Rise of Social Networking Sites

When was the last time you viewed and updated your profile on Facebook, Friendster, LinkedIn, or MySpace?

Probably, a few minutes after you started working? Or before you finished your first cup of coffee for the day?

Yes, you are probably connected! — To your friends from high school and college. To your relatives and family inside and outside the Philippines. And even to total strangers with the same interests, beliefs, and lifestyles. Through social networking sites (SNS) this connection is made wider, easier, and faster. And best of all, these sites come with free space for photos, blogs, videos and music.

Remember classmates.com? Launched in 1995, this was one of the first social networking sites. This website (http://www.classmates.com) helped users locate and connect with classmates around the US.

Xanga, another popular SNS started in 1999. It begun as a site for sharing book and music reviews. Now, it has an estimated 40 million users called Xangans. I started my Xanga site in 2004 when I was still in Vietnam, blogging mostly about life and work in a foreign country. Xanga allowed me to connect to other Filipinos living outside the country.

According to Universal McCann’s Wave2 Global Research (March 2007), 194 million people around the globe manage a profile in a social networking site. There are hundreds of social networking sites that include Bebo, Facebook, Friendster, Hi5, LinkedIn, MySpace, Tagged, TakingITGlobal, etc.

Bebo? That simply means, “Blog early, blog often?”

Have you heard of sosyalan.com? This is Pinoy-centric networking site launched in June 2007. After its first six months, it recorded 50,000 users. “Now, it reaches 200,000 Filipinos worldwide,” according to Tom Pestano, its founder. He added that his site is focused on the 4Fs of social networking: flame, fun, friendship, family.

Filipinos lead in Friendster

Launched in 2003, Friendster is the most popular SNS among Filipinos! The site has 63 million registered users. According to internetworldstats.com, there are 12.2 million Filipinos on Friendster. Guess, that includes you? And I.

According to www.alexa.com, the top five Internet sites in the Philippines are Friendster, Yahoo, YouTube, Google and Multiply.

“If you look at the top 20 sites on the web today, you’ll notice that about 30 to 40 percent of them are social networking or social media sites, this wasn’t the case just 5 years ago, said Jeff Roberto, Friendster’s marketing director. “The social networking space is still evolving and we’ll continue to see growth here.”

This growth has led many social networking sites to cater to specific countries and cultures.

You can read this full article in the Manila Times (Tech Section)