Definition:
A social network service focuses on building online communities of people who share interests and/or activities, or who are interested in exploring the interests and activities of others. Most social network services are web based and provide a variety of ways for users to interact, such as e-mail and instant messaging services.
Social networking has created new ways to communicate and share information. Social networking websites are being used regularly by millions of people, and it now seems that social networking will be an enduring part of everyday life. The main types of social networking services are those which contain directories of some categories (such as former classmates), means to connect with friends (usually with self-description pages), and recommender systems linked to trust. Popular methods now combine many of these, with MySpace and Facebook being the most widely used in North America; Nexopia (mostly in Canada); Bebo,[3] Facebook, Hi5, MySpace, Tagged, Xing; and Skyrock in parts of Europe; Orkut and Hi5 in South America and Central America; and Friendster, Orkut, Xiaonei and Cyworld in Asia and the Pacific Islands.
There have been some attempts to standardize these services to avoid the need to duplicate entries of friends and interests (see the FOAF standard and the Open Source Initiative), but this has led to some concerns about privacy.
Advertising Oppurtunities for Companies:
eMarketer predicts that $2 Billion will be spent this year (2008) on social network advertising worldwide and that this market will continue to grow - reaching $3.8 billion in spending by 2011. However, a large portion of this spending is predicted to be coming from the US market. As Internet usage continues to grow in other parts of the world, and social networks continue to proliferate, advertising dollars on social networking sites outside of the US will begin to play a major role.
There have been many claims that Social Network Advertising will revolutionize the online advertising market. Most famously, founder of facebook Mark Zuckerberg, announced that "For the last hundred years media has been pushed out to people, but now marketers are going to be a part of the conversation."There is no doubt that social network advertising is a significant new way of reaching customers, however the market is far from being mature.
"In general, it's been improving but we still have a long way to go. Things have been going well this year...it's hard to predict where social networking will come out." - Sergey Brin (Google Co-Founder)
Reference Links:
^ "Getting booked by Facebook", courtesy of campus police: Milwaukee Journal Sentinel website. Retrieved on January 19, 2008.
^ Fatal MySpace internet hoax mother is charged, Herald Sun, 17 May 2008
^ Banned for keeps on Facebook for odd name, Sydney Morning Herald, 24 September 2008
^ Social Networking Ad Spending Update
^ Social Networking World Maps
^ Economist.com - Word of mouse
^ Reuters - 'Brin says Google social network ad business "improving"'
^ [Facebook Beacon Project]
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