It’s easy to see that Myspace is the largest of all the social
networking sites. It contains four-fifths of the total population of people who
use Social Networking Sites. The nice thing about Myspace is its
customizability. The site can be worked with a good amount of HTML to look
however you want it to look. Also, because of its popularity, hundreds
of sites have sprung up to help you with your own Myspace page,
designing it to adding games or other programs. The downside to Myspace is also
its upside. Because the site is so popular with many friends you can
interact with, it has also been targeted by small companies that will
spam and send junk email to your account to try and sell their products.
Spam is a growing problem which is slowly causing people to switch to
other sites.
Facebook is probably the most popular networking site when it comes to
College students. You may not be able to customize your own Facebook
page as much as Myspace can but Facebook has a unique feature that allows
you to add applications to your profile which serve as mini-webpages
or software programs. These can range anywhere from your Best Friends
application to playing Poker with other players on Facebook. Most of
these applications are developed by Facebook members and most anything goes
with these programs as long as their are no illegal implications with
them. Facebook is slowly growing and is excellent with preventing spam.
The problems with Facebook can be seen with the look of the site
itself as their is virtually no customizability with your own profile page.
This site is very similar to other sites like Myspace and was
originally launched back in 2005 but never achieved the popularity of Myspace.
It is much better with dealing with spam than Myspace because it only
has 1.8% of the market share of Social Marketing Web sites. Bebo does
have a unique feature with Bebo Bands. People can create a profile for
their own band that showcases your new music and has featured artists such
as Paris Hilton and Kylie Minogue. And whereas Myspace has a friends
list, Bebo offers a fan section for those who enjoy your music. The
problems that arose with Bebo were that people found one in three people on
Bebo was under 18 years of age that showed detailed information about
the kids. It is also difficult to find friends on the site that may go
to your school or work.
Blackplanet was one of the first Social Networking sites and boasts a
population of 16 million and primarily concentrates on Black Diaspora
(or those who originate from Africa and have spread throughout the
world). On the site, one can find African Americans to other blacks around
the world. The site is open to everyone of course but has the highest
concentration of blacks (as it isn’t just African Americans) of any of the
social networking sites. Blackplanet is currently run by Omar Winslow
who is an Internet analyst who frequently appears on TV. The downside
to Blackplanet is its lack of diversity on the site but at the same time
that’s the good part of it, as well. The site is a bit simplistic but
can be changed to adapt your style.
Another site that started almost ten years ago, Xanga is primarily used
by teenagers. It differs from the other sites because it hosts not
only profiles but places to host videoblogs, weblogs, and Podcasts. It has
around 60 million users as of right now. You may have seen many videos
and ads displaying Xanga. Xanga has an extensive marketing campaign
that has been a bit shady at times but overall has been successful. Xanga
is nice because anyone in the world can use it as it has the ability
to be displayed in many different languages such as Chinese, Korean, and
Japanese. One of Xanga’s problems is that if you want to join their
premium service (which pretty much allows you to host more data) you have
to pay a monthly fee to use it.
iMeem has grown enormously since 2006. Its primary purpose was to be a
typical blogging/hosting social site but eventually was soon just known
for its music hosting, a type of Napster if you will. Users could
upload their own music to the site as well as their own videos for others
to enjoy. After a month or so it attracted millions of more users. Just
like Youtube, others could upload their songs and have others leave
comments. It wasn’t meant for copyrighted materials but eventually their
was an explosion of illegally uploaded music on the site. Now all the
songs uploaded (unless owned by the uploader) are 30 second samples of
the song that can be purchased through iTunes as an option. Imeem still
goes strong with its videos though and should at least be looked at, not
to mention its blogs.
360 is still in its beta testing but is going strong. It helps that the
largest search engine in the world is running it. 360 runs just the
same way as Orkut or Myspace would run but whats really nice about 360 is
how it integrates and works with the other Yahoo applications and
programs. With 360 you can talk on your Yahoo Messenger directly on your
360 Page. It also works very well with LAUNCH (a program of Yahoo’s that
works as a radio tuner). 360 is very customizable and is very low on
spam because of its popularity. Something to definitely look into, 360 is
very likeable. The only bad part about it is it doesn’t have a very
high population but is great for those that use Yahoo a lot.
If you’ve ever been on the web before, you’ve seen an add about
Classmates.com. This site is extremely different from the others as its
primary purpose is to find Classmates that once attended one of your schools.
As implied, the audience for this program leans more towards the older
spectrum. People that want to find what happened to their classmates
back in the 80s or 90s or even earlier will like this site. It’s a
worthless site for people born in the late 80s and past as those users
mainly use Myspace and Facebook to see what’s happening to their old high
school chums. So unless you’re thirty or older this site probably won’t
be worth your time, but if you happen to be older than it’s a great
site.
This site’s population consists mostly of those from Central America
and a good population of Asia. Most American users flock towards Myspace
and Facebook but for those who don’t know English as well lean towards
hi5. Hi5 is another type of site that is extremely customizable and
user friendly featuring the same ideas and programs such as Myspace. It
does have a unique aspect that differs from other programs with its
degrees of friends. There are three degrees in all. There is first degree
(which contains all of your immediate friends) second degree (which shows
the friends of your friends) and third (which shows the friends of
your friends of your friends). This program really helps finding friends
that you can’t find just by searching for their names.
Tagged.com is simply a Myspace clone. It does exactly the same thing
but seems to have a bit more intrusive adds than Myspace. It’s population
ranges from all over the world but doesn’t have a specific country
that separates it from the others. Actually, the only thing that separates
it from other social networking sites is that its search engine is a
bit more advanced than others using meta tags on everything. It does
feature a youtube type video showing program integrated in the actual site
that is used fairly often. With a low population and uninteresting
adds, its easy to see why it’s so low on the popularity list.
If you’re into blogging, then this is the site for you. Originally
named for Emos, LiveJournal has turned into the perfect site for getting
things off your chest. It does offer a friend adding program and another
that lets others just watch your blog. Pictures can also be added to
your blog in many different formats. But overall its a blogging
application. You also have the option of not having someone see your profile and
what you post and then it turns into an online Diary or Journal for
your use. Only about 1.8 million of the accounts are actually active as
of right now but the demographics of the site are primarily female
standing at two-thirds of the population. Strangely enough, most users are
American and Russian.
If you’re into Animé then you’re going to enjoy Gaia Online. In a
nutshell, Gaia Online is an Anime themed forum based web site. Users
(usually gamers). On this site however, people don’t own a page they can
customize but instead own an avatar that they can customize. But here’s
another catch. In order to change your avatar you must use Gaia Gold which
can be obtained through activities and flash games that the web site
offers. So if you’re really into gaming this could be the site for you.
It really stresses status as people just by looking at your avatar can
see how dedicated you are to the site and how much free time you have
on your hands. This site is kind of on the edges of Social Networking
but is trying to integrate it so as to much up to the giant Myspace.
Believe it or not, Myspace wasn’t the top Social Networking Site on the
Internet since the start. Friendster, up until 2004, was the giant but
was soon surpassed by Myspace. Friendster offers the choice of
broadcasting any video from any video hosting site (except for Myspace Video)
which makes it very likeable especially if you’re a user of Revver.com.
Friendster also has an older population of people with most people
above 25 years of age. One of Friendster’s unique programs is its Circle
of Friends which shows and collects data about the relationships you
have with your listed friends and their information. So pretty much, if
you find a random person on their site, it can show you how you are
related to that person (e.g. This guy is my grandpa’s cousin’s best friend)
even if you have no idea who they are. Very cool feature on the site.
Orkut is Google’s answer to Myspace and does it fairly well.
Originally, Google wanted it to take away competition from Myspace but it had a
different affect. Orkut attracted a high population of Brazilians and
then later a high concentrations of Indians (from India). It grew very
quickly in Iran as well but was soon outlawed by the government. Just
recently, the site announced that the whole interface of Orkut will be
redone to something totally different, so check out what it looks like
right now. There have been some legal implications involved with the site
that include hate groups being formed and also users distributing Child
Porn and drugs with the site, but they have been dealt with swiftly.
And if you don’t like those things, just avoid them and Orkut is a very
enjoyable experience.
This Social Site is owned and operated by Microsoft. This site receives
a high amount of traffic ranging around 100,000,000 hits per month.
The unique thing about Spaces is that it offers a program called gadgets.
What these are pretty much are small programs that can be added to
your site for more customizability like games or flash programs that show
pictures or play music. Technologic wise, Live Spaces is the most
advanced and can be used even without having any friends or others looking
at your site. The problem arrises with this site when you don’t use
Internet Explorer, most people do use this so there isn’t a problem for
those who use Mozilla Firefox, they repeatedly receive problems running
Live Spaces as it’s a browser that wasn’t made by Microsoft.
This site is interesting in that it’s nothing more than a cheaply done
myspace clone. It has received many users mainly do to the fact of
advertising rather than by word of mouth. It offers no redeeming qualities
or unique programs that could make it likeable. If you want to talk to
friends it could also be difficult to find some or any at all. The
interface is a bit difficult to get used to and tries to cram ads down your
throat whenever it can. Overall, not a very good web site and one that
should try and be avoided at all costs. Best to just stick with
Myspace if you’re thinking about doing this one.
Buzznet is very similar to a typical social networking site, but how it
differs is rather than having the web page just about you, it focuses
more on a group or activity such as juggling, movies, or Fan Clubs for
Celebrities. The site is fairly new being created in 2005 and gained
notoriety for its Photo sharing which rivals that of Flickr. It also has
another program that’s very similar to Digg’s system where you can find
and share news articles or videos for others to view and that others
can vote for. But instead of voting, they refer to it as Buzzing. So if
you Buzz something a lot, it’s worth looking at. Buzznet has a little
bit of everything and really should be looked at if you work well in a
group.
Sconex was specifically made for Teenagers, mostly high school
students, to interact with each other. It has many things similar to Facebook
in that one can post their class schedules and teachers or even make
blogs about what they did in Science class earlier that day. It’s very
user friendly and supports itself entirely with Adsense and a select other
advertising programs. The concern rises with the sexually explicit
photos that some High Schoolers post on their own pages. Parents are
concerned at these findings although they are no different than what is
posted on any other site.
MiGente is made mostly for the Latin Community around the world and
boasts 2.5 million members. It’s a smaller site that usually only has
about 4,000 various people online at any given time but has been enjoyed
immensely by its members. It pretty much looks exactly like BlackPlanet
does mainly because it is owned and operated by the same people. So if
you have ever had any experience with BlackPlanet you’ll know what to
expect with MiGente. They have also just recently launched a music
sharing program to broadcast your own Latin based music.
There really isn’t anything too special about myYearBook but it is very
easy to use and easy to get started and is used mainly for kids aged
12-17. Recently, myYearBook signed a deal with CliffNotes to provide
free Cliff Notes on the site to those who are currently reading the High
School curriculum. It does have over a million users though and is
starting to pick up steam. The layout of the site seems to attract the
younger audiences with its bright colors and cutesy atmosphere.
Popularity: 8% [?]
