Moveable Type and Wordpress are both touting new “social networking” features for future releases. The question is: does anyone care? Do people really want to start their own social networking sites around their blog? From what I can tell, these are attempts to add features that will generate media buzz, not features that will get users excited about the product. I could certainly be wrong, though. What do you think?
http://realtech.burningbird.net/web/networks/creating-social-networks-nobody-wants
001 // Matt Wilcox // 08.17.2008 // 12 PM
I’m having a hard time understanding the point. Mainly because I just don’t understand how ‘social network’ marries to a personal blog. To me it’s like having a square block and a round hole. Surely a blog is about talking your piece under one URL. Surely the only discourse or social feature required or even plausible given the focus of a blog is a conversation with readers about the topics you post - which is what comment threads are for.
How can there be a cohesive ‘social network’ based around the on-line thoughts of a single person? Why would you turn your blog into a place where people can sign up and have profile pages of their own? Or am i thinking of a personal blog too much as a filing system for ‘my content’ rather than a ‘pseudo-location’ for friends to visit?
I suppose this is a bit like personal sites of old. Mine used to have my blog (with comments), a gallery (no comments), and some forums where old buddies all hung out and chatted. I wouldn’t have called it a social network though. Throwing in member pages and a forum does not a social network make.
002 // Kyle Neath // 08.17.2008 // 11:19 PM
I don’t really know MT’s goals (as I just don’t follow that group), but as for Wordpress’ social-network venture (http://buddypress.org/), it’s not really the idea of creating a social network around a blog. It’s more the idea of creating a social network platform that bases itself on Wordpress’ codebase.
Think of it this way: Wordpress -> Wordpress MU (i.e. wordpress.com) -> BuddyPress.
I can easily see turning a site like wordpress.com into a social network — a group of people writing blogs on their own, but interacting with each other via the platform. Almost like newsvine does with each person having their own column (blog), and social networking features on top of that.
003 // Jeff Croft // 08.21.2008 // 11:09 AM
That definitely makes more sense, Kyle. Thanks!