[Sly Fox]

Beware of social networking overload
As Web sites proliferate, focus on one or two; don't be like Marcia

By Eve Tahmincioglu
MSNBC contributor
updated 8:44 a.m. CT, Mon., July. 21, 2008


There’s a great scene from "The Brady Bunch" when Marcia — just turned high school freshman — is nervous about fitting in and making friends so she signs up for every club listed on the school bulletin board.

This is sort of what I see happening with many of you and all the social networking sites out there.

I’ve been getting questions from readers, colleagues and friends about the social networking explosion in cyberspace. It seems like there’s a new site popping up every day, and no one wants to be left out of the latest and greatest group. The choices are endless, everything from Black Planet, a site for African Americans, to Xing.com, a site for professionals with an international flair.

And here is a reasonably up-to-date list ...

Fact file Social-networking overload
Web site .......... Who should join? ........... Membership
MySpace ......... Everybody ..................... 110 million users
Facebook ........ Everybody ..................... 80 million active users
ThomasNet ...... Engineers ...................... 40 million user sessions
LinkedIn .......... Professionals ................. 23 million users
XING ............... Professionals ................. 5.7 million users
Sales Spider .... Business owners ............. 2 million users per month
Plaxo ............... Everybody ..................... 1 million monthly users
ITtoolbox ......... IT professionals .............. 700 discussion groups
Jigsaw Data ..... Professionals .................. 500 companies, 450,000 users
Ryze ............... Professionals .................. 120,000 users
Fast Pitch! ........ Professionals ................. 50,000 users
Credit: Outsell, Inc.

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