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Sergiu

Okay, so you guys wrote some pure-scientific comments (most), yet trying to create an online community / social network is pretty hard. After coding my website for 3 months by myself, and trying to be original, I get flamed by several websites with some irelevant arguments. MyLOL.net is all about making friends online, it is recommended mostly for teens, and yet..it displays zango content, and they have separate rules. You need to be 18 to play the movies,games. And that's the main reason they said the website is "ok, but teens bigger than 18 should access". Is there such thing? They have the right to chose.. IMO.

So the main question, without going too far from our main topic, is that teens should have a way to express themself..

Cheers,

Jen

How are social networks used in recruitment?

John Richardson

I concur with you on your comments...

"Rather than isolating themselves in retirement centers, boomers will want to go where the action is so that they can refresh and renew. The collision of younger and older generations in our urban centers will reshape social networks in interesting ways".

As more and more boomers receive their AARP cards, I think we may see a reversal of urban sprawl and the beginning of true community.

jm

And then there is a different type of social network emerging that is unlike YouTube, MySpace or Friendster. These niche blogs are clustered around a specific topic and accessible through a central portal which may or may not offer other features such as discussion boards, chat and tagging. For example, Blogging Baby brings people together who are interested in parenting. One of our ventures, HouseBlogs, brings together homeowners who are working on their own dwelling. We are evolving our niche blogs destination based upon our experience in the field of learning and organizational development.

These blogs create a social network that wouldn't normally exist in real life because of geographical barriers. So an owner builder in Portland can correspond and trade advice with an owner builder in South Africa or Estonia. Members sometimes send each other materials, parts and books. Occasionally, they meet in person.

The site has been successful so far because there are strict membership guidelines, but specific blog content is not moderated.

As we planned out this project, some of the results have been expected and some have been surprising. It has been an exciting experience.

anita

I think one of the hardest problems to solve with social networks is creating strict enough controls that marketers and deviants don't dominate the user base (or at least the requests for friends), yet at the same time allowing folks to Collaborate and Connect easily with their friends and meet new friends. Friendster's demise is a good example of what happens when there are too many restrictions, while MySpace's slow decline illustrates the eventual reaction when there are almost no controls.

I actually had only read posts like this, and never used a site like MySpace. I decided to give it a test run, and the results were actually pretty funny, so much so I decided to post them on my silly (work appropriate) humor blog (Say No to Crack). Needless to say, I wouldn't have wanted to meet any of my new 'friends' face to face!

Howard Owens

Do you draw any distinction between social networks and virtual communities.

See, I haven't abandoned the term "virtual communities." To me social networks are defined very much along the lines of the Friendster patent -- the ability to connect and share friends -- which makes them a subset of virtual communities.

YouTube is more of a virtual community, comprised in someways of multiple virtual communities, than a social network. You do not, in YT, create friend networks the way you do in MySpace or LinkedIn.

So a question might be does urbanization come about because of social networks, or is that an intrinsic value of any virtual community?

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