Why friendster is not as popular as facebook or myspace?

I wonder why? Because friendster is one of the earliest social networking site. However, in most of the countries, it's not as popular as the other like facebook and myspace.

Although friendster is still the most popular social networking site in Malaysia but I can see a lot of my friends in Malaysia starting to use facebook. I can see facebook taking over in near time.

I've found this during the search for the answer, it is taken from Crunch base.

Founded in 2002, Friendster is one of the web’s older social networking services. Adults, 18 and up can join and connect with friends, family, school, groups, activities and interests. The site currently has over 50 million users.

It’s rumored that Google offered $30M to buy Friendster in 2003 (when the company looked very promising), but was turned down. Things have somewhat changed since then though. Friendster failed to become what MySpace and Facebook are today largely because of its inability to scale with the growing demand. Since 2004, Friendster has gone through five different CEOs.

Friendster was the 2007 recipient of the Webware 100 Award for best community site. The company has also been granted a number of social networking focused patents.

Inability to scale with the growing demand (means that their server or architecture can't afford to serve their growing user) is the main reason according to CrunchBase.

Lesson that I've learn: First mover advantages is not always there, technology have to keep on updating and they need to listen to market trends. New comer can overcome the first player easily by taking advantages of their inability.

Twitter is also having the same problem right now (a lot of down time due to scalability), will Twitter able to overcome this and not become the second friendster?

Technology in Plain English

I love these video, they explain technology or term in very interesting way (plain english?). I think every grandfather and grandmother will understand technology after watching this. :-P These videos are produced by commoncraft.com


If you wonder, what is social media? How to use social media or social networking? Here you go: Social Media in Plain English.


If you want to know what is rss? What I can do with rss? How can I use rss? Here you go: RSS in plain english.



Even wonder what is wiki all about? How wiki is created? What you can do with wiki? Here it is: wiki in plain english.


Don't know what is twitter? Why is everybody using twitter now? What is the different between twitter and blog? Here you go: Twitter in plain english.


What is blog? What is the definition of blog? Why blog is a personal news station? Here: Blog in Plain English.


How to organize your bookmark? Why use bookmarking can be social? What is the benefit of social bookmarking? How to start your social bookmarking? Social Bookmarking in Plain English


Social Networking in Plain English


Have you ever lost your digital photo when your computer crash? How online photo sharing can help this? How to easily organize your photo? Why online photo sharing has become the social media? Go go go: Online Photo Sharing in Plain English


What is podcasting? Why iPod owner love podcasting? Why podcasting is the personal radio station with on demand features? Find out here: Podcasting in Plain English


What is Google docs? Why use Google docs? How to collaborate documents on the new? Yeah! Go here: Google docs in Plain English


Why you need PR Web to market your new ideas or product? How to make use of PR Web to increase visibility of your news? Why PR Web? Here: PR Web in Plain English


Last but not least. Our own Malaysian mobile operator Maxis advertisements on flickr mobile in plain english. Enjoy!

Photoshop on the web? Splashup

Ever wanted to edit your image when you are using a public computer where your favorite photo editing software is not around?

Have a look on Splashup. Splashup offer an online photo editing tools that mimic photoshop in terms of interface, but of course it offers much less than the powerful photoshop.

You don't need registration to test out the application, just click on the "Jump right In" image on the home page. I expected the Splashup application to take a longer time to load, but it does load quite fast to my surprise.

Here are my result using Splashup and webcam image capture capability offer by them.



Other than the photo editing capabilities, such as basic tools, layering, filter, crop, resize.. etc. Splashup also offer various ways to save your image. Including saving to:

• Your own hard drive
• Picasa
• Flickr
• Facebook
  

The experience of using it is quite fun, I almost forgot that I am using a web application, I feel like I am using a desktop application. The down side of this is it doesn't support right click and keyboard shortcut, but what can you ask more. This can be very useful, especially when I'm on travel and need to upload and edit some photo.

Give it a try!

Malaysian Own Chat Widget/Shoutbox !!

I've just installed a shoutbox on my blog. It's called shoutmix, and more importantly it's a Award Winning Malaysian made widget.

I've been selecting among few chat widget to install, namely meebo, cbox, shoutmix, plugoo, zoho chat.

• cbox - this is the first one that I found, the website looks too simple to me. So I proceed to find the next alternative.
• plugoo - I thinks it looks promising, because it can link to my IM, I installed with linked to my gtalk. But after I tested, it's more a IM than shoutbox, I wanted the message to left on my blog instead.
• zoho chat - So, I move on to the next this one. Anyway, I don't like it because it needs visitor to put in their name first before posting and looking at previous post. I prefer those allow direct put in name and chat.
• meebo & shoutmix - meebo and shoutmix is the last two options for me. I choose shoutmix mainly because it's made by Malaysian, but it does offer all the features that I need. Simple interface, shoutbox (that stored previous message), fast loading time.

So, please leave your message there, I will definitely reply you.

Google is connecting your friends

Google is bringing social networking to another level, where you can have Myspace, Facebook, hi5, orkut, Plaxo...etc on your own website (without any programming).

Look at the video on how it functions.



I've already send in the request to be one of the early preview user. Hope that they will approve my request. I will share with you on this blog, once I have it.