As I stated in an earlier post, I believe that 2008 will usher in the age of the personal social network. Every method of online communication (email, bulletin boards, instant messaging, blogs, etcetera) has had that initial period where only the early adopters used it and then it suddenly gained widespread exposure and exploded into use. This next year will be when that happens to personal social networks.
The real question, though, is WHY would you want your own personal social network? Or, why would you join a personal social network? The reason is because they provide a new tool to facilitate the gathering of a smaller, niche group of people. We have always had these niche groups. Families are a niche group of people. The company you work for is a niche group of people. Your artist friends are a niche group of people.
A personal social network uses the technology of the web to help form these niche groups of people and then help them communicate easily.
Let’s look at an example.
There is a small group of painters that get together once a month to talk about what they are doing and learn from each other. They are all watercolor painters and they usually each bring a recent painting and share techniques, etcetera. They all have friends that would love to join the group, but a lot of these friends do not live nearby. They decide to form their own online social network and invite all of their friends.
Now anyone can join the group and easily share with anyone else. They can form sub-groups that are based on location or interest or anything else they can think of. They can easily stay caught up on what everyone else is doing and easily set up their in-person meetings. They can hold live, online meetings or they can make them time-delayed so anyone can contribute at a time that works best for them. There are many different ways that people can communicate through social networks and therein lies their real power.