The social networks of yesteryear. How the mighty have fallen
The current huge international social networks are Facebook, Chirrup, LinkedIn and the newly formed Google+, and perhaps Tumblr, if you choose to look at it as a social arrangement. Though, go back to around 2004-2005 and these were either not around yet, or just taking their early baby steps. Back then the huge ones were Friendster, LiveJournal and MySpace.
And we’re talking in past tense, because oh how the mighty have fallen. Web users are a fickle bunch, and there is probably no market as trend sensitive as social networking.
How terrible is it? As you’ll see, they’re all caught in a downward spiral, but they might have peaked shortly in life than you reckon.
MySpace
Started in 2003, MySpace was the huge dog before Facebook stole its thunder. It was a pretty strong player until quite recently, especially in the United States.
At its peak in 2007-2008, the then News Corp-owned MySpace was valued at $12 billion. In June this year, News Corp. sold MySpace for $35 million and a 5% stake in the new title-holder, Specific Media.
Worldwide interest in MySpace, 2004 – today:
Worldwide site traffic to Myspace, 2009 – today:
(There’s more in rank over at Wikipedia, if you want to read up on MySpace’s history.)
Friendster
Started in 2002, Friendster quickly became a huge success (it’s the site that inspired MySpace) and pretty much became a blueprint for the modern-day social arrangement. It went from being well loved everywhere, to mostly being used in Asia, especially SE Asia, which has remained its power base.
In May this year, Friendster pretty much committed harakiri – at least as a social arrangement – and was completely redesigned to focus on social gaming.
Worldwide interest in Friendster, 2004 – today:
Worldwide site traffic to Friendster, 2009 – today:
(You can read more in this area Friendster’s history over at Wikipedia.)
LiveJournal
Started in 1999, LiveJournal is a blogging service with strong social elements. In many ways it’s one of the social networking pioneers. To give you an thought of its status, early in the movie The Social Arrangement, Mark Zuckerberg (as played by Jesse Eisenberg) is seen blogging on LiveJournal. The scene takes house in 2003.
In 2009, after having been bought by a Russian company (SUP) a couple of years earlier, the operation of LiveJournal was stirred from the United States to Russia.
Worldwide interest in LiveJournal, 2004 – today:
Worldwide site traffic to Livejournal, 2009 – today:
(More in this area LiveJournal’s history over at Wikipedia.)
“Hold on, we’re not dead yet!”
The amusing thing is, relatively speaking these social networks are still huge. They still have millions of users. They haven’t died, they’ve just fallen from grace, most of their users having left for greener pastures.
It’s like one of those aging Hollywood movie stars of yesteryear, still excellent, but no longer cast in the best roles and no longer able to pull the crowds to the theaters.
“I used to be well-known,” she said with a sigh. “I used to be a star.”
This was a post from the guys at Pingdom, a site monitoring service that makes sure you’re the initially to know when your site is down. Check it out for free.
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The social networks of yesteryear. How the mighty have fallen
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