The past two years we saw the rise of the social networks. A new site sprouts up at least once a week. If you read what some of the early adopters are saying, you get the feeling that people are tired of signing up for every new service every time. ...
Wikipedia's definition of a social-network service is software to build online social networks for communities of people who share interests and activities, or who are interested in exploring the interests and activities of others.
I have been ob...
I found a piece by Guy Kawasaki which really got me thinking. It perfectly illustrates the disjunct we find between the allure of social networks (and my new obsession -- niche business networks) and the practice of implementing them.
Many com...
The social networking space is reminiscent of a gold rush right now. Facebook, MySpace and Google all want to stake their claim in the ground. They claim they are "open" and they allow you to port your data, but they are still clutching at our identi...
It struck me today what an uphill battle we’re facing in the new media / web 2.0 / social networking industry. These shiny new communication and engagement tools are an unknown and feared art. What’s more frightening to a business than the phrase...
Twitter is a weird service. It is simple to use, yet difficult to explain to someone. To explain it best is to say its like Facebook, but Facebook without everything but the status updates. Yet, if someone said to me "Twitter or Facebook. You can on...
I've been Twittering for a week now. You know. The micro--blogging site where you can follow (or listen to) friends and complete strangers, and they can follow (or listen to) you in return. Where you can snoop around to check out whether Matthew Buck...
I've been fascinated by the term Web 2.0 since the phrase was coined. So were a lot of people from all different camps. Is it a design style? Is it development methodologies? Is it the way users interact with platforms as a service? The democratizati...
Google Friend, launched on Monday evening, brings to a close the era of social networking sites, and makes "social" a standard part of using the Web.
This trend has been clear for a while: the OpenSocial initiative has effectively allowed you to s...
I've been pondering, recently, the rise of narcissism as a disease of our world. Depression used to be the problem, everyone swallowing handfuls of Prozac and eating chocolate cake in their pyjamas. Now, I believe, fuelled by our inherent egomania an...
