point that businesses who are normally behind on the internet are now starting to take notice and find out “what is social networking and what can it do for my business?”

It is in the wording of the question itself that the problem lies.

First, here is a brief explanation of what a social network is done Twitter-style in 140 characters or less:

Niche social networks are websites where people with shared interests can network with each other, share thoughts and ideas, contribute resources, and be a part of a virtual community where they can interact with people anywhere in the world.

Okay, it was longer than 140 characters. Still, niche social networks are sweeping the internet and businesses are starting to take wholesale notice. The problem is, many are approaching it wrong. They are looking at it as “how can I get more business from it” instead of approaching it as “how can I help contribute to my industry and my customer base by offering a genuine resource, and thereby potentially increasing business as a result?”

For this example, we will look at the car business. For the most part, social networking in the car business has failed. Many dealers have tried to get into it by creating MySpace and Facebook pages. Some are putting social networks on sites like Ning and GoingOn. In almost every case, the focus is sales, plugging in the inventory, or talking about how great the dealership is. It isn’t working.

If a dealership (or any other business) really wants to participate in Web 2.0 by offering a social network for their client base they need to take it a step further. Here are some pointers:

• Keep it Local, Publish Global - A good niche social network for a car dealer will be centered around their community but offer tools, articles, videos, and photos that can appeal to anyone.  Why?  Keeping it local has obvious advantages, but you want anyone who comes to the network to be able to gain something from it.  The more people involved, the more content there will be.  Fresh content, even from people out of the market area, can keep the locals coming back for more.


• Offer Resources and Fun, not Sales Pitches - People might be interested in the nice trade-in that came in last week or the 0% financing that the manufacturer just released.  Might.  They will almost definitely be interested in things that pertain to them whether they are buying a car or not.  Humorous stories, videos, and photos arre crowd pleasers.  Tips on car maintenance, buying advice, and local auto clubs can keep them coming back.  Features on local events and charities touch the community in different ways.  The sky’s the limit, but keep it centered on benefits, not sales.


• Avoid MySpace and Facebook - This goes against what many recommend, but here is why. Both Facebook and MySpace are antiquated formats that get spammed a lot and are, in general, unattractive.  People who use these networks regularly are used to them, but new users trying to join your network will probably be unimpressed.


• Promote it with Customers - Someone buys a car.  Why have them on your social network?  You want them there because they will give the best content.  People who are happy with a purchase may be willing to tell the world about it.  We know the ones who want to complain will find a venue, so why not give a place for positive statements?  Give them the URL and encourage them to join.

Any of these examples apply to other businesses, not just the automotive industry. Translate them to your business and you have a chance to really tap into areas of the internet where you aren’t currently present.

socialnewswatch.com

Entrepreneurs Think Niche With New Social Networks

BY BRIDGET CAREY
bcarey[at]MiamiHerald.com

Todd Weider hasn't done much social networking online. He had never even visited Facebook.com until two months ago.

But that didn't stop the 36-year-old entrepreneur from starting his own social network website called SplashVision.com. The Fort Lauderdale-based site has been up and running for nine months as a place for people who work and play on the water.

''I love technology and I have a lot of experience with boats,'' Weider said. So, with the help of programmers, he built a site targeting the boating industry -- a community he's been a part of all his life.

But can this new site be successful with so many other established social networks in cyberspace?

Yes -- if it can offer users something unique, industry experts say. At the Social Networking Conference last week in Miami Beach, many entrepreneurs who attended were focusing on a niche community or service to get noticed in a world dominated by online giants like Facebook, LinkedIn and MySpace.

On Monday, News Corp. said its division that includes MySpace increased sales to $798 million, and operating profits are at $23 million.

Weider said he is amid a deal with a ''large media company.'' He expects to start making a profit by the end of the second quarter.

''Once you create something of value, it becomes profitable very quickly,'' Weider said.

Conference speaker Mark Brooks, editor of the Social Networking Watch, said there is a growth of smaller, more focused social networks popping up. And there's especially a need for one to target the original Facebook users -- a college-only audience.

''There is a gaping hole right now for a replacement Facebook,'' Brooks said. ``At some point, students are not going to want to hang out where their mothers are.''

Collegetonight.com is trying to be just that, but with a twist. It's more about letting your real-life college entourage know where everyone is hanging out, and incorporating mobile communication.

''It's not about being a social networking site,'' said Zachary R. Suchin, 24, chief executive of College Tonight. ``It's about a social network.''

Brooks said it's ''very difficult'' for social networks to be successful, unless it is a niche or does something very different. After all, why should someone sign up for another Facebook or MySpace if it's exactly the same?

''If you have a social network or are starting one up, it's a good idea to have an application'' on another network like Facebook, Brooks advised the audience.

Applications, which are add-on features to someone's profile, are immensely popular with Facebook users. According to comScore, 20 million Facebook users (that's 61 percent of the site's U.S. audience) have engaged with an application in November. The social network Slide.com put several applications on Facebook -- one called ''Top Friends,'' which had 6.2 million engaged viewers in November -- and those applications have increased awareness and traffic to Slide.com.

Applications are free to create and use, but advertisers are spending more to be seen within those applications and networks. Richard Jalichandra, chief executive of social media tracking site Technorati, said it is projected that in 2011, $1.1 billion will be spent on advertising on new media.

But for several niche sites, the revenue doesn't only come from ads that beckon you to punch a monkey and win an iPod. LifeAt.com creates social networks for condos and other subdivisions, which allow only residents to become members. Boca Raton-based EB Developers just paid LifeAt about $15,000 to create and manage private LifeAt social networks for three of its Florida properties.

Adam Freedman, chief technology officer at EB Developers, said the residents are slowly embracing it, with about 10 percent of the residents at each property signed up.

''This is just the perfect private social network between the people they only want to talk to,'' Freedman said.

But no matter what the target audience is, the key to success is getting people to keep coming back. Part of that means users should feel that there are benefits in coming back often, said Tim Walker, a social network analyst with Hoovers. And if they can find that benefit somewhere else, they might not care to create a profile.

A good social network ''doesn't have to beat you over the head to come back in,'' Walker said. ``I'm afraid the reality for a lot of these sites is that if you can't get someone to walk right in the first time, it's very hard to get them to come back.''

MySpace to help youth land a job

Teenagers accused of wasting their time on the internet now have a valid excuse, they're searching for a job.

Social networking website MySpace has joined up with CareerOne.com.au to create MySpace Jobs (www.myspacejobs.com.au).

Careerone hopes its move into MySpace will help young adults and school leavers looking to get a start in the job market.

"Our research shows that 68 per cent of Generation Y find it difficult to break into the employment market," News Digital Careers chief executive officer Dr Stephen Hollings said.

"Bringing the employment market to them through the MySpace partnership provides Generation Y with easy access to jobs, advice and information - all specifically tailored to their demographic."

The MySpace Jobs portal includes many of the features available on the CareerOne website, plus a number of social networking tools such as forums, Ask Us blog and an online moderation Q&A section.

A Community page (www.myspace.com/cooljobs) also lets users upload photos, post comments and meet other like-minded MySpace users who are seeking work.

© 2008 Australian Associated Press Pty Limited (AAP)

MySpace signs deal to screen BBC shows

SOCIAL networking website MySpace has signed a landmark deal with the BBC in a move that will bring it into direct competition with YouTube.

BBC Worldwide has launched a video channel on MySpace TV that features short clips from selected shows including Doctor Who, The Catherine Tate Show and Parkinson.

"This is the first global content deal that any social network has done," said Rebekah Horne, vice president of Fox Interactive Media and MySpace in Australia and New Zealand.

The BBC's clips will be up to eight minutes in length and will include archival footage.

MySpace Australia has also signed a major deal with the ABC to launch a channel next week with clips from Summer Heights High, The Chaser’s War On Everything and Enough Rope With Andrew Denton.

These landmark agreements reflect YouTube's 2006 foray into official broadcaster channels following a string of copyright disputes. Broadcasters use these channels to control and promote their online content rather than users uploading the content without permission from the copyright holder.

MySpace claims that it is offering a more social alternative to YouTube videos.

"YouTube's a video site, MySpace is a social network," Ms Horne said.

"You can watch a (MySpace TV) video, blog it, email it, and add it to your profile."

But these features only work for MySpace users – other viewers cannot email or embed the clips outside the social network.

With five million users in Australia and over 5000 people signing up to MySpace worldwide each day, MySpace offers a large audience for both the BBC and ABC.

"It's about being where people want to be," Ms Horne said.

MySpace is also in discussions to bring MySpace TV to Australian mobiles, which would increase the current number of 50,000-60,000 videos uploaded by users each day.

MySpace's expansion into video-sharing could be seen as an attempt to keep the website relevant as users migrate between social networks.

One blogger has declared January 30th "International Delete Your MySpace Account Day".

But MySpace doubts that this will have a great impact on their network.

"This Delete-Your-MySpace day is just about being controversial," Ms Horne said.

"MySpace is still the biggest social networking site in the world."

In the words of BBC comedian Catherine Tate, MySpace does not look bothered.

news.com.au

Hate Groups Could Land Social Networking Sites in Court

Social networking forums, where users give full vent to their gripes about everyone from gas providers and airline companies to the local bus operator, have caught the eye of media lawyers, who warn that such postings may be leaving sites such as Facebook and MySpace open to libel actions.

Advertisers raised concerns last summer over the kind of user-generated content they could be associated with on such sites, and there are now growing fears over so-called "hate pages", such as Facebook's "I hate BT".

Under current legislation, if website owners remove defamatory material as soon as they are aware of it, then they are not liable. But lawyer Nick Armstrong, writing in Media Law, published by Sweet & Maxwell, sees serious legal risks in allowing users to establish groups and pages whose sole purpose is to invite aggressive criticism of organisations and individuals. He also believes that website owners need a better grasp of their responsibilities.

"Social networking sites are perhaps being too complacent about some of the risks in this area," says Armstrong, a partner at law firm Charles Russell. "There is a widespread but inaccurate belief that posters of defamatory material are liable rather than websites themselves, but this should not be taken as a green light for social networking sites to allow users to say whatever they please."

Risk of defamation

He argues that the courts may decide that current laws do not absolve sites of responsibility if they could reasonably have known in advance that libellous comments would be made.

"Sites would be safest if they didn't allow 'I hate' pages because a court is likely to say - however impractical it is - that Facebook, or whoever, should have known that there was a risk of defamation." They could be liable for, in effect, inciting users to post defamatory material, he adds.

That leaves social networking sites with two headaches. How do they close such groups, and is it really right to decide what users should and should not discuss?

Armstrong agrees that shutting down "hate groups" is not the way forward, but says that websites need to react faster when complaints come in - which can be difficult as sites grow.

"It's like something out of Kafka trying to get through to Google, for instance. The danger with these sites is that they are so big that a complaint might not be acted on fast enough."

Facebook would not say whether it had considered banning "hate groups", but a spokeswoman did point to the site's terms of use. Users are told they cannot post content that "makes threats of any kind or that intimidates, harasses, or bullies anyone, is derogatory, demeaning, malicious, defamatory, abusive, offensive or hateful".

guardian.co.uk

Online social networking new lifestyle

Online social networking websites saw their ranks swell and values soar this year as everyone from moody teenagers and mellow music lovers to mate-seeking seniors joined online communities.

A woman looks at the MySpace website in this undated photo. Online social networking websites saw their ranks swell and values soar this year as everyone from moody teenagers and mellow music lovers to mate-seeking seniors joined online communities. [Agencies]

Google's freshly released "Zeitgeist 2007" reveals that seven out of the 10 hottest topics which triggered Internet queries during the year involved social networking.

A Top Ten list compiled by the world's most-used search engine includes British website Badoo, Spanish-language Hi5, and US-based Facebook.

Video-sharing websites YouTube and Dailymotion are on the list, along with the Club Penguin online role playing game where children pretending to be the flightless birds "waddle about and play" together.

Virtual world Second Life, where people represented by animated proxies interact in digitized fantasy settings, is the final social networking property in the Zeitgeist Top Ten.

The world has only seen "the tip of the iceberg" when it comes to online social networking, says MySpace vice president of business development Amit Kapur.

"It is a natural step in the evolution of the Web," Kapur said.

"The Web is getting more personal. I think you are going to see much more of that happen on every website across the Web."

MySpace aspires to become people's homes on the Internet, with profile pages serving as online addresses as well as springboards to online music, video, news and other content conducive to their tastes and interests.

"It is a next-generation portal," Kapur said.

Industry statistics show Facebook membership more than doubled in the past year to about 55 million, while reigning champion MySpace grew 30 percent to top 110 million.

One in every four US residents uses MySpace, while in Britain it is as common to have a profile page on the website as it is to own a dog.

"We are very social animals and this allows us to ramp it up to a whole other order of magnitude," says professor Jeremy Bailenson, who heads a Virtual Human Interaction Lab at Stanford University in Northern California.

A strong appeal of online role-playing games and virtual worlds is that they free people to "interact as their ideal self and not their real self," according to Bailenson.

"You can be whatever age you want -- 20 forever -- dress any way you want, be any gender you want, and be socializing with zillions of people at once all the time," Bailenson said.

His lab has created 3-dimensional digitized models customized with people's facial expressions and mannerisms.

"You can make a digital version of you that is animated so your grandkids' grandkids could put on a helmet and you can read them a story from the grave," Bailenson said, adding virtual communities offer a sense of immortality.

"People love virtual community."

Interest in online communities surged in 2007 as the gregarious nature of humans merged with increasingly available high-speed Internet and affordable computing hardware, according to Bailenson.

"It has reached a critical mass," Bailenson said. "It is not just the geeks doing it. It is my mom."

California-based social networking website BOOMj just launched as an online community for Baby Boomers, the first of which turned 65 years old this year.

"Boomers grew up meeting people through mutual friends, which a lot of times meant it was the bartender," said BOOMj spokesman Jim Welch, himself a "boomer."

"Now you have Boomers re-entering the single world, widowed or divorce, and on new-relationship terrain they haven't set foot on in many years. As they re-enter the single world they reach out to the Internet."

Younger generations are much more comfortable with the Internet, which has woven ever more tightly into their lifestyles.

"It won't replace face to face interaction," Bailenson said.

"It is another way of thinking about maintaining social relationships. It is here and it is not going anywhere."

Forrester Research senior analyst Jeremiah Owyang said the social networking rage is happening "where ever there is high-speed Internet."

Owyang said membership at the website Cyworld includes 85 percent of South Korea's Internet users. A major company in that country gave employees annual bonuses in the form Cyworld currency.

Online communities and virtual worlds are forums for commerce, advertising and business meetings, said Owyang.

MySpace's Kapur says social networking will become increasingly global and mobile as the use of Internet-linked handheld devices becomes ubiquitous.

The meteoric rise in popularity of social networking websites is driving up their values in the minds of investors as the firms grapple with how to cash in on membership bases.

Microsoft recently paid 240 million dollars for a 1.6 percent stake in Facebook and Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing paid 60 million dollars for a piece of the San Francisco company.

The investments give three-year-old Facebook a theoretical value of 15 billion dollars. News Corp-owned MySpace wouldn't disclose its value, saying only it has about triple the membership and activity of Facebook.

chinadaily.com.cn

MySpace cranks up heat in Facebook turf war

By Jon Swartz, USA TODAY

MySpace popularized online social networks and has a membership the size of the population of Mexico. It commands a gluttonous chunk of advertising, has a multibillion-dollar parent in News Corp. and boasts dynamic leadership in co-founders Chris DeWolfe and Tom Anderson.

Yet MySpace will have the mind-set of a start-up the next several months, with an audacious menu of business partnerships, technology initiatives and expansion plans to gain the attention of consumers and advertisers.

It has little choice. Though the most popular social network, MySpace is in an escalating battle with upstart Facebook. As major retailers such as Coca-Cola and Blockbuster pump up advertising on social networks to reach millions of Americans creating personal Web pages, MySpace is trying to be heard above the din of Facebook — a rival less than half its size. MySpace co-founders DeWolfeand Anderson have a few tricks up their virtual sleeves as they try to reassert their company — often stereotyped as a site for kids — as a preeminent power.

The goal is to make MySpace the starting point for people on the Internet, where they can check in on the activities of friends, peruse e-mail, get the latest on news and weather, and post their favorite photos and videos. "We're offering one place where people are in control," DeWolfe coolly explains at an L.A. restaurant near MySpace's offices, cradling a cocktail.

MySpace is competing with Facebook not only for advertising market share but for mindshare: Facebook is benefitting from the type of buzz in Silicon Valley that MySpace received a few years ago.

"There is a class divide between the two," says tech blogger Robert Scoble. "MySpace is Hollywood. Facebook is Silicon Valley. The tech influencers go to Facebook, but the mainstream crowd is MySpace."

While some may scoff at such stereotypical comparisons, Facebook's growing popularity is a concern for MySpace, financial analysts say.

"Is Facebook to MySpace as Google was to Yahoo?" posits Spencer Wang, a financial analyst at Bear Stearns, alluding to the upstart search-engine service that upended an older competitor. Since Facebook made its network available to anyone in September 2006, its user base has grown sixfold, to 59 million. Wang expects that to reach 100 million by mid-2008.

"The Facebook factor is a huge concern," Wang says. "It could lead to a potential cannibalization of MySpace's user base, less time spent by users on MySpace, and increased investments by MySpace to fend off Facebook."

Facebook, which had no comment for this story, has a higher percentage of college-educated users, considered attractive to marketers. MySpace users are more likely to click on ads because they are less private than Facebook users, Scoble and financial analysts say.

At the Web 2.0 conference in San Francisco in October, News Corp. Chairman Rupert Murdoch acknowledged that MySpace may not reach its previous revenue forecast of $800 million for its 2008 fiscal year, ending in June.

Power to the people

Some may dismiss MySpace, with its unruly layouts and neon-glow graphics. But the masses — it has 110 million members — love it.

"MySpace is not a wild child," DeWolfe says, pointing out that 40% of the site's members are over 35 years old. "It is a company for everyday people who wish to express themselves in music and videos. Facebook is a utility."

No less an authority on mainstream tastes than News Corp. noticed that when it swooped in and plunked down $650 million to acquire MySpace in 2005.

Despite some initial skepticism at the time of the deal, it is now considered a "home run" by analyst Wang and others. Since the purchase, MySpace's monthly unique visitors have increased more than fivefold, and its daily page views have soared to 1.5 billion. Oh, and that $650 million acquisition? MySpace is estimated to now be worth $2.4 billion — nearly four times News Corp.'s initial investment.

What's more, MySpace's revenue has improved 10 times since the acquisition.

A big slice of that is ad revenue. This year, MySpace is expected to sell $525 million worth of advertising, about 58% of the social-networking industry's total, says researcher eMarketer. Facebook, by contrast, is expected to ring up a profit of about $30 million on revenue of $140 million this year, says Bear Stearns analyst Robert Peck.

Webisodes of original productions such as The Fit and Quarterlife, condensed versions of old TV shows such as Fantasy Island, viral videos and presidential candidate forums run on MySpaceTV, the company's video channel.

About half of MySpace's 800 employees work in a tony office with a panoramic rooftop view of the Hollywood Hills, Rodeo Drive and palm trees. A game room is anchored by two Guitar Hero stations and basketball hoops. Walls are festooned with commemorative posters of famous MySpace users such as music groups Franz Ferdinand and Jet.

Indeed, MySpace has burnished its enormous following through its show-biz connections. There are 6 million bands registered on the site.

Before MySpace, many bands sent demo tapes to radio stations and music writers to get the word out. Now, they can post songs to their MySpace page. "It changed everything for us," says Joel Madden, lead singer of Good Charlotte. The band has tested new material on its page for feedback and posts messages for fans. It's even scouted other MySpace pages to find opening acts.

Jesse Carmichael, keyboardist for Maroon 5, says the five-member group started a MySpace page to communicate more directly with fans. It now has more than 300,000 friends.

Music is just a fragment of MySpace's vast constituency, however.

As MySpace turns 4 years old in January, it has grand plans to extend its reach.

Next year, it plans to offer members the option of creating multiple profiles tailored to friends, family and business associates. A channel with Oberon Media, a maker of multiplayer games, is in the works for the first half of 2008. MySpace unveiled a service that lets MySpace members make free Internet phone calls through Skype. And it just unfurled Transmissions, a program that lets musicians showcase music on their pages and sell performance videos.

The Southern California company has taken steps to raise its profile and show off its high-tech chops. This month, it opened an office in San Francisco with about 50 people. It plans to expand to about 200 by mid-2009. DeWolfe vows to raise his profile in Silicon Valley, as he did at the recent Web 2.0 conference in San Francisco.

Wait. There's more. Next on the expansion agenda: offices in Russia, Brazil, Turkey, South Korea and Poland in 2008.

Meanwhile, MySpace's membership in OpenSocial — a Google-led consortium of about 75 social-networking sites that includes MySpace, LinkedIn and Friendster — should also buttress relations with makers of mini-software programs called widgets, some of whom feel MySpace has not been as supportive as Facebook, says David Gentzel, creator of Trakzor, an application used by 4 million MySpace users to track when their friends view their profiles.

The Facebook factor

What makes the horse race between MySpace and Facebook so interesting is the fluid nature of the market and its always-dynamic roster of players. Since 2003, there have been no less than three go-to networking sites: the since-faded Friendster, MySpace and — now — Facebook.

"Who knows? There could be a new hot company five years from now," says Konstantin Guericke, CEO of social-networking site Jaxtr and co-founder of business network LinkedIn.

Complicating matters, multiple sites can co-exist. Social-networking denizens have shown a predilection to use major sites in distinctly different ways.

Consider MySpace, Facebook and competitor LinkedIn: MySpace is treated as an uninhibited, open hangout for the young and creative at heart; Facebook is a more discreet destination for selected friends to schmooze and network; LinkedIn is for business dealings.

"I use all three for different reasons, but from a musical standpoint, MySpace has a hip music disposition," says rap legend MC Hammer. "Facebook is great, but it's for a more mature crowd."

Yet Facebook's mature — some might argue elitist — crowd is a highly influential one. "Facebook has won the hearts and minds of the techies," says Jennifer Simpson, an analyst at Yankee Group.

That became painfully clear to MySpace last month when — despite a new advertising plan and the new OpenSocial partnership with Google — it was lost in the vapor trails of Facebook, which also announced a new ad plan as well as an investment by Microsoft.

"We've always felt we were the original social network, but we haven't done as good a job establishing our place in the social ecosystem," DeWolfe says.

"Facebook has made inroads with the over-25, professional crowd," says Jason Feffer, a former MySpace executive who now is CEO of SodaHead, which makes opinion-poll widgets for Facebook and other social networks. "But MySpace is bigger, it has a lot more media relationships through Fox, and it has OpenSocial."

What's more, MySpace has a significant edge in the foreign market, where 80% of all Internet users reside. It has localized services in 23 countries. In other words, it has more on its mind than Facebook.

"We've been global for a year and a half," Anderson says. "There is more to what's going on than just the U.S. market. People focus on Facebook, but we have larger rivals in other countries."

2008: Year of the Mini Social Networks

MySpace, Facebook, and the other large social networks need not worry. The small, niche social network sites that are popping up faster than poker rooms in the 90’s are not going to hurt the big boy’s bottom lines. They’re just going to draw more people by the end of the year because of one fact.

They’re just more useful than the big sites.

The appeal that brought millions to form profiles and make friends on MySpace and Facebook will have the opposite effect in 2008 an beyond. We built our MySpace page and started Facebooking because everyone else was doing it. As closed social sites begin to gain in popularity, they will appeal to people because NOT everyone else is doing it. Inclusion is easy on today’s internet. Being part of something exclusive is becoming the new IT thing to do.

Ning and other emerging websites offer places for people to “give everyone the opportunity to create your own social networks for anything.” Here are some of the more popular emerging themes for these closed social niche networks:

Age-Based Social Networks

There are social networks popping up for everyone from 8-year-olds to 80-year-olds. Websites like Boomj (social network for baby boomer), Whyville (”a virtual world where boys and girls from all over the real world come to chat, play, learn, and have fun together”), and Eons (”loving life on the flipside of 50″) are making it possible for people in particular age groups to interact with each other.

The appeal here is obvious. Age gives people an instant point of reference where they know that, no matter what else is different, they have something in common. Exploring these websites reveals that the members seem to be more open, willing to reveal more about themselves than they would on general social networking websites.

Local Social Networks

Quick story: a friend was at a party the other day and really hit it off with a girl he met there. They talked, laughed, drank… all was going well. As the night drew to a close, he asked for her phone number. She hesitated, saying that she didn’t really give her phone number out to people that she just met. Then, she took a card out and wrote something down.

It was her MySpace page.

She said they could get to know each other better that way first. He was disappointed, but it was better than nothing.

Social networks like Tribe and GoingOn to localize their networks and give the audience places to find local focus. While MySpace and Facebook have similar interfaces, it’s impossible to separate yourself into the closed networks, as the bulk of friends and members will still be crossing over to other general areas.

Social networks with local membership and flare are becoming more and more prominent, especially with dating. Being social with people you can never meet based upon proximity is one thing. Having them available within your city is something completely different. Local social networks act as that buffer zone where people can interact and get to know each other without having to meet for drinks or talk on the phone. In 2008, there will be multiple large social networks in every major city. Expect to start hearing radio ads and even a few television spots pop up.

Professional Social Networks

The car business, which is notoriously a year or two behind the times when it comes to the internet, has a few social networks for car dealers popping up. The presence of Automotive Social Networks is either a sign of the end of the world or an example of how any, ANY, profession can find itself with a social network specific to its profession.

Getting advice, networking, sharing experiences — we are professionally based individuals who revolve around our jobs. Few are willing to admit it, but it’s true. Having a place with like-minded people makes it easier to cope sometimes. That’s the appeal to social networks by profession.

Interest Social Networks

Forums fade. They pop back up, then they fade again. Slowly, they will be integrated into social networks that offer more interaction beyond the forums themselves.

Gaming, for example, has dozens of emerging social networks. Gaming Social Networks like Great Games Experiments offer networks within the networks to allow gamers to become even more specific about their wins and conquests.

Why Now?

What makes 2008 the year that Niche Social Networks will emerge? The answer has 2 parts: Money and simplicity.

With the Facebook Beacon debacle and other outcries for less user data being used for marketing, it makes sense to target networks where the advertisers already know they’ve got the right audience. Hyper-targeted marketing will continue to emerge, but for now, closed social networks make it much less controversial.

The simplicity aspect is even more important. It is simple from every angle - simple for members to find the answers and networking they need, and simple for developers to make the sites and promote them with very little investment. Google’s Open Social and several other applications will make it very easy for these types of networks to get started and grow.

socialnewswatch.com

Open Web Awards Announced Final Winners

The voting in the first ever Open Web Awards is over and Vizu has validated the results. The awards ceremony will be held at the Palace Hotel in San Francisco, California on Thursday, January 10th from 7:00 – 10:00 PM.

Here are the winners:

Mainstream and Large Social Networks - Netlog.com

Applications and Widgets - WidgetBucks

Social News - Digg.com

Social Search - Facebook.com

Sports and Fitness - Sportme.org

Photo Sharing - Vois.com

Video Sharing - Kaltura

Start Pages - Cafemom.com

Places and Events - MySpace

Music - Pandora.com

Social Shopping - Zlio.com

Mobile - Google Maps for Mobile

Niche and Miscellaneous Social Networks - Cafemom.com

Social Networking Tips for Jobseekers

Beware. Those of you who have posted personal information online might be under surveillance. Jobs candidate who maintain profiles on social networking sites, may want to reconsider its content.

Employers are now increasingly using social networks to assess job applicants, verify CVs or even find ideal candidates based on online profile. As is true with any other domain, recruiting is forced to acknowledge the area, which has the highest footfalls or coming together of professionals outside their normal work spheres.

The trend that started a few years back in the tech industry is fast spreading. With the emergence of the concept of blogs and social networks such as MySpace, Orkut, Facebook, Linkedin, a growing number of people are leaving significant online footprints.

"As the cliched ‘war for talent’ managers are being forced to resort to taking unconventional and ‘out of the box’ measures to cope with this shortage. An online social networking site provides an unbiased, unmotivated and easily accessible source of checking out a potential employee without compromising his or her privacy," says Shiv Agrawal, ABC Consultant’s CEO.

infotech.indiatimes.com

Can Social Networks Change the Real World?

The United States is generally considered to be the most powerful country in the world. The head of this country is the President. The President is selected in a national election, but must first make it through the primaries.

The first state primaries generally predict who will be selected to run for the presidency. Not only do they predict, but they also influence. If someone believes after seeing these primaries that their candidate no longer has a chance, or vice versa, it can change their voting habits - they might not decide to bother.

Enter MySpace. They have decided to turn the system on its head by having their own primaries well before any other state. And we all know the reach of MySpace. As the linked article states, if it were a country, its population would make it nearly in the top ten most populous.

So maybe it will make a difference or maybe it will not. It is hard to say what the overall effect will be, but one thing is for sure. Many younger individuals who may care a lot about MySpace, but a lot less about politics may take interest. Politicians have tried for decades to bring these younger individuals to the polls. Will this be the year? As the elections have been so close in the past couple of years, is it possible that this incfluence could be enough to decide the leadership of the strongest nation in the world? Never underestimate MySpace!

viralvoodoo.com

Social Networking for the Socially Minded (Part 2)

Part 1

Project Agape's Facebook application -- soon to be replicated on MySpace and elsewhere -- shows early signs of success, at least by one measure. Some 10 million people have used it.

An open question is whether this mass of supporters, many of them young, will lead to more giving, said Timothy L. Seiler, director of the fundraising school at the University of Indiana's Center for Philanthropy. "I think people are joining to be part of a group and that's the primary motivation," he said. "The primary motivation isn't to be philanthropic."

On Facebook, the biggest group created through the "Causes" application, benefiting cancer research at Brigham & Women's Hospital in Boston, has attracted nearly 2.9 million members. They've given slightly more than $52,000. A group supporting the Alliance for Climate Protection has generated $17,000 from 1.5 million members.

Another question is whether the for-profit companies can find a sustainable business model.

"People in the public and especially our users are really sensitive to somebody making money," said Matt Flannery, the founder and chief executive of Kiva.

Kiva, a not-for-profit Web site that connects lenders with people in poor countries who need tiny loans to start businesses, has received plaudits from former president Bill Clinton and talk-show host Oprah Winfrey. Kiva asks lenders to make a contribution to the site at the end of the lending process, though it is not required.

The for-profit Web sites note that big corporations pay millions to associate with certain causes, opening up possible advertising and sponsorship opportunities. But for now, many claim not to care much about making a lot of money.

"We're not prioritizing revenue. We're prioritizing the product and audience," Traeger said.

Traeger, 33, who came to the Washington area after graduating from Princeton, sold Christianity.com to Salem Communications for $3.6 million in 2005.

A year later, he connected with several like-minded investors who wanted to back a Web site like Razoo. The name is a New Zealand term for a small coin; Traeger likes to say small contributions, when combined, can add up to great value. The site mainly focuses on networking but still needs to integrate fundraising and other functions. With about 20,000 members, the site has yet to achieve critical mass.

"We originally thought, 'We will build it and they will come.' That definitely took too long," Traeger said.

So Razoo has given about $20,000 in grants to charities who assemble the most members on the site.