I am sure that all of you out there remember the movie Ferris Bueller's Day Off, but how many of you remember Friendster? There are probably not as many of you that remember Friendster, but those of you that do probably have fond memories of it. In fact, you are probably still a member. How many of you remember seeing MySpace for the first time after having been a member of Friendster for a while and thinking, "sure, this site does cool things, but man is it ugly!".Here are some interesting facts about Friendster that I was not aware of:
- Friendster currently has 75MM users worldwide
- Friendster is the number one social network in Asia
- Friendster is the 9th largest website in the world with 22.1 billion page views a month
Friendster is not dead! In fact, today Friendster made a big annoucement.
Friendster has announced it has deployed the OpenSocial standard application programming interfaces (APIs) as part of the Friendster Developer Program. The fact that Friendster has lasted as long as it has tells me one thing; it is not about the platform, it is about the people.
Many of us who used Friendster connected with old friends and family, that is what made it great. Sure, you can do the same thing on Facebook, and yes they may do a better job. Still, at the end of the day it is the social connections that make the platform meaningful.
Ben Stein, take it away!