The Rise and Fall of Friendster and the expansion of Social Media

After the central characteristics for Social Media were developed, it was only a matter of time until large masses of people began to flock these sites. The first major site to breakthrough to the mainstream was Friendster in 2003. Here are the facts:

1. Friendster started in 2002
2. Gained popularity through 3 main groups (Bloggers, the Burning Man arts festival attendees and gay men)
3. By May 2003 it had 300 000 users all from WOM (Word-of-Mouth)
4. Media coverage began and number grew exponentially

Downfall of Friendster

Despite this breakthrough, Friendster soon lost their fan base after a series of mishaps and miscalculations hampered the usability of their site. Consider:

Scalability
The infrastructure was weak and ill-equipped to handle an influx of visitors. Friendster experienced technical difficulties, annoying users and loosing members.

Limiting User Interactions
The site allowed users to connect with others through only 4 degrees of separation.

Insulting Users
Friendster took off their “Most Popular” tool which allowed users to connect with other individuals that they didn’t personally know. All this came about because the users were limited (4 degrees of separation) and were looking for ways to view additional profiles. The “Most Popular” tool allowed them to see profiles of interesting people. A trend of adding friends came about. The people who had the most friends were fictional/fake accounts (Fakesters), which the majority of the community enjoyed surfing. The fake accounts outraged the company. They reacted by deleting the “Most Popular” tool and all the fake accounts. Unfortunately, they also deleted real accounts (for example: if your profile picture was a flower, you were deleted!). The users were upset because it seemed as if the company did not share the users’ interests.

At the same time that Friendster was fading in North America, it started to become popular in the Philippines, Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia.

While Friendster has faded away from Western users, it still has a considerable appeal in South Asia, demonstrating the resiliency of Social Media when forced to cope with market changes and local competition. There is an entire international market that can be explored and developed on.

2003 Onward: Silicon Valley vs. MySpace

After Friendster, many more Social Media sites emerged either trying to emulate its early success or catering to very specific demographics. For example:

• ‘Passion-centric’ sites like Dogster, MyChurch and others connected users with specific interests.
• Business and corporate oriented networks took root on sites like LinkedIn, Visible Path and Xing.

Meanwhile, venture capitalists sought to make sites that would appeal to a mass market. Microsoft developed Windows Live Spaces and Google had Orkut. Neither took off impressively in North America but found wide audiences elsewhere.

Social Media would truly explode with the founding of MySpace, which was originally intended to pick up users after the collapse of Friendster and allow them to re-establish their existing networks. Upon hearing rumours of Friendster adopting a fee-based membership program, many users organized to jump ship together, leading to a successful jumpstart for MySpace.

Bands and record labels in California quickly took notice of the service and used it to promote new music and concert dates, often offering giveaways and exclusive content.

“Bands were not the sole source of MySpace growth, but the symbiotic relationship between bands and fans helped MySpace expand beyond former Friendster users. The bands-and-fans dynamic was mutually beneficial: Bands wanted to be able to contact fans, while fans desired attention from their favorite bands and used Friend connections to signal identity and affiliation”. (Source: Social Network Sites: Definition, History, and Scholarship).

Also pivotal to the success of MySpace was the inclusion of user-demanded features. To keep the experience fresh and engaging, the website allowed users to edit their pages with HTML code and even display their own images and designs.

This personalized element became one of last driving forces in the development of the Social Media culture. It has become all about sharing yourself in the most dynamic and interesting way possible. Even with a basic template, users themselves could create a whole new ‘space’ for themselves, making their online environments inviting with minimal restrictions.

Stay tuned for A Brief History of Social Media - Part 3, where we discuss the social phenomenon that is Facebook and the beginnings of Social Media Marketing.

So what have you learned so far about the origins of Social Media that you can take into practicing SMM? Leave your thoughts in the comment section below!