What Happened To Friendster

Written by: Gary Horsman

What Happened to Friendster?

A Case for Your Very Own Center of Content

Friendster was once a big social networking service. The service allowed users to contact other members, maintain those contacts, share content and media and discover events, music and hobbies. At its peak it had over 115 million registered users.

They tried to transform the service into a gaming site and this only made things worse for the people that wanted to use it as a social network. Friendster got it wrong and as big as they were they are now defunct.

On June 14, 2015 Friendster released the follow message to it members and the rest of the world:

Friendster is Taking A Break

My point going over the closing of Friendster is that people that used it lost the content that they had placed there. When Friendster tried to transform into a gaming site this changed the conditions for users in ways that were significant. Friendster made this change without consulting their user community. For people that used Friendster as their center of content they were flat out of luck.

That’s too bad.

If you develop your very own center of content which I define as your website and/or blog then you are in control. You define the content and how it is presented. If something is deleted then you were the one making the decision. If the layout changed then you decided how and when.

You can use social media to help gain exposure for your content but to protect your business it is essential to develop your center of content.

Think about the poor people that had invested time and effort in the “Friendster Experiment”. Friendster was big and innovative. They failed. This resulted in the efforts of many people also failing.

Key Advice

1. Don’t develop significant content only on a social media platform.
2. Develop your center of content (website and blog) with delightful, engaging and shareable content.
3. Use social media to gain exposure for your center of content.

Take control of your content by publishing at your center of content. You will not be at the whims of management in some far off place who are not even giving a thought to you or your business. Use social media with your eyes wide open and with care.

If you want to learn more about Content Marketing and developing your center of content I invite you to the Introduction of Our Content Marketing Tutorial.