SN Spotlight: Ning

This is interesting- Create your own Social Network!

MySpace Desperation

MySpace was a fairly popular network in the US and other places around the world.  In the US it is known as the old school social network that has fallen off the face of the earth (unless you are a sex predator, struggling band, or under the age of 13).

For years, MySpace has been competing to catch up with Facebook.  They have revamped the site, changing things like the layout and logo (which is now My_______.). 

However, they have now reached an all time low. Rather than continue to fail and compete, they have joined their enemy.  MySpace now has a 'mashup' feature with Facebook.

What is this?

Facebook  users are now able to transfer their likes and interests to their MySpace account when they sign into Facebook from their MySpace page. From here, they will get a stream of content based on their likes and interests making it more of a source of enterainment rather than a social network.

Regardless of whether this new 'mashup' is successful or not, it is not bringing in new users, only potentially attempting to keep the final existing users.

While I was never allowed to have a MySpace when I was younger, I created an account (look at me now mom!) to check out this 'mashup' feature.  I wasn't too impressed, it catered to my likes, showing the music, movies, and other various things attached to my Facebook profile, but wasn't something I would log onto everyday for social entertainment. 

New Friends

Due to an extremely busy schedule with school, work, the holidays, interviews, and extra projects my blog posts have been lacking severely.

However, good news is to come from this.

I signed into the spam email account I created for this blog (Didn't want to clog up my email with all the SN emails I would be getting from my various accounts) and I had... oh, over 80 new messages.

Turns out, my accounts were finally a bit more active then when I started.  I had friend requests lined up, people from around the world viewing my site, notifications involving people waiting to chat, sharing links, and best of all, 3 personal messages. 

Two of these messages were from people on Badoo and one from Hi5.  The messages basically were about how they saw my blog (which I strategically posted on all my profiles in hopes of more viewers) and that it was a cool idea and design.  One message also asked me to view her blog, lookville.com, a blog about fashion. 

While my blog and social network accounts are not going viral, at least I'm making a few friends along the way!

RockMelt

This is not a social network, but it is integrating all social networks together!

RockMelt is a new web browser.  For those of you who don't know, a browser is the thing that comes up and displays the sites you look at.  It kinda holds them.  Its where you hit the back button or type www. google.com, etc.  Example Browsers are Safari or Internet Explorer.

This new browser RockMelt is so new and exciting, it is changing everything.  You have to be invited, but its so easy to get an invite, just go to www.rockmelt.com and ask for one (you must have a Facebook to sign up) but in a few days check again and it will let you download it.


So whats so fun about this new browser? Along the right side of your screen it will allow you to put little App like buttons, and clicking on them you can see/update or post without actually going to the page.  On the left side it is similar, but with your friends, you can chat, post to their wall, or share the site your currently browsing without leaving it or opening a new tab. 

Facebook and twitter gives you real time updates, and most blogs, video sites, email accounts will let you put an app on the side. 

Convenience is the word for this new browser, and while many say it will be a big distraction, it can also be a really big help too.  It's only a distraction if you let it be one.
Watch the video to see for yourself, and don't forget to get the invite!

Spotlight: Badoo in London

Badoo is unique.  When I first created the Badoo page, I was very excited because it was finally something new! It didn't have the usual, find your friends, here is your profile, (yawn), same old boring stuff. 

Rather than focusing on showing yourself off to your friends, it had a big focus on meeting other people.  The main page is called people nearby.  Here you can meet new people, searching by city and narrowing by miles.  Along the top of the page is the spotlight, a row of random people, their pictures, names, and current status.   

The simple global navigation allows to navigate to the people nearby, encounters, messages, and profile.  The encounters is a page that brings up a random person and says do you want to meet them? Yes, Maybe, No?

Additionally, a feature I liked was the popularity scale (although my popularity was 'Very Low'.  This scale determines how popular you are by visitors, people that wanted to meet you, people you want to meet, mutual attractions, friends, and favorites. 

The more I clicked around on this site, I began to see how this site could be similar to a dating network, because of the emphasis on meeting people.

When I tried to increase my popularity, that's when I discovered all of the restrictions on the site.  Many of the available features required money or a pay pal account, which was a huge disappointment.  Another way to get around the restrictions is one big fee is to buy super powers, which cost 9 dollars. 

If it weren't for the monetary restrictions on this site, it may have become my new favorite social network... still a never cool, unique, yet simple site that provided a fun, positive experience.

Fighting Domination

While Facebook captures 100 countries out of 127 popularity, there are several sites still fighting for a spot. 
This map shows the top social networks by country, and the majorty of the sites here are language based for the specific country, which is perhas why Facebook is not as popular there.

As you can see there are 6 sites on this map I have already explored, and many others I have yet to discover.

Spotlight: Hi5

Hi5.com

This network was pretty average, allowing users to create a profile, post pictures, comments, etc., etc.  you know the drill.

The layout was also pretty plain; white background, black and blue text, but spiced up a bit with all the game and quiz taking options.

Aside from all this boring, usual stuff though, I did find some unique features.

This network felt more childish to me than the other networks I came across, mostly because of the features.  For example, for some features you needed to have a certain number of coins, and I found that was one of the main things on your profile; How many coins you have. 

Well I had 0, being new to the site, which was no fun.  I learned that you can buy coins, or play games, or 'download' certain applications to gain more coins. 

The other thing that made the site feel immature was the huge game features on it.  It almost felt like more of a gaming network than social network (but maybe that's because I had no friends to be social with). 

Making an 'Avatar' for yourself was a main option as soon as you created your profile, but I didn't find that many people actually created an Avatar when I was browsing for friends. 

After requesting a few random people to be friends, I logged on an hour later and got really excited because it said I had 11 Friend Suggestions.   Thinking this was like friend requests, I thought these people wanted to be my friend, so I selected add friend for all of them.  However, I found out it was actually just a suggestion.  Hi5 was saying since you want to be Hanna's friend then do you want to add Mark as a friend too? Needless to say, I was very disappointed after figuring this out.

One thing I noticed, this site had the most diverse users, with the exception of Skyrock, that I have seen yet.  It seemed like people from a number of countries were on this network rather than focused in one part of the world.

This could be a result of the Google Translation feature on every page.  This was awesome for me because if I stumbled across a profile or page that was in another language, I hit the google translation button it reloaded the page in English for me!

 Before the translation

Give this button a push

And Voila (no pun intended)

So it doesn't translate exact, but not everyone is perfect!  It works well enough to get an idea of what they're saying.

 Giving 'fives' to friends was something I could related to with the Facebook 'poke' feature, but other than that, this site had an overwhelming amount of games and restrictions because of my zero coins, broke, balance and lack of friends once again. 

Spotlight: Tuenti

Tuenti in Spain

The name comes from "tu enti[dad]," meaning "your entity."

I tried to create an account on the social network Tuenti, the most popular network in Spain.  However, this exclusive network is invitation only to join. 

After researching reviews about the site, since I was unable to actually see it, I found it is fairly basic, allowing users to create profile and do what most social networks allow users to do. 

One unique feature I have not seen yet is that it has no advertisements. 

The Social Network: Mark Zuckerberg

I found it only appropriate not only to see the movie, The Social Network, but also write about it here, on my blog that highlights social networks. 

The movie was fantastic and hilarious. I recommend it to everyone.  It tells the story of the creation of Facebook, the revolutionary social media.  Despite the seriousness of the two law suits Mark Zuckerberg, the creator of Facebook, finds himself involved in his hilarious character alone keeps the audience rolling with laughter.

This approach seems only appropriate seeing that the primary audience is most likely young adults who use Facebook.

The process of how each piece of Facebook was added and put together, whether accurate or not, was interesting in that it was personally connected to something in Zuckerbergs own life.  For example, the relationship status was created because of an annoying friend who kept bugging Mark about whether a girl in his class was single or not.  Now on Facebook, people can check a relationship status to see if someone is single or not.

As Facebook continues to grow and change we will see what changes Mark Zuckerberg brings to the table, keeping Facebook as the number one social network in the US, and many other countries around the world. 

Spotlight: More on Bebo

Who visited my profile? 

I clicked on this link on my Bebo account and a map of the world appeared with little marks in the UK and in Australia. I had 3 views! Most likely my new friend from Australia and two friends from the U.K.

This feature tells you how many people have viewed your profile and where they viewed it at, and I really love it.  I mean, with only 3 views, my profile doesn't seem to be going viral around the world, however, if this was my real profile and I had friends on Bebo it would be really cool to see who is creeping on me and where they are from.

With this feature, you can turn it on, off, or make it anonymous.  If it is on, you can see the location and profile of who visited you, but then your name and location will show up on others maps when you visit their profile.  If it is anonymous, only the location is shown, and if it is off then no information is shared.

Facebook should definitely get this feature.

   

Spotlight: Bebo in the U.K.

I am offically a 'Beboer'. 

When I researched Bebo.com I found it was very popular in the U.K. as well as Ireland. 

It was a pretty basic, what you would expect, social network site, but had a cool, funky feel to it.  While personalization was a major feature, interactivity with others was not. 

I worried I would never make a friend on this site, becuase it was impossible to even find a friend unless you knew the first and last name of someone on the site.  I of course, did not, since all of my friends are on Facebook, however I found a way around it. 

I typed in a couple of names that were friends names or would most likely be a common name.  For example, Tim Jones.  In doing this a couple of people came up and I friended them all hoping someone, anyone would be my friend.  I did this with a couple of names.

You could say this network went overboard with privacy settings, and perhaps that is desirable for many people, but for my purpose of exploring social networks it makes it really damn hard.

Upon looking at reviews of Bebo, I found they have some of the highest ratings in security and that the default setting for profiles is private. 

All of this didn't stop me in making a friend though! Tim Jones, a  fireman from Australia informed me that Bebo is also very popular in Australia and New Zeland!  Unfortunatley, as soon as we got talking Tim had to leave to go "surfing with his mates" but hopefully I will hear from my new friend again soon. 

Another girl I friended, Sarah Henry, who accepted my request, claimed to be 21 on her profile but in reality was only 16 years old.  Although we didn't talk, she had a lot of drama in her life from the looks of her comments page.  One of her friends was "moving to the States to live with her baby's daddy" and although she and her best friend were in a huge fight she, "STILL LOVES HER LIKE A SISTER".    

Below you can see my profile, with the timeline.  This unique feature shows all my activity on bebo in an interactive timeline.  More on Bebo later, hopefully with some converstion from Tim and juicy drama from Sarah.

Facebook is home

I have decided to take a break from the spotlight for this post. 

The first reason is that I just created four new accounts on sites that are popular in Brazil, Spain, Japan, etc. that you will be hearing about in the near future.  However, I want to really get to know how these sites work first, and hopefully talk to some people who use the sites.

The second reason is because I have come to realize why Facebook is so popular in the US and why QQ is for China, etc. etc.

Now maybe this is obvious, but in making all these pages on new networks, and struggling with making friends who will actually talk to me and not just accept my request to be friends, I truly understand why everyone is on Facebook. 

Who wants to make an account on a foreign site such as Hyves, the popular site in the Netherlands, only to find that you cannot do anything on the site because you have no friends, and cannot make any friends because of privacy issues or language barriers?  Moreover, if none of your friends are on the network, then how would you stay connected to what’s going on in your social life? Who would you creep on??

I am not at all criticizing the privacy settings on these sites, personally I have my own Facebook privacy settings very strict, but it really does limit what you can do if you don't have any friends on the network already.
And personally, I love making these new accounts, and will continue to do so and search for friends willing to talk.  It is a nice change from Facebook, which is sometimes a bit annoying when you read everything that everyone you know is doing at every second of everyday.

It's like a vacation away from home to visit another country.

Spotlight: VK in Russia

Its a hard life trying to find friends on this network, road blocks like privacy and unwillingness be friends with a random person set me back in my attempt to make contact. I added several people as my friend, hoping to find someone willing to talk to me but after having no success with finding friends I was about to give up.  

However, a week after making the profile I finally had my first friend!  Natalya-Vanilla Sky-Vishnevskaya. 

On Natalya's page she had over 8,000 friends, her music likes included Kesha, Rihanna, Britney Spears ( Spelt as 'Spiars'), and tons of posts from friends (all in Russian).  Her profile shared her husbands name, where she worked, and contact information.  I have attempted to talk to my new friend, however no response so far. 

Perhaps I will have better luck with the next network.  

Spotlight: VK in Russia

VK-B KOHTAKTE


When I began making my profile on VK I thought I was making a second Facebook account.  This nearly identical site is a little underdeveloped when compared to facebook, and in some areas more developed. 

Included in this Facebook look-a-like is a profile page, friends, photos, groups, messages, notes, music, events, and setting options.  Additionaly it has an instant message feature and applications feature. 

The 'wall' on the profile page has a unique feature called grafitti.  This allows you to write on others walls but rather than using the keyboard to type a message, you can use a 'spray paint can' to draw or write on the wall.

One area that seems a bit more developed than facebook is the people search application. From here a list of random people will appear, but then you can begin to sort results by changing the long list of critera.  For example, you can sort by country, sex, relationship status, age, religous views, schools, military, and much more.

I found this particular feature helpful when I began to browse through profiles, because all of the conversation, information, gossip, etc. was in Russian.  Therefore, using this feature I was able to find people who use the English language. 

Shortly after making a profile, there was already activity happening. I had five group invitations, similar to group or event invitations on Facebook.  In looking at the invitations, they were sent from random people, all who spoke a different language.  

There was one group I was able to recognized from the logo MARY KAY, the popular make-up brand in the US. Others included Great World Treasury of the Cinema, Enrique Iglesias MTV EMA voting, and some I couldn't understand such as Фотограф-Чижиков Николай. г.Москва. Индивидуальная фотосъемка, lovestory, жанр, портрет, Портфолио. 

Spotlight: Skyrock in France

While Facebok takes the lead in France for most popular social networking site, Skyrock.com is not far behind.  This network, based in France, is a European central network and has multilingual options.

Compared to other social networks, Skyrock does not differ greatly and could be compared to MySpace with busy profiles and cluttered, jam packed  pages.

Privacy on this site differs from some though.  Visiting Skyrock.com, right from the start without creating a profile you can view other profiles, blogs, search for people, chat rooms, and watch as the "what's up?" feature (similar to tweets or status updates) displays a new 'status' every four seconds.

The most popular content on Skyrock is easy to find with links that have the content sorted into categories such as the most viewed, top 100, blog stars, etc.  Browsing through profiles and blogs, many people write in both English and French, sometimes even within the same post.  The most popular blogs involved a variety of topics such as beauty or dating advice, words of wisdom, inspirational writings, daily ramblings, celebrity gossip (especially American celebrities), and much more.

The chat feature on this social network is unique in that there are chat rooms by country, and also a number of other themed chat rooms to join at any time.  The biggest chat room by country I came across when I was browsing chat rooms was the France chat room with 340 guys and 260 girls at once!  Most of the themed chat rooms were in French, therefore I could not understand the conversation. 

 In a general chat room for the US and UK however, the conversation was mostly in English with some French.  Once in the chat room, there was an open chat between every person in the chat room, however, you could also click on a single person in the chat room to start a private conversation.  The chat rooms can also kick you out for doing something such as "yelling" or writing in all caps.  

In the US chat room, not all members were from the US, but more so anyone who could speak English.  Most of the conversations revolved around where people were from, and just getting to know who one another was.  Additionally, wanting to go into a private chat was a common aspect once I joined the chat room.  Personally it was a little creepy with random people flirting, asking how old you were, and if you wanted to go into a private chat. 

Spotlight: QQ in China

Facebook is famous around the world with its 200 million plus users, but imagine a network with over 300 million active accounts!  Well thats exactly what the social network Tencent QQ has accomplished, making it the largest social network in the world.

QQ, which started as an instant messaging system,  now has grown to include a number of features such as chat-rooms, games, internet storage, dating services, and personal avatars.  While the name, QQ,  may not be as familiar as Twitter in the US, it has a recent presence, due to its partnership with AOL to compete in the US social gaming market.

When you visit QQ.com today, you'll find a site filled with information, but unless you can read Chinese characters, all you can do is look at the pictures.  QQ however does have an international site that supports the English and French language at www.imqq.com.

Screen shot of qq.com