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Social network service

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A social network service focuses on building online communities of people who share interests and/or activities, or who are interested in exploring the interests and activities of others. Most social network services are web based and provide a variety of ways for users to interact, such as e-mail and instant messaging services.

Social networking has encouraged new ways to communicate and share information. Social networking websites are being used regularly by millions of people.

While it could be said that email and websites have most of the essential elements of social network services, the idea of proprietary encapsulated services has gained popular uptake recently.

The main types of social networking services are those which contain category divisions (such as former school-year or classmates), means to connect with friends (usually with self-description pages) and a recommendation system linked to trust. Popular methods now combine many of these, with Facebook widely used worldwide; MySpace, Twitter and LinkedIn being the most widely used in North America; Nexopia (mostly in Canada); Bebo, Hi5, StudiVZ (mostly in Germany), Decayenne, Tagged, XING;, Badoo and Skyrock in parts of Europe; Orkut and Hi5 in South America and Central America; and Friendster, Multiply, Orkut, Wretch, Xiaonei and Cyworld in Asia and the Pacific Islands.

There have been some attempts to standardize these services to avoid the need to duplicate entries of friends and interests (see the FOAF standard and the Open Source Initiative), but this has led to some concerns about privacy.

For more information about Social network service, read the full article at Wikipedia.
This text uses material from Wikipedia and is available under the GNU Free Documentation License.


News tagged with social networking

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Facebook (and systems biologists) take note: Network analysis reveals true connections

Facebook (and Systems Biologists) Take Note: Network Analysis Reveals True Connections

Technology / Computer Sciences

created Dec 07, 2009 | popularity 4 / 5 (9) | comments 8

(PhysOrg.com) -- Facebook figures out that you know Holly, although you haven't seen her in 10 years, because you have four mutual friends -- a good predictor of direct friendship. But sometimes Facebook gets ...


Facebook profiles capture true personality, according to new psychology research

Medicine & Health / Psychology & Psychiatry

created Dec 01, 2009 | popularity 5 / 5 (4) | comments 0

Online social networks such as Facebook are being used to express and communicate real personality, instead of an idealized virtual identity, according to new research from psychologist Sam Gosling at The University of Texas ...


Loneliness can be contagious

Medicine & Health / Psychology & Psychiatry

created Dec 01, 2009 | popularity 4 / 5 (4) | comments 4

Loneliness, like a bad cold, can spread among groups of people, research at the University of Chicago, the University of California-San Diego and Harvard shows.


HP researchers try to tell you who your friends are

Technology / Computer Sciences

created Dec 17, 2009 | popularity 1 / 5 (1) | comments 0

Most people have scores of contacts, scattered around their mobile phone, e-mail address book and multiple social networking sites. Scientists at Hewlett-Packard can tell you which of those contacts are your closest friends.


You may be ready for online ritual suicide with the aid of a new website  that helps you kill your virtual identity

'Anti-social network' aims to be Facebook killer app

Technology / Internet

created Dec 10, 2009 | popularity 5 / 5 (1) | comments 0

Facebook makes you despair? Social networking makes you want to end it all? You may be ready for online ritual suicide with the aid of a new website that helps you kill your virtual identity.


Want privacy on Facebook? Here is how to get some (AP)

Want privacy on Facebook? Here is how to get some

Technology / Internet

created Dec 17, 2009 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (3) | comments 0

(AP) -- Over the past week, Facebook has been nudging its users - first gently, then firmly - to review and update their privacy settings.


Samsung M5650

Samsung Launches M5650 Music Phone

Electronics / Consumer & Gadgets

created Dec 21, 2009 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0

Samsung Electronics today unveiled the Samsung M5650, a music-focused addition to its popular lineup of full touch screen handsets for young mobile users.


Mathematical models key to tracking gossip, terrorists

Mathematical models key to tracking gossip, terrorists

Other Sciences / Mathematics

created Dec 09, 2009 | popularity 4 / 5 (4) | comments 0

(PhysOrg.com) -- Thanks to the Internet and online social networks (OSNs) news and gossip now spread literally like wildfire -- uncontrollably and seemingly without any order. But according to one Ryerson ...


Facebook mines Census data to track its diversifying users

Technology / Internet

created Dec 17, 2009 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0

In its earliest days, Facebook was primarily a white and Asian phenomenon. No more. In the first-ever study of the race and ethnicity of its U.S. users, Facebook said Wednesday that blacks and Latinos have joined the social ...


New model details why some information 'goes viral'

New model for social marketing campaigns details why some information 'goes viral'

Physics / General Physics

created Aug 06, 2009 | popularity 4.2 / 5 (16) | comments 2 feature

(PhysOrg.com) -- Marketers dream of finding ways to get something to "go viral" on the Internet. Indeed, viral marketing, whether it be through email, YouTube, Facebook or Twitter, has become the Holy Grail ...


MIT wins Pentagon prize in social networking contest

MIT wins Pentagon prize in social networking contest

Technology / Other

created Dec 07, 2009 | popularity 4 / 5 (2) | comments 0

A team from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has won a 40,000-dollar prize for using social networking tools to identify the locations of 10 large weather balloons in a contest sponsored by ...


From terrorism to HIV, it's all about the network

Other Sciences / Social Sciences

created Dec 18, 2009 | popularity not rated yet | comments 0

(PhysOrg.com) -- Similarities between webs of terrorists and networks of rescue personnel may seem unlikely. To an eclectic collaboration of engineers and social scientists, the connections are not only possible, but a potential ...


Swedish service performs your last online wishes (AP)

Swedish service performs your last online wishes

Technology / Internet

created Dec 11, 2009 | popularity 1 / 5 (1) | comments 0

(AP) -- Sunniva Geertinger was devastated when her boyfriend took his life early this year.


Inequality, 'silver spoon' effect found in ancient societies

Other Sciences / Social Sciences

created Oct 29, 2009 | popularity 3.8 / 5 (16) | comments 22

The so-called "silver spoon" effect -- in which wealth is passed down from one generation to another -- is well established in some of the world's most ancient economies, according to an international study coordinated by ...


Informal social networks better at encouraging Hispanics to prepare for disasters, study finds

Medicine & Health / Health

created Dec 16, 2009 | popularity not rated yet | comments 1

(PhysOrg.com) -- Lay health teachers who engaged Hispanics inside their social networks were more effective than mailers at encouraging participants to prepare disaster plans.