Bubbleblog

Subject: Antisocial Networking
Category: Web
Posted by: James M (09.07.07)

I don’t know about you, but everyone seems to be ‘social networking’ these days. I’m sure you have an account with MySpace, or YouTube, or Flickr, or Facebook, or Linkedin or similar.

I did recently see that people are now using Second Life as a social networking tool too though. A marketing list I’m on held an event on it the other day, with a real life DJ spinning the virtual decks. More and more businesses are creating a SL alternate office too it seems. (Watch this space for a Thoughtbubble office on a small tropical island somewhere.)

However, with all these social networks becoming big business (with multiple millions of users and multiple billions of dollars being spend therein) I guess it was only inevitable that the sharks and cowboys would come along and jump on this virtual bandwagon.

I’m specifically talking about sites like Zoominfo (no link as I don’t want to increase their traffic), where I found myself, my company, my business partner all listed. They have even created references to us (all taken from our own website). They tout themselves as ‘the premier business information search engine with more than 35 million people and 3.8 million companies’. But they are branded as a social network site, with tools like ‘invite a friend’ to join and Zoom Network.

Is it just me who sees this as a form minor cyber identity theft? By listing me, specifically linked to my company and citing references to me as well they are implying that I have willingly ‘joined’ their network. Am I being too naïve here though? Am I underestimating the average web user? With everyone social networking like mad, surely your average networking newbie would see spam networks like ZoomInfo for what they are, like I did? Just plain antisocial.