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The Progression of the Social Web

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The Progression of the Social Web
Melanie Helm
Info103: Computer Literacy (ADD1322E)
Instructor Joan Rhodes
July 1, 2013

The Progression of the Social Web From its humble beginning to the present day, it is mind boggling to think it has been a decade since the social web began and what is even crazier is that it has become an integral part of our everyday lives in modern society. There are now sites for virtually every special interest out there that we may have. There are now sites to share photos, videos, status updates, meeting new people, sharing recipes, sites to connect with old friends, and create new ones. It also seems there are social solutions for just about everything and every need. Social web has progressed in so many ways it is absolutely hard to keep up with these days. Usenets began in 1979 by Tom Truscott and Jim Ellis. Usenet systems let users post articles or posts (referred to as “news”) to newsgroups. Usenets are the precursor of the RSS feed readers which are commonly used to follow blogs and news sites today. They do not have a central server or a dedicated administrator. Google groups and Yahoo!, which are group sites, use many of the original usenet systems. The first Bulletin Board Systems (BBS) were primarily hosted on personal computers and users could only use it one at a time and had to login using a computer modem. BBS’s first came into existence in the late 70s. Though in a much slower fashion, BBS’s were the first to let users logon and interact with one another. Next came “online services” which CompuServe and Prodigy were the first corporations to integrate chat services. From 1985 through 1999 the Genie, an online service, was created by General Electric subsidiary. Genie offered games, shopping, mail and forums; a tough competition to CompuServe. AOL started as an online service too and made great strides at making the Internet more universally accessible in the U.S. In 1988 the IRC (Internet Relay Chat) was developed and used for file sharing, link sharing and keeping in touch. It was really the father of instant messaging as we know it today. IRC was mostly UNIX-based though, limiting access to most people. ICQ was developed in the mid-90s and was the first instant messaging program for PCs. It was at least partly responsible for the adoption of avatars, abbreviations (LOL, BRB) and emoticons. Other IM clients soon followed. Six Degrees was launched in 1997 and was the first modern social network. It allowed users to create a profile and to become friends with other users. While the site is no longer functional, at one time it was actually quite popular and had around a million members at its peak. In 2000 it was purchased for $125 million and in 2001 it was shut down. AsianAvenue, MiGente, BlackPlanet, these sites popped up in the years following SixDegrees’ launch, between 1997 and 2001. They allowed users to create profiles and add friends (without needing approval to add people). Users could create professional, personal and dating profiles on these sites.
While they were some of the earliest social networks, there were few innovations among them. LiveJournal started in 1999 and took a different approach to social networking. While Six Degrees allowed users to create a basically-static profile, LiveJournal was a social network built around constantly-updated blogs. LiveJournal encouraged its users to follow one another and to create groups and otherwise interact. It was really the precursor to the live updates we see in social networks currently. Major Advances in Social Networking began in the early 2000s and brought some huge developments to the social web. Friendster was really the first modern, general social network. Founded in 2002, Friendster is still a very active social network, with over 90 million registered users and 60+ million unique visitors each month. Most of Friendster’s traffic comes from Asia (90% of it). Hi5 is another major social network, established in 2003 and currently boasting more than 60 million active members according to their own claims. Profile privacy works a bit differently on Hi5, where a user’s network consists of not only their own contacts, but also second (friends of friends) and third (friends of friends of friends) degree contacts. Users can set their profiles to be seen only by their network members or by Hi5 users in general. While Hi5 is not particalarly popular in the U.S., it has a large user base in parts of Asia, Latin America and Central Africa. LinkedIn was founded in 2003 and was one of the first mainstream social networks devoted to business. Originally, LinkedIn allowed users to post a profile (basically a resume) and to interact through private messaging. They also work on the assumption that you should personally know the people you connect with on the site. MySpace was founded in 2003 and by 2006 had grown to be the most popular social network in the world. MySpace differentiated itself from competitors by allowing users to completely customize the look of their profiles. Users could also post music from artists on MySpace and embed videos from other sites on their profiles. While Facebook started out as a Harvard-only social network back in 2004, it quickly expanded to other schools, then to high schools, businesses and eventually everyone (by 2006). In 2008 Facebook became the most popular social networking site, surpassing MySpace, and continues to grow. Multiply, a “family-friendly” social network and media sharing site was established in 2004 and puts much more emphasis on security and privacy than many other networks. Multiply users have the option to set security levels on each item they post, making things public, network-only, or invite-only. Orkut, launched in January 2004, is Google’s social network, and while it’s not particularly popular in the U.S., it’s very popular in Brazil and India, with more than 65 million users. Orkut lets users share media, status updates, and communicate through IM. Kontain, which launched in 2008, works a bit differently than many social networks, putting the focus on usability and allowing users to follow each other through photos, videos, and music, rather than just simple status updates. They also actively recruit businesses to sign up, promoting their service as a way to connect with customers. As social networking grew, niche sites began cropping up for specific interest groups. There are now social networks for virtually every hobby, passion, interest, industry and group that you could imagine. Ning is a platform for creating niche social networks. Networks are hosted by Ning but can take on their own personality and can even pay to have their own branding instead of the Ning brand. New users can either create social networks for any niche they choose or join any of more than 1.5 million existing networks. With the growth of social web usage in households, there are so many other social websites that we would be all day listing them all. Social web has evolved to become the main tool of communication used on a daily basis. As stated by Cindy King of SocialMediaExaminer.com, “What used to be simply Facebook and Twitter is now Google+, LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter (and who knows what’s next). On top of this, you have many specialty networks like Foursquare, Yelp and Instagram”, there is a plethora of social sites to choose from. Leach said, “Social networks are gold mines for finding sources”. (Quill; Jan/Feb2008, Vol. 96 Issue 1, p24-26, 3p). I am excited to see where the next phase of social web phenomenon takes society with its progression in the years to come.

References
Bowles, M. D. (2010). Introduction to computer literacy. San Diego, CA: Bridgepoint Education, Inc.
30 Social Media Predictions for 2012 from the Pros | Social Media Examiner. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/30-social-media-predictions-for-2012-from-the-pros/
Top 15 Most Popular Social Networking Sites. (n.d.) Retrieved from http://www.ebizmba.com/articles/social-networking-websites
Socialnomics09. (2009, September 27). Social media revolution [Video file]. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NhPgUcjGQAw Brooks, K. J. (2008, February 14). Social Networking Sites. Retrieved from http://web.ebscohost.com.proxy-library.ashford.edu/lrc/detail?vid=6&sid=f2a6e780-4d5e-484e-8124-9b22c662c05d%40sessionmgr11&hid=10&bdata=JnNpdGU9bHJjLXBsdXM%3d#db=lkh&AN=29415663

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