From Current.TV, a new Supernews cartoon about a guy struggling with his addiction to social networking. Myspace, Facebook, Friendster and Second Life mustn’t be ignored!

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AOL has acquired social networking site Bebo for $850 million in cash. AOL CEO Randy Falco (left in picture) sent an email to all AOL employees this morning. Allen Stern’s press call notes are here. (TechCrunch) read more

Apparently, the unresolved question of AOL’s ability to effectively monetize Bebo’s audience via customized ads (based on behavioral data) centers around patented technology purportedly owned by Modavox Inc.  With over a billion dollars spent on their new business model, AOL seems to still not be in control of this vital element. Stay tuned.

What Does Social Networking Do For You? If you can’t answer that quickly and calmly, here’s your chance to gain some clarity personally, as well as helping social networkers in general!

…the first comprehensive survey of how people use social networks to manage personal and professional relationships. Are social networks delivering the value you expected when you joined? Whether you use social networks for business or pleasure, your perspective is vital to the success of this unprecedented study…produced by My Global Career on behalf of Gigaom’s Found | READ

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Of the most popular social networking websites, Bebo is today named in a report as the top performer, beating its rivals Facebook and MySpace. Computing Which? publishes the results of an independent test assessing the 10 most popular sites for ease of setting up and using the site, the range of features, and the way the sites protected privacy and security, including how easy it is to remove personal details.read more

Flock is one of those things that I actually discovered months ago and thought… “hey, cool…that’s different!” …downloaded it… installed it… then just a few minutes ago, finally started really taking a look under the hood. I owe it all to Veronica Belmont of Mahalo Daily…she inspired me with the video below…to take a closer look…at Flock, that is:)

An open source browser that innovates on the Mozilla architecture, Flock was built on the idea that people use the Web in very different ways than they did ten years ago. Self billed as “The Social Web Browser”, Flock was the winner of Mashable’s 2007 Open Web Awards for “Judge’s Choice for Applications and Widgets”.  CNET also calls “Flock One of the Top Web 2.0 Hits of 2007“…and Webware even created: A Newbie’s Guide to Flock. On the other hand, one reviewer from FastCompany.com described Flock as having “too damn much going on…a frenetic window full of potential distractors.”

What can I say besides “Different strokes. . .”, “One man’s junk. . .”, and now. . . “What the Flock?”

Flock has picked up some steam lately, with a new version that’s more stable than before, and is filled with tons of social networking goodies. We headed over to their HQ to find out what makes this browser so different (and fun).

Tags: Flock, Mozilla, Firefox

Another new niche search engine named pipl.com is focusing specifically on “people information” that is hidden in “The Deep Web“. It is estimated to be 500 times larger than the surface web which is the focus of traditional search engines. A significant component of the information that pipl.com collects comes from hundreds of millions of social network profiles. If you haven’t already, you’d be wise to first do a search on you own name and see what it already makes available to the public about you. Then read the “5 Facts…) if you’re so inclined.
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The LinkedIn platform, known as the LinkedIn Intelligent Application Platform, consists of two parts, a way for developers to build application that run inside your LinkedIn account (via OpenSocial) and the far more useful and interesting part — ways to pull your LinkedIn data out and use it elsewhere. read more@Wired.com

A final, but significant note to round out 2007 that actually made headlines a few weeks ago, is the new developer plaform debuted by LinkedIn. The concensus in social networking circles seems to be that LinkedIn is “…now a step ahead of the competition” making it the “…better business social network.” (VentureBeat).

Lucian Beebe from LinkedIn’s Product Management Team tells how LinkedIn’s Intelligent Application Platform will enable you to be more productive by being able to pull your profile data out of LinkedIn and use it elsewhere.

It takes a lot of guts …and a HUGE reputation to preamble a blogpost with something this strong. John Reese has both!

This may be the single most important blog post you may ever read.

I MUST WARN YOU… it’s very possible that the first time you read this post you will overlook it’s power. It’s very easy to do.

So I beg of you… PLEASE follow just two rules before you continue…

1. You must PRINT-OUT this blog post before reading it. I want you to read this entire post while being able to hold it in your hands. This will give you the best chance of getting it.

2. Read this entire blog post with an OPEN MIND. Promise yourself that you will not cast judgment, ‘react’ or even try to discount anything you are about to read until you have read the entire post all the way through AND have given it all a chance to sink in.

If you can follow those two simple rules you are ready to continue. You are ready to change your life.
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The future of social networking is coming into focus and it looks like Facebook-ish features will be increasingly be integrated into your everyday applications. To wit: Yahoo and Google are looking to integrate social networking into their email applications, reports Saul Hansell at the New York Times. Yahoo is ahead…read more

sub·sume: to include or place within something larger or more comprehensive : encompass as a subordinate or component element (yw:))

Scholars Are Falling Into Line to Maneuver Through New Territory: Online Socializing as Academic Discipline. First to Facebook were the teens. Then came the money, the market researchers and the media. And now come . . . the academics. Should we care? read more

Danah Boyd - Social Networks authority (photo)
Photo Credit: By Adam Tinworth Photo