30
Jul
Which social network lets me have a drink with a long lost friend?
stored in: Internet, Random, Social

Jason Calcanis has started a long conversation in the blogosphere by declaring bankruptcy on social networks. He is exhausted by the number of people he has to meet up there, and who are sending him requests for more (link), whereas on the other hand Ben Casnocha, in an unrelated post, talks about how social networks are helping people connect to each other. 30 years back, people just didn’t have this facility, and now it’s just so easy, that everybody’s doing it.(link)

With the overkill on Facebook, it is not suprising that Calcanis is freaking out. I do too. Unlike emails, which are very private, social networking are just obscenely public. Just try logging in and not replying to scraps, and you start getting booed by people for trying to act pricey. Somehow I just can’t get used to the idea of catching up with so many people at the same time. Everybody I need to, and want to meet, are already on my speed dial list, and calling up feels so much more like interacting.

Yet, I wouldn’t go on to say that social networks are a complete waste of time (though they are a huuuge waste). I have met a number of old friends on Orkut, which I would have never met otherwise.

On the whole, what we need, is a little bit sanity on our social networks. Okay, I want to be connected to the rest of the world, but no, not right now, and not with everybody else in the universe. And no, I don’t want to try out all of those widgets everyday, and no please no I don’t even need the invites.

Twitter (or Blogger) makes a lot more sense in that way. If you really want to be connected, what better way that to start up your blog, or microblog. So that people who are interested, can passively keep track of what you’re doing. And so that the next time you meet, you know what’s been going on with everybody.

Here is what I think : Facebook will die soon. Atleast the hype will. And so will RockYou (to me, which looks like a big kid with too much money, and nothing to do). What will stay is the people, who will probably catch you on another network, or just like old times, meet you in the pub next to your place.

So if you’d like to be connected, sign up for my feeds here.

Update: Here is an interesting post about why Facebook is like Microsoft, and why it is not a good thing. (link). And anyways when did anything related to Microsoft start becoming Good.

2 Responses to “Which social network lets me have a drink with a long lost friend?”

  2. Rithesh Prasad Says:
    July 30th, 2007 at 8:34 pm

    Sudhanshu,

    Great post. I do agree that there is a great need for private social networks or niche social networks that are targeted towards a specific interest or a vertical. That is why Ning will be the next big web 2.0 story!

    That said, I don’t think Facebook will die any time soon. It is a massive success already and scores of millions of users definitely seem to like it.

    - Rithesh

  3. Vercingetorix Says:
    July 30th, 2007 at 11:51 pm

    Rithesh,

    Thanks for the pointer to Ning. You’re so damn right about it. With 70k networks, and growing, Ning was the perfect place to launch API’s like facebook. The Facebook effect should have come over at Ning, I guess they missed a really big chance there.

    And about Facebook, what you’re saying is exactly what people thought about Orkut last year. Even now orkut isn’t really dead, but the hype is gone. People are moving to Facebook, and soon they will move to the next big thing.

    And great to see you around here again.

    -Sudhanshu

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