A social network service focuses on building online communities of people who share interests and 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 created powerful new ways to communicate and share information. Social networking websites are being used regularly by millions of people, and it now seems that social networking will be an enduring part of everyday life. The main types of social networking services are those which contain directories of some categories (such as former classmates), means to connect with friends (usually with self-description pages), and recommender systems linked to trust. Popular methods now combine many of these, with MySpace and Facebook being the most widely used in North America;[1] Bebo,[2] MySpace, Skyrock Blog, StudiVZ, Youmeo, Facebook and Hi5 in parts of Europe;[3] Orkut and Hi5 in South America and Central America;[4] and Friendster, Orkut, and Cyworld in Asia and the Pacific Islands. CouchSurfing is a new type of social network called hospitality exchange networks.[5][6]
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.
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