This week saw one blogger grab some statistics for visitor numbers to the main social networking sites, and deduce that we're getting bored with them. Visitors to MySpace are down 26 per cent from a year ago, and while Facebook numbers are up over a similar period, they're way down from mid-2007 when you couldn't move for people banging on about Superwalls, Status Updates and Scrabulous. So does this bode ill for social networks in the long term?
Since 2001, I've spent time on Friends Reunited and got bored, then spent time on Friendster and got even more bored, spent time on MySpace and got frustrated, bored and angry, and more recently spent even longer on Facebook, thanks mainly to the merits of various word puzzles and other third-party applications and widgets. If you'd asked me at any point whether I thought I'd become a thriving member of a new social networking community in a year's time, I'd probably have said "no" in firm but gentle tones – but that feverish swarm that occurs around successful social networking startups is irresistable to many, including me.
So while the decline of MySpace, Friendster and the supposed imminent decline of Facebook might well signal our boredom with the whole concept of social networking – which would certainly cause a certain amount of forehead slapping for Microsoft, who recently bought 1.6 per cent of Facebook for an absurd $240m – perhaps we've merely exhausted our patience for these particular sites, and we're unknowingly waiting for a new one to come along. Quite what new-fangled spin any new site will manage to put on social networking to draw us in, I can't imagine. Pets? Must have been done. Bathroom appliances? Non-ferrous alloys? God knows. But, tragically, I'm sure I'll be in there, desperately adding friends in a lame attempt to make myself seem more popular than I actually am.
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Anyone who's actually tried using a social networking site for a few months knows that this happens. All those people who paid BILLIONS for stock in these companies should have tried signing up and trying it out for themselves first.
My experience with both myspace and facebook made me think they were so brilliant for the first five weeks that it could never have lasted. I'm not sure if its the same when you're fifteen, but at the age of 35 me and my friends definitely all got less interested after a while.
I don't think it's the same as something like EBay which has slowly but surely wormed its way into people's hearts, and is a constantly useful thing.
Be very interested to see what happens to all those stock options!
Posted by: em | Friday, 01 February 2008 at 06:47 PM