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.