Year of the Social Network: 2006 or 2007?

News Corp's buyout of Intermix (parent company of Myspace.com) started a ball rolling toward large-scale acceptance of social networks. Of course, Myspace already had a significant following, but News Corp has done a remarkable job of just letting the site be. Even Myspace.com/Foxnews hasn't been moderated - it's still a spoof page of Rupert Murdoch, who's "Who I'd Like to Meet" section describes "People with a master's degree in journalism, who aren't affraid to take some orders from the top, or bend the truth to suit my needs and desires." News Corp, regardless of your opinion of their other ventures, has left Myspace more or less to it's own devices.
So with 2006 winding down, I'm wondering if we're saying goodbye to the year of the social network, or saying hello to a fresh new one. I've already talked a little about Affiliate Marketing on Squidoo, which represents a cross between a DIY website and a social network. Yahoo has tried (relatively unsuccessfully) to build out it's Yahoo 360 pages. Microsoft, a latecomer to the social networking party, is beta testing it's Wallop social network. Another new social networking application is emerging as well called Ning. Ning is a great opportunity for socially-inclined affiliate marketers because you can change the source code of the page, all while running the Ning social networking application in the background (so you can add friends' lists, for instance). Unlike Myspace or 360, and likely Wallop, Ning encourages users to place their own ads on their site, be it Google Adsense or raw affiliate links.
Social networking platforms are slowly learning that people contributing content to a platform would like the ability to have a piece of that success. I doubt Squidoo and Ning will be the only companies to invent social networking profit sharing.
I feel pretty confident that for all the strides that were made in 2006 in the social networking realm, 2007 will emerge with a new wave of impressive social networking opportunities.
Keep a close eye on the very well funded Demand Media। It is run by former Intermix CEO Richard Rosenblatt (who was the critical link for the Myspace / News Corp acquisition). It's received over $100 million of funding. It's acquiring smaller niche content providers (including eHow.com where I was on the initial development team back in 1998) as well as technology solutions to manage social networks. I get the feeling Mr. Rosenblatt is planning on rolling out something significant, which may affect thousands of affiliate marketers overnight.

News Corp's buyout of Intermix (parent company of Myspace.com) started a ball rolling toward large-scale acceptance of social networks. Of course, Myspace already had a significant following, but News Corp has done a remarkable job of just letting Read More...