Saturday, September 20, 2008

War of Online Social Networks



You all know about what is social networking. Through social networking, people keep in touch with current friends, reconnect with old friends, create friendship with people who have similar interests or similar groups. Apart from connectivity people can share their ideas or experiences with other like-minded people. Some networking can also help members find a job or establish business contacts. This is the most demandable business on internet. It grows exponentially and generate huge-huge traffic on internet. There are plenty of social network websites, believe me each and every website is making millions or billions of dollers. If any one is not making that much still it's buy out price is in billion. I use Myspace, Orkut, Facebook and Hi-5. These are some leading social network website. I looked closely these sites and compared their features. See the table which I made,


MySpace has 191 million members. This site is massive, bragging the largest membership of any social networking site on the Internet. Facebook just reached the milestone of 100 million users. It was initially intended for college students. Orkut and Hi5 have 60 and 50 million registered users.
I divided the features in 4 parts.
  1. Profiles: User's personal profile is the heart of any social network website. This is the place where user can do whatever they want. They can express their emotions and feelings. So, this thing should be in favour of users. Users will decide which type of theme, color or background they want to set. Myspace supports these things. You can use your own html or css code and can make own template. Only HI-5 and Myspace provide personal url for every user.
  2. Security: Internet is a dangerous place to put your personal information. But we don't need to worry. These sites are secure.
  3. Networking Tools: It includes additional features like chat room, personal videos, music, blog, forum etc. Only Myspace provides blogging facility.
  4. Search: Efficient and Fast search is the backbone of any social network. As you can in above table, different type of search parameters. These parameters make search fast and efficient. Common parameters are search by email, name, city/zip code. Orkut is backward in searching. Orkut need some improvement in search part.
Their are several like friendster, tagged, linkedIn etc. Which one are you using?

11 comments:

Sunil Kosuru September 20, 2008 at 1:00 PM  

cool compilation, seems my space is topping others, will have a look at my space :)

Varun September 20, 2008 at 5:42 PM  

I use facebook and orkut.Myspace isn't safe these days

Mrs. Stevenson September 20, 2008 at 9:21 PM  

very cool post. i used myspace, tagged, friendster and myyearbook but i barely open them now. too lazy or dont have time to do it. I like myyearbook coz i get to play my fav. game hehehe.

Nancy Janiola September 20, 2008 at 9:34 PM  

I used to have friendster and myspace but blogging's taking so much of my time everyday that i have to place my social networking accounts to the back seat... i know this sounds unlikely to those who are engaged to such but we all have our personal preferences and i really do enjoy blogging so much...tho, i visit friendster once in a while...not as often as i do to my websites...

Very useful information there is tho, for those who are really into it...thanks for sharing...nice to hear from you again!

Chawley's friend September 20, 2008 at 10:31 PM  

Nice work dude... Nice research on those numbers and other functionality.. keep it up

Shafique Gajdhar September 21, 2008 at 9:46 AM  

im new here...
nice blog..

well gud research-work dude....!!!
i thgt facebook was leading...
well abt me,
i use orkut
(i guess m addicted to it)
nd hi5(nt much )
i just created an acc. on facebook hvnt tried it...
letc
nd yeah i just strd blogging with a frnd of mine...(i kno it sounds diff or somethingbt thts tru)
i guess u wud like to c it....

keep sharing...!!!

* મારી રચના * September 21, 2008 at 10:23 AM  

i use orkut and facebook... wel.. think abt myspace now.. nice topic

Anonymous,  September 21, 2008 at 11:26 AM  

Interesting post... by the way you could have done a comparison why a social networking site is more popular is a given region..like orkut is more popular in India and Brazil , while Myspace rules USA. Does that reflect anything about the user preferences?

Ranjeet Kr. Vimal September 21, 2008 at 11:34 AM  

@ Angelzfear: social networking is like chain reaction..grows exponentially... the concept is very simple: suppose u r my frnd and u hv ur account on orkut,,,den it has high probability that i ill join orkut.. myspace launched early in us..when it's popularity came to india, orkut had been acquired india market..this is the simple concept abt popularity social networks :) i wanted to include it in my post..but i thought post wud b very long.. so i ditched ..:)

Nishank Mehta September 22, 2008 at 11:40 PM  

Initially I was not too keen on social networking....but now I spend a major percentage of my surfing time on Orkut.

Btw, a really informative analysis of the four top social networking sites....must really have a look at MySpace. But, for India I feel Orkut is still the preferred site...

Post a Comment