Facebook, Friendster Signal Changing Tide
Tuesday, June 26, 2007
The world of social networking is changing, but don't worry, it's notpermanent. It's more of a tide than anything that reaches and recedesfrom all things. MySpace is changing, Facebook is catching, andFriendster is resurrected.Editor's Note: Inthe beginning, many criticized that a network built on teenage vervewas sure to fail. So far, they've been wrong. But other networks arecatching up quickly, and the MySpace demographic has changed, nearlyreversed.
Like Internet dating in its infancy, social networks have graduated from something for the kids (with dating, it was the geeks)to a normalized part of society. Critics had similar concerns aboutRock N Roll in its day, and short skirts, and tie-dye, and jazz anddancing.
Most likely there was a time when daily hygienewas tantamount to snobbery. Things change with acceptance. MySpaceexchanged one stigma for another, immediately branded a site forteenyboppers, and then the fishing hole to catch a predator.
Despite that, and despite the concernthat such a youthful audience replete with perverts would fizzle outover time, the site has continued to grow, even to the point that themajority of the 109.5 million visitors to MySpace users are now over35, both according to comScore.
Of course, you know what happens when the grownups raid your secrethangout, right? The He-Man Womun-Haterz Club can't thrive in a cloud ofperfume, the mice can't play with the cat around…choose whichevercliché you wish.
You might note also though that Rupert Murdoch is rumored to be looking for a way out, if he can exchange MySpace for a nice chunk of Yahoo.
Anyone not signing up for MySpace these days (really, is thereanybody?) are defecting to Facebook, Friendster, and Bebo. It's notreally defecting as much as it is double dipping,though. Over half of social network users maintain multiple profiles,flitting from network to network the way they would rooms at a party.
In the past six months, after Facebook opened up to non-collegiates anddevelopers, the site has more than doubled in number of uniquevisitors, growing from 23 million users in December 2006 to 47 millionin May 2007. During the same period, Bebo jumped from just under 11million visitors to 17 million.
But the most explosive recent growth has been, surprisingly, from Friendster, a company that just so happens was awarded a US patenton social networking, signifying how long they've been in this game.The site has steadily grown since December from 18.7 million visitorsto 24.8 million.
While that's less than the others in terms of visitors, the site, and VentureBeat,point to the page views, spiking by 40 percent just last month to 9billion. The company attributes the sudden spike to "fixing" thetechnology that stymied its growth in 2004, just as the meteoric riseof MySpace was to occur.
Friendster's graph server, whichmade it impossible to manage four quadrillion factors (we're assumingVenture Beat is using not using that number as hyperbole), has beenrevamped to more easily show how users are linked to their friends, andby what degree of separation, similar to a feature used on LinkedIn.But the main result of this revamp is that users are better able totrack what's going on with their friends, thus increasing page viewsper user.
While that may seem like cheating, it's growth nonetheless, and of theothers in the top seven networks – HI5, Tagged, and Piczo – Friendsteris the only one not stagnant or declining over the past half-year.
So what happens next? Who knows for sure? It seems Murdoch is thinkingof jumping ship, perhaps just for a better opportunity, or it could behe detects the changing tide. Maybe Facebook is catching up too fast.Maybe Friendster is poised to sue the whole lot of them.
Or maybe it's just the natural, social flux of things.
Article by Jason Lee Miller, a WebProNews editor and writer covering business and technology.
**************
See what's free at http://www.aol.com.
44The world of social networking is changing, but don't worry, it's notpermanent. It's more of a tide than anything that reaches and recedesfrom all things. MySpace is changing, Facebook is catching, andFriendster is resurrected.Editor's Note: Inthe beginning, many criticized that a network built on teenage vervewas sure to fail. So far, they've been wrong. But other networks arecatching up quickly, and the MySpace demographic has changed, nearlyreversed.
Like Internet dating in its infancy, social networks have graduated from something for the kids (with dating, it was the geeks)to a normalized part of society. Critics had similar concerns aboutRock N Roll in its day, and short skirts, and tie-dye, and jazz anddancing.
Most likely there was a time when daily hygienewas tantamount to snobbery. Things change with acceptance. MySpaceexchanged one stigma for another, immediately branded a site forteenyboppers, and then the fishing hole to catch a predator.
Despite that, and despite the concernthat such a youthful audience replete with perverts would fizzle outover time, the site has continued to grow, even to the point that themajority of the 109.5 million visitors to MySpace users are now over35, both according to comScore.
Of course, you know what happens when the grownups raid your secrethangout, right? The He-Man Womun-Haterz Club can't thrive in a cloud ofperfume, the mice can't play with the cat around…choose whichevercliché you wish.
You might note also though that Rupert Murdoch is rumored to be looking for a way out, if he can exchange MySpace for a nice chunk of Yahoo.
Anyone not signing up for MySpace these days (really, is thereanybody?) are defecting to Facebook, Friendster, and Bebo. It's notreally defecting as much as it is double dipping,though. Over half of social network users maintain multiple profiles,flitting from network to network the way they would rooms at a party.
In the past six months, after Facebook opened up to non-collegiates anddevelopers, the site has more than doubled in number of uniquevisitors, growing from 23 million users in December 2006 to 47 millionin May 2007. During the same period, Bebo jumped from just under 11million visitors to 17 million.
But the most explosive recent growth has been, surprisingly, from Friendster, a company that just so happens was awarded a US patenton social networking, signifying how long they've been in this game.The site has steadily grown since December from 18.7 million visitorsto 24.8 million.
While that's less than the others in terms of visitors, the site, and VentureBeat,point to the page views, spiking by 40 percent just last month to 9billion. The company attributes the sudden spike to "fixing" thetechnology that stymied its growth in 2004, just as the meteoric riseof MySpace was to occur.
Friendster's graph server, whichmade it impossible to manage four quadrillion factors (we're assumingVenture Beat is using not using that number as hyperbole), has beenrevamped to more easily show how users are linked to their friends, andby what degree of separation, similar to a feature used on LinkedIn.But the main result of this revamp is that users are better able totrack what's going on with their friends, thus increasing page viewsper user.
While that may seem like cheating, it's growth nonetheless, and of theothers in the top seven networks – HI5, Tagged, and Piczo – Friendsteris the only one not stagnant or declining over the past half-year.
So what happens next? Who knows for sure? It seems Murdoch is thinkingof jumping ship, perhaps just for a better opportunity, or it could behe detects the changing tide. Maybe Facebook is catching up too fast.Maybe Friendster is poised to sue the whole lot of them.
Or maybe it's just the natural, social flux of things.
Article by Jason Lee Miller, a WebProNews editor and writer covering business and technology.
**************
See what's free at http://www.aol.com.
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