Unit Structures: Social Network Transitions

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Saved by 9 people (0 private), first by anonymouse user on 2007-12-11

Carlaarena on 2008-10-02 - Tags socialnetworking , transitions , community , networks , socialnetworks , egocentricnetworks , objectcentricnetworks
Malinkaiva on 2008-02-22 - Tags socialnetworking , community , transitions
Chiti003 on 2008-01-24 - Tags socialNetworking , facebook , socialsoftware , redes_sociales , socialnetworks , community
Andyroberts on 2008-01-06 - Tags object-centered-sociality
Pavel1998 on 2007-12-11 - Tags socialnetworks , web30

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To generalize, let's consider two types of social networks: ego-centric and object-centric. An ego-centric social network places the individual as the core of the network experience (Orkut, Facebook, LinkedIn, Friendster) while the object-centric network places a non-ego element at the center of the network. Examples of object-centric networks include Flickr (social object: photograph), Dopplr (social object: travel instance), del.icio.us (social object: hyperlink) and Digg (social object: news item). The characteristics of ego- and object-centric networks are similar, and a human can certainly be considered a social object, but I delineate based on the significant experiential difference.

In a post I wrote exploring the network effect multiplier, the value proposition of object-centric social networks is described. Object-centric social networks offer core value, which is multiplied by network value.

Highlighted by pavel1998

Therefore, the idea of college students jumping ship from Facebook to an empty Facebook-clone is pretty ridiculous. No matter how many features, or whatever, these nets have - the features aren't the motivating factor. So what will be the next big thing? It will be a situationally relevant social experience that exploits dense, underserved clusters, treating the ego-centric aspects as a sub-feature. I'm almost certain that the experience will be mobile based, incorporating geolocational data and personal beacons. We'll still want a rich social experience, but this experience will be secondary to the core situationally relevant need answered by the site (be it positional data or otherwise).