Social Networking v2?

After looking more closely at Ning.com last week, I got to thinking a little more about social networks in general. If you break down who uses social networks, there are a few types of users. If we look at those users closely, the question I raise is this:

Is it possible to create a social network that safely and efficiently works for all types of users? I think so, and I actually thing that Ning.com is on the right track.

Before we delve into the discussion of these different groups, and how they would operate, let’s define who they are and where they currently congregate. Conveniently for me the fit in a few nice groups although there are obviously exceptions.

• The high schoolers: These are the 14-19 year olds that are using social networking as a platform to meet people, interact with their friends, share media (photos, videos, etc.) and basically use it as a way to have fun. Unfortunately there are a lot of non-high schoolers on here, but maybe that’s still where their mind is…and yes, I have a profile, count me guilty. (Current leader: MySpace.com)
• The college set: These are the 18-24 year olds that are more interested in a refined set of users. They don’t want anyone and everyone contacting them and want to be able to make closer contacts. Of course there is a lot of overlap with other social networks here, but for the larger portion it holds true. (Current leader: Facebook.com)
• The minglers: These are the 22-35 year olds that want to get further faster. As in any industry, you have to know people. Finding your given peers is a powerful way to get started and these users want to make any contact they can that will possibly give them a leg up. (Current leader: LinkedIn.com)

Ok, now that we have an idea of who we are talking about, let’s see how we could safely put them in the same world. There are some features that are unique to certain networks that need to be dropped, and others that need to be spread. The ability to add CSS to MySpace gave the high schoolers the ability to personalize their profiles at will. While this is a great idea in theory, it’s also possibly the cause of MySpace being the slowest, most annoying website on the web.

While personalization is nice, for the sake of performance and appearance, a cleaner more organized look would have the ability to make the network be more appealing to a broader set of users. In this category of discussion, I think that Ning.com has gotten the model right. Allow your users to segregate themselves into sets, and allow the sets themselves to be modified. You can have a custom look that appeals to your group of users. Facebook has a nice model as well, but Ning.com has it right in my opinion.

In order to make your network be ubiquitous, you need a solid API. Other products have to be able to nest right in and belong. Facebook has definitely hit this one on the head. Take a few minutes to check out it’s additional application and you will see that extensibility is king.

What would it take to sell me on a social network? I want a portal. I know that’s kind of what I do for a living, so I am not quite objective here. If I was building a product, this would be my feature set for Jason’s Social Network Killer….

• Communications: In order to really keep me on this service, it has to be truly useful outside of social networking. I want to take Yahoo!’s Ajax email client, and Meebo’s online multiprotocol IM client, and create a portal that gives me the ability to email and IM with my own email and IM accounts.
• Outside Integration: While it’s nice to get Facebook notices of all of your friend’s updates, but it can get to be white noise if your network is large. Why not give me the ability to subscribe to any feed instead? That way I can see top Digg stories, or the AP wire, or even my friend’s blog feed, whatever. Give me the ability to add outside content to my network so it’s useful to me and also shows my friends what I am interested in reading.
• Search: Truly powerful search that I can opt out of. If I want to put myself on the market, great, if not, hide me. If I am under 18, make me non searchable. MySpace has started to get on the right track of hiding profiles, but I can still be found. Give me a stealth mode in case I am just using it for specific people. The abilities to search by company, school, interest, etc. are the meat of the search here.
• Keep it social: Make business pay to use it. Ads are a great model, but if you want to generate revenue and reduce spam annoyances, make it cost for anyone other than a consumer to use it. Sure MySpace started as a site for bands to network, but it’s not that anymore. A social network is for people to communicate with their peers. Every company has a website that I can find if I need it. If they want a presence in the social, let them buy it, and restrict how it can be used.
• Extensibility: Create a solid API, and police how it can be used. Performance is important, create an API that can be used, and then police who can use it. Create partnerships with truly useful sites and allow your users to use their services.

There are certainly more things that you could and should do. These are just some things that I have picked up from my experiences. I would definitely use a social network more if it provided more.

This is pure speculation, but I wouldn’t be surprised if there is a room full of geeks at Google or Microsoft working on this right now.

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