Monday, December 17, 2007

It's social networking bashing day

CNET: Social networking may be over-hyped
Companies should think twice before developing their own social-networking applications, as the movement has yet to prove itself as solid an investment for businesses as other online communications technologies such as instant messaging, according to a report by information and technology research firm Gartner.

More like: Who wants to be a member of 5,000 different networks???
It isn't a bad idea to create a social network, I think the problems deal with the barriers of entry. How many networks, user ID and passwords do people need before they are going to go crazy?
Not only that, I hate it when people have nicked my User ID. I just register to any new network so someone else can't take my moniker! Case in point- my Gmail account.
Another issue with the social network is how to use them effectively. No one really knows. You have this great idea for a network and how do you drive traffic to it in the first place? Then how do you get people interested in product once they're there??
Apparently the experts are getting paid top dollar for their opinions. Bottom line is, they don't know either. No one really does. It's also a problem when the networks are quoting their best case studies are from 3 years ago.

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