Google arbejder iflg. New York Times på at gøre alle dets produkter og servicer sociale. Men kritikere mener måske ikke, at Google har det rigtige DNA til helt at forstå den sociale grafs betydning.

“Google’s culture is very much based on the power of the algorithm, and it’s very difficult to algorithm social interaction,” Ms. (Charlene) Li said.

Ping Upgrade

Apple har tilføjet en ny feature til dets sociale netværk Ping, således at brugeren nu kan kommunikere og anbefale musik direkte fra deres ipod istedet for at gå til Ping. Men skriver Cnet: "But most important is that Ping lives in a gated suburb that most of your friends never visit. If Apple is really serious about social, then it has to find a way to integrate Ping with Facebook, Twitter, and the rest of the networks your pals are already using. My hunch is that we'll see that eventually."

Facebook Dollars

NYT har i dag en artikel om, at Facebook har indført en virtuel valuta for dets 50 mio. "indbyggere", som man kan bruge til at købe spil etc. med. Men den nye valuta har måske endnu flere muligheder.

“If they can get 50 million registered credit cards, why wouldn’t they use them to pay for your newspaper subscription?” said Alex Rampell, the chief executive of TrialPay, an advertising company that offers free Facebook Credits to people who buy certain products."

Google vs. Facebook

I en notits i NYT forklarer Eric Schmidt fra Google uoverensstemmelserne mellem Google og Facebook. Her hedder det bl.a.: "Mr. Schmidt gave a few updates on those conflicts and rivalries, as well as some others. Expect to see social tools from Google this fall, he said, but do not expect a brand new social network. Instead, Google will add social components to its core products.
He and other Google executives were not shy about needling Facebook for making it difficult for Google to import social information. Upon signing up for Facebook, people can import their Google contacts, but it does not work the other way around, Jonathan Rosenberg, senior vice president of product management, noted.
“The best thing that would happen is Facebook would open up its network and we’d use that information to improve our ads and our search,” Mr. Schmidt said. “Failing that, there are other ways in which we can get that information, which is what we’re working on.”

Alternativ til Facebook

Open-source projektet Diaspora, der er et "folkeligt" alternativ til Facebook, har lavet nogle fornyelser på dets side, således at det bedre kan konkurrere med Facebook, omend en af disse fornyelser består i, at brugerne nu kan integrere deres Facebook-aktivitet med Diaspora. Men det folkelige projekt bryder sig ikke om Facebook. På dets blok hedder det således: "While Facebook helps the whole digitalized world to keep in touch, it suffers from severe security and privacy issues and is run by a monopolist that designs (and must design, by its nature) the platform's future based on profit-oriented goals."

Social Medier på film

Den 1. okt. kommer Facebook-historien på film under titlen "The Social Network" med bl.a Justin Timberlake

Asociale medier

På IDEA Labs blog-side beklager Dan Schulz sig over at sociale medier generelt er temmelige asociale, han skriver flg.:

"I'm sure you've heard people talk about the ego-centric nature of today's social media, which tend to focus on one-to-one and one-to-many communication. Not only does the spotlight on the individual create an unappealing blend of "often boring" and "always noisy," but it also makes it essentially impossible to facilitate real community. In fact, even the systems that are designed for groups leave much to be desired."

Han har desudne lavet en graf, der viser, hvilke sociale medier, der er mest ego-centreret og hvilke der er mest globale, se øverst.