Network Overload

Back in April I mentioned offhand that I was playing with Ryze, a barebones but fairly established site for business networking. I realized pretty quickly how late I was to the party. Heck, academics are already studying this stuff.

Social software, FOAF, trusted networks… however you categorize these systems, they’re clearly the Next Big Thing™ of the moment. And, of course, since I’m a sucker for gimmicky web gadgets, I’ve played with them all. You can now be my friend on Ryze, Friendster (the current media darling), the blogger-backed LinkedIn, the UK-based Ecademy, the seemingly half-baked Everyone’s Connected…

The newest one making the rounds is Tribe.net. And I think they’ve had the advantage of seeing the stumbles and pitfalls of the others in their site’s design. It’s close to what Friendster will probably be in a year, minus some of the hormones.

How many more of these are still brewing in some googly-eyed VC’s latte? How much is too much? And, if I end up having accounts at more “friend” sites than I have actual friends, will the universe implode?