aTypical Joe: a gay New Yorker living in the rural South
Monday, October 01, 2007
Social Network v Social Tools
Steve’s talkin’ sense:
Mashable reports that iWon is about to add a social network to its site. This raises two points: 1. iWon is still around and 2. Mathematically, adding an iWon social network will officially mean that every frickin’ site now thinks it has to have one. This is getting silly. I now have more social networks than I have actual friends.
... I’m not a social network curmudgeon. There’s a value to these things (especially if you own one) and they are the backbone of Web 2.0. But enough already with them. If you’re not going to reinvent the social network, don’t add to the crowd. It’s as though clueless web execs heard that social networks were big, so they decided “Hey, let’s buy one at Circuit City.”
Social tools on the other hand are extremely valuable, and every site can benefit. Local news sites should have sharing tools, mashup tools and other social interface mechanisms galore. You can’t add too many social tools. Let people embed your video on their damn blogs, for crying out loud.
