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Socia Media History and Events

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Services for Real Estate Pros with Inner Architect

Because it is fun and often revealing to look back into history, the following is a brief look at some interesting Social Media milestones. If you have other milestones not included in this lineup, via Mashable’s “The History of Social Media (InfoGraphic)”, give us a shout.  Here are some that stood out.

The First Email

How many people know this fact? We never thought it was this early in our evolution.

The Globe

Do you remember this social network? It was definitely a precursor of things to come in the Dot.Com meltdown.

Social Matrix: Is It Really This Big?

Conclusion

Friendster the grandfather of all social networks is still alive and well? It is interesting that few bloggers challenge the registered user statistics for all social networks. Twitter, a micro-blogging site, most likely mirrors blog attrition numbers yet nobody challenges them. Of the 190M+ registered users on Twitter, how many accounts are abandoned, run by bots, or the product of single users establishing multiple accounts? The same question for Facebook could reveal a much lower number of actual users. As we continue to see growth and adoption, what is the relevance of true registered user numbers in understanding the impact of each network? Only time will tell how far we have actually evolved.

Comments(2)

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Susan Neal
RE/MAX Gold, Fair Oaks - Fair Oaks, CA
Fair Oaks CA & Sacramento Area Real Estate Broker

Hi Dean - My first online experiences were on Prodigy, which was somewhat of a closed network for Prodigy members.  I think the monthly fee was about $25. The interactivity on it was very limited, and except for paid ads by major corporations, which ran in a one inch high band along the bottom, absolutely no business talk was permitted.  You could chat, in a way, but if you promoted your business at all, you would have your account suspended. 

It was not in color, consisted of mostly primitive games, some research sites, and message boards, but it was still exciting because it was so new. That was in the 1970s I think.  While I was with Prodigy, the World Wide Web became available and that was even more exciting, but to access it through prodigy involved additional monthly fees on top of Prodigy's fees so many people didn't expand their subscriptions.

Mar 13, 2011 01:14 PM
Dean Guadagni
Inner Architect - San Rafael, CA

Susan, that is simply awesome! Thank you for sharing this story. It's amazing how backward they had it. The "closed garden" mentality has been thankfully shattered by open source and transparency.

This reminds of when we used to refer to anything computer as "Univac" similar to copying something but calling it Xeroxing. Imagine if Univac beleived in the personal computer wave? We know the end results for their stance.

dean

Mar 15, 2011 09:57 AM