Communication has always played a major role in determining the level of happiness and satisfaction one might have.
By having frequent communication with others, one would also be able to increase the level of awareness over his/her surroundings.
Communication itself comes in many different forms.
From the basic of having a face-to-face conversation, through emails or even giving each other a buzz on the phone are a few to mention ways about how we communicate.
In this modern society we are in, the Internet has established a name for itself as a place filled with information, alternatively, it has also been able to evolved itself to becoming an effective channel for communication purposes.
Reminiscing over fond memories of my experience using the Internet, it brings me more than just times when I will spend many hours online searching for information and data, facing the good old CRT to the change into LCD monitor, but also being equipped with the ability to catch up with my old lost friends whom accompanied me through my childhood times, relatives and even at times, my siblings through communicating via the Internet.
Skype, Microsoft Instant Messenger and Yahoo Messenger are software which is commonly used in this era of Internet-Savvy time for communication purposes.
At the start of the 20th century, Social Networking websites started to surface into the Internet.
Social Networking Websites have soon become a part and parcel of a netizen daily lifestyle. I personally was not spared from this Networking craze.
These software are able to achieve success in the current market is mainly due to its ability to allow its user to break through the geographical boundaries connecting and bringing the whole world nearer to him/her.
Whenever I reflect back on my experience with the Internet, I fondly remembered my first encounter over communication software was by using the Internet Relay Chat (IRC).
Through IRC, I was then introduced to the first Social Networking Website which I have signed on with, MySpace.
Under a state of novelty, I was impressed with MySpace.
Uploading photos, letting the account user to key several descriptions linked to their account allowing viewers to know more about himself/herself, ability to browse through the wide range of profiles available for viewing and the chance of potentially getting to know more friends are some of the functionalities which I thought is something really fun to have.
By having frequent communication with others, one would also be able to increase the level of awareness over his/her surroundings.
Communication itself comes in many different forms.
From the basic of having a face-to-face conversation, through emails or even giving each other a buzz on the phone are a few to mention ways about how we communicate.
In this modern society we are in, the Internet has established a name for itself as a place filled with information, alternatively, it has also been able to evolved itself to becoming an effective channel for communication purposes.
Reminiscing over fond memories of my experience using the Internet, it brings me more than just times when I will spend many hours online searching for information and data, facing the good old CRT to the change into LCD monitor, but also being equipped with the ability to catch up with my old lost friends whom accompanied me through my childhood times, relatives and even at times, my siblings through communicating via the Internet.
Skype, Microsoft Instant Messenger and Yahoo Messenger are software which is commonly used in this era of Internet-Savvy time for communication purposes.
At the start of the 20th century, Social Networking websites started to surface into the Internet.
Social Networking Websites have soon become a part and parcel of a netizen daily lifestyle. I personally was not spared from this Networking craze.
These software are able to achieve success in the current market is mainly due to its ability to allow its user to break through the geographical boundaries connecting and bringing the whole world nearer to him/her.
Whenever I reflect back on my experience with the Internet, I fondly remembered my first encounter over communication software was by using the Internet Relay Chat (IRC).
Through IRC, I was then introduced to the first Social Networking Website which I have signed on with, MySpace.
Under a state of novelty, I was impressed with MySpace.
Uploading photos, letting the account user to key several descriptions linked to their account allowing viewers to know more about himself/herself, ability to browse through the wide range of profiles available for viewing and the chance of potentially getting to know more friends are some of the functionalities which I thought is something really fun to have.
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But, as time goes on, due to the lack of participation from my peers with the application, I soon distanced myself away from it.
Though MySpace have received widely a success in the United States industry, as shown on “Analysis: Friendster, Facebook, MySpace, and Xanga.com”, it failed to attract most of the Asian communities alike, at the very least, my friends and I.
As understood from various sources from the Internet, it was shown that most of the account holders with MySpace are mainly in their 30s to 40s. The data of the extract can be further outlined at this site.
Back then, at the age of about 16, turning 17, my preference was to getting myself acquainted with people of my age group, therefore, this clearly wasn’t much of a place where I can achieve what I was looking for.
As a result, it didn’t took me long to realise that I have plainly forgotten about my existence in MySpace.
However, the experience with MySpace opened up a whole new dimension on the benefits of the Social Networking Website from a different perspective.
Soon enough, Friendster came along.
To be frank, the moment I started out with Friendster, I was simply hooked with it.
It was such a success that most of my friends have an account with them.
Besides having almost all the features which MySpace have, it has additional functions which put it on a plus in my user experience with it.
I could spend countless of hours online just to read through my friends’ profiles. By doing so, I was able to gain a substantial amount of information which could help me in getting to know my friends much better.
Besides getting to know each of my existing friends better, I could also search for new friends using the “Search” function.
Though MySpace have received widely a success in the United States industry, as shown on “Analysis: Friendster, Facebook, MySpace, and Xanga.com”, it failed to attract most of the Asian communities alike, at the very least, my friends and I.
As understood from various sources from the Internet, it was shown that most of the account holders with MySpace are mainly in their 30s to 40s. The data of the extract can be further outlined at this site.
Back then, at the age of about 16, turning 17, my preference was to getting myself acquainted with people of my age group, therefore, this clearly wasn’t much of a place where I can achieve what I was looking for.
As a result, it didn’t took me long to realise that I have plainly forgotten about my existence in MySpace.
However, the experience with MySpace opened up a whole new dimension on the benefits of the Social Networking Website from a different perspective.
Soon enough, Friendster came along.
To be frank, the moment I started out with Friendster, I was simply hooked with it.
It was such a success that most of my friends have an account with them.
Besides having almost all the features which MySpace have, it has additional functions which put it on a plus in my user experience with it.
I could spend countless of hours online just to read through my friends’ profiles. By doing so, I was able to gain a substantial amount of information which could help me in getting to know my friends much better.
Besides getting to know each of my existing friends better, I could also search for new friends using the “Search” function.
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Whenever I enter a profile randomly, I am able to utilise functionality tools like “How you’re connected” to know how many “hops” I am away from the person I am viewing.
This function has never fail to impress me in getting to know that the world is pretty small in proximity with the network of friends I have.
But, things don’t go well always.
It was back in 2007 that Friendster starts to decline in popularity among its users.
I was greatly affected by it too. There are many reasons that contribute to it.
Brazen spamming has become a common sight and is a major problem in Friendster.
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Frustration fills me up whenever I received such spamming comments in my profile.
Whenever I log onto my account, I will receive more than 2 spamming messages either to my Inbox or, my comment page. It then soon became more of a nuisance than promoting Social Networking.
Even with many outraging complains, the administrative team at Friendster failed to address this problem swiftly enough, thus, causing much resentment within its users.
Besides the spamming spree, Friendster’s basic functionalities start to fail too.
Uploading of photos became a hassle as connection between the server and I would fail unexpectedly in frequent basis.
The number of photos that can be uploaded into the profile is also limited.(Of course they(Friendster) have changed its stand by increasing the limits.)
As such, the usability of the site went on to it’s lowest ever since its inception.
While these problems persisted, Facebook, another Social Networking website, surfaced into the scene.
Facebook has got the basic functionalities of both MySpace and Friendster.
In fact, it is more than just a Social Networking Website.
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Facebook not only allowed Interaction between its account users, it also gave more than that.
Game applications were introduced, which were relatively new from the traditional Social Networking sites available back then, to increase its level of entertainment value.
I would say that such a move soon sufficed to becoming one of the major reasons on its rapid growth.
Besides having gaming applications available, Facebook also supported the Instant Messaging ability.
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In my opinion, the three main functionalities I have talked about, Games, Instant Chat Messenger & Social Networking applications, are the main attraction to its current audiences.
To summarize the whole reflection, functionalities and popularity are two bundled important aspects to become a successful Social Networking website.
It is quite evident to conclude that Facebook is much well-received in this area as compared with the other two sites which I have mentioned.
What about you?
References:
http://asia.cnet.com/blogs/shopablogic/post.htm?id=63000050 - (Facebook) vs Friendster
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facebook - Wiki, Facebook
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MySpace - Wiki, MySpace
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friendster - Wiki, Friendster
http://web2.sys-con.com/node/282142 - Friendster, Facebook, MySpace and Xanga.com
http://versusanything.com/friendster-versus-facebook/ - Friendster vs Facebook
http://temasekpoly.wordpress.com/2008/01/07/friendster-vs-facebook/ - Friendster VS Facebook
http://www.friendster.com/forums/post/list/11/812/page/0 - Forum comments on Facebook and Friendster
http://www.web-strategist.com/blog/2008/01/09/social-network-stats-facebook-myspace-reunion-jan-2008/ - Jeremiah Owyang
Regards,
Aaron(41800025)
1 comment:
I admit that games are what attract me to social websites such as Facebook. Especially the Developer application, which allowed users to develop their own applications. Instant messaging I found to be annoying at times and didn’t use it as much. Overall, it was it was a good reflection, especially with your comments on spamming and negligence with Myspace.
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