Has the influx of Social Based Sites hit critical Mass?
Over the course of the past year or so, social media based sites have exploded and taken over what was then known as the internet. Social based sites took the power away from major conglomerates and placed it within the hands of the individual. The time has finally come where the individual has an opinion that can’t be ignored. In 2007, 38% of all people used some form of social network and that percentage is suppose to double in 2008.
Last week I had the pleasure to make the Social Networking Conference held in Miami Beach Fl, which I will go into more detail about very soon. The reason I reference this is due to the amount of individuals whose main concern was that there are too many social based sites and it’s saturating the market place. It is true there is a massive growth in the number of social based sites. You can see a pretty detailed list of social and web 2.0 based sites at go2web20.net. I currently haven’t seen the bottom of the list yet, but I am trying.
The interesting thing to note here is many of these social based sites are becoming very niche. The day of Digg and Facebook knockoffs are coming to a close, and as time goes on these social based sites will have a very specific subject matter. What does this mean? It means the amount of people actively involved in these communities will be much smaller but the involvement level will rise.
To answer the question I purposed at the beginning of this article. Has the influx of social based sites hit critical mass? The answer is no but, the time of newly developed general social based sites has. The sites that make it will have understood the need to be more focused and provide their users with someone that will add some real utility to their online experience.
