Vertical Social Networks

May 13th, 2007
Big or Bullshit: Vertical Social Networks by David Cohen

"...So what happens when there are just too many social sites for a regular guy deal with? Perhaps we’ll see the emergence of social aggregators and the centralization of identity and trust (these last things need to happen anyway). You see some examples already. Sites like Profilactic, SocialURL and soon, we hear, the much anticipated product from Jared Polis’s new company Confluence Commons are trying to help by aggregating existing social content. But as these social networks proliferate, one thing that would be incredibly helpful would be a “write once, use many” centralized user profile. I would love to see OpenID go in this direction (or someone leveraging OpenID) by allowing users to create their base profile in one place rather than having to constantly enter it into every network they want to check out. Tools like these will abound, and the key is that these tools should be in a unique position to truly understand each users preferences, affinities, and social webs. This may even be the way that the attention economy initially develops: rather than getting users to volunteer their click-streams, it’s far easier to simply study what they’re already telling you.

I don’t believe that MySpace, Bebo, and FaceBook have yet fully harnessed the profile information freely offered by their users for laser targeted advertising, but they will. If you believe that, just imagine for a second what the aggregators can do! Of course, they’ll need the users, but I believe that there are enough benefits to users in this scenario that they’ll flock to the aggregators.

When I think about what’s likely to happen, I think that the vertical social networks will proliferate and become a useful part of the web. But in terms of their potential as an investment - I guess I’ll have to call Bullshit. Look to the aggregators and the toolsets that emerge around identity - I think that will be Big.

We’ll know what Brad thinks soon. But pick a limb and come hang out with me. What do you think about vertical social networks?"

http://coloradostartups.com/2007/05/13/big-or-bullshit-vertical-social-networks/#comments

I think David is right on for the most part and that aggregators will have most of the true opportunities for "BIG" but there will be specific brands that will come out of the vertical social networks that will also be "BIG" simply because of certain founders involved. Thanks David for mentioning SocialURL on ColoradoStartups.com