January 16, 2008
Free Social Networking Sites
As I have been talking about the advantage of Social Networking Sites, I thought it a good idea to list several free social networking sites. Fair enough, a little Google work and you could find them yourself, however, I have had my outsourced staff do a little legwork for you.
Here is just a ‘tip of the iceberg’ of free social networking sites that are active and could help propel your business to success in 2008.
List of Free Social Networking Sites
Backfence.com
Collaborative "hyperlocal" community hoping to see thousands of web sites bloom, created by neighbors, for neighbors, and supported by local advertising. www.backfence.com
Badoo
A world wide community that allows its users to share their lives
www.badoo.com
Bebo
Social network for people who want to stay in touch with their old friends and college pals. Search for current or past students of your college or school, or join clubs, exchange photos, and read blog entries from other users. www.bebo.com
Bolt
News and features, email, chat, message boards, and more.
www.bolt.com
Catster [read review]
Post and share your cat's photos and facts. Site enables viewing by breed, size, name, hometown, and more.
www.catster.com
Communities.com
Online community with chat rooms, instant messaging, detailed photo profiles and galleries, photo ratings, and more.
www.communities.com
CommunityZero
Allows a group of people to communicate and exchange information over the Internet in their own private and secure area.
www.communityzero.com
Consumating
Meet hipsters, bloggers, freaks, and geeks in your area by showing off your quirky personality with zany answers to questions.
www.consumating.com
CouchSurfing [read review]
Helps users make connections worldwide. Meet people from other countries and offer your couch to your new friends when they visit.
www.couchsurfing.com
Cybertown
The sci-fi community of the future.
www.cybertown.com
Cyworld
Virtual community connects members with new or existing social networks through a "minihompy," which includes a guestbook, message boards, photos, and a personal bulletin board.
http://us.cyworld.com
Dandelife.com
Combining personal biographies, graphic timelines, and social networking. Tell your story and explore the lives of others.
www.dandelife.com
Desi Rater
A photo rating site to rate Indian girls and guys online. Upload your picture and get it rated by others. Includes chats and forums.
www.desirater.com
Dogster [read review]
Post and share your dog's photos and facts. Site enables viewing by breed, size, name, hometown, and more.
www.dogster.com
eSnips
Social sharing site where people share any digital content showcasing their talents, interests, and passions from one centralized place.
www.esnips.com
Everything2
User-created encyclopedia, web directory, and knowledge web. Everything2 offers definitions, articles, and writeups by readers about anything and everything. www.everything2.com
Facebook
An online directory that connects people through social networks at colleges and universities, high schools, or workplace. People with a valid email address from a supported college, high school, or company can register for Facebook and create a profile to share information, photos, and interests with their friends. www.facebook.com
FaceParty
Build a personal web site, upload pictures, send messages, chat, and find people.
www.faceparty.com
Flickr
Find a collection of sites relating to Flickr, an online photo management tool where users can share photos, store, search, and sort photos.
http://flikr.com
Friend of a Friend Project (FOAF)
Creating a web of machine-readable home pages describing people, the links between them, and the things they create and do.
www.foaf-project.org
Friendster
Social network sharing profiles, thoughts, photos, and opinions.
www.friendster.com
Google Groups - [read review]
Google Groups allows users to start their own email discussion groups and message boards, and browse archives of Usenet groups. http://groups.google.com
hi5
Place to meet new people, connect with friends, and share ideas.
www.hi5.com
Huminity
Social networking and chat software.
www.huminity.com
Instant Goodness
Online community offers a fun and easy way to make web pages for sharing interests, ideas, and information with the world.
www.instantgoodness.com
Interracial Village
Online community for people all over the world from different cultures. Includes lifestyle, cottage shop, message board, and more.
www.interracialvillage.com
Last.fm
The world's largest social music platform. Show off your taste, see what your friends are listening to, hear new music, get personal radio and new song recommendations. www.last.fm
Life With Alacrity
A blog on social software, collaboration, trust, security, and privacy, by Christopher Allen
www.lifewithalacrity.com
LinkedIn
Online service helping professionals find and connect with one another through shared social contacts.
www.linkedin.com
Makeoutclub
Online independent music and subculture community.
www.makeoutclub.com
Mashable
Blog focusing exclusively on social networks.
www.mashable.com
Meatball Wiki
Community that deals with online culture, especially how people online come together naturally in groups.
www.usemod.com/cgi-bin/mb.pl
Meet Up
Connects people around topics of interest locally.
www.meetup.com
MSN Groups
Message boards and communities of people as unique as you.
http://groups.msn.com
Multiply
Web community that allows friends and friends of friends to stay in touch by sharing photos, stories, group messages, and more.
www.multiply.com
MySpace
Explore the sites of MySpace, the virtual community, including the home page, its music portal, editor and toolbar wizard, the technorati's portal blog, and articles about the virtual community.
www.myspace.com
myYearbook
Social playground originally built by two high school students. You've got friends!
www.myyearbook.com
Ning
Online service where users can create, customize, and share their own social network for free in seconds.
www.ning.com
orkut
Online community that connects people through a network of trusted friends.
www.orkut.com
Picit.com
Dedicated to greeting cards, funny pictures, online dating services, pic ratings, and other free stuff.
www.picit.com
Playdo Community
Create a unique character by choosing its appearance, age, gender, origin, and interests, then enroll it as a citizen in Playdo City where it can interact with other users.
www.playdo.com
RateMyBody
Online community. Meet people, chat, and rate pictures of others.
www.ratemybody.com
Skyrock
People's network connecting one another through shared social community. Offers blogs, profiles, chat rooms, and featured videos from users world wide.
www.skyrock.com
SmartGroups.com
Helps to organize the different groups of people in your life using email and the Internet.
www.smartgroups.com
SMS.ac
Mobile community that enables users worldwide to flirt, chat, and share interests with other by sending SMS messages.
www.sms.ac
Stickam.com
Broadcast yourself live. Add live feed, video chat, movies, photos, and audio to your web page, MySpace page, or blog.
www.stickam.com
StumbleUpon
A browser add-on for finding and sharing great web sites.
www.stumbleupon.com
Suicide Girls
Cult of sexy amateur punk, emo, and goth girls with online journals, pictures, and movies.
www.suicidegirls.com
Tagged
Online community where users can share photos, keep journals, discover friends, and more.
www.tagged.com
TagWorld
Combines photos, blogging, tagging, and storage in a free online service.
www.tagworld.com
Takepart.com
Online community focused on socially conscious media and issues. Watch videos, read blogs, and meet friends committed to helping change the world through entertainment and social action.
www.takepart.com
Tickle
Offers tests, matchmaking, and social networking. Tickle services include LoveHappens, an online introduction network with profiles that feature stories written by friends and family.
http://web.tickle.com
Tribe.net
Online social networking service that connects the people in your personal networks and community.
www.tribe.net
Wallop
Flash-based social networking site where users can share photos, blog, and interact with friends.
mywallop.com
Well, The
Pioneering online community known for engaging conversation and intelligent debate. Features more than 260 conferences ranging from technical and specific to abstract and surreal.
www.well.com
Wikia
Provides a collection of communities with web sites that any user can edit, from movies and TV, to sports, gaming, health, and other topics.
www.wikia.com
WireClub
Chat and dating site featuring clubs to connect like-minded users.
www.wireclub.com
Yafro Moblog
Create a free online picture journal using your camera phone or digital camera, and share them with friends or make new friends too.
www.yafro.com
Yahoo! 360
Bringing together popular Yahoo! communications, content, and community features, including blogs and other sharing tools for recommending favorite movies, restaurants, music, and more.
http://360.yahoo.com
Yahoo! Groups
Yahoo! Groups allows you to create and manage online email communities in areas such as Recreation and Sports, Entertainment and Arts, Hobbies and Crafts, Computers and Internet, and Health and Wellness.
http://groups.yahoo.com
Yahoo! Member Directory
Directory for finding profiles of Yahoo! members with similar interests and getting in touch with them.
http://members.yahoo.com
Yuwie
Yuwie is 100% FREE. Yuwie is like any other "connect with friends" or social networking site. But we have one major difference. Use Yuwie - Get Paid! Yuwie pays you to blog, upload pictures, refer friends, chat, hang out, etc.
Zaadz
Social networking site focused on building communities around spirituality, ethical businesses, and personal growth.
www.zaadz.com
Filed under Web 2.0 Techniques by Ryan Shamus
Comments on Free Social Networking Sites »
[...] Ryan Shamus wrote an interesting post today on Free Social Networking SitesHere's a quick excerptExplore the sites of MySpace, the virtual community, including the home page, its music portal, editor and toolbar wizard, the technorati's portal blog, and articles about the virtual community. http://www.myspace.com. Yahoo! Groups … [...]
Hey Ryan,
Quick clarification regarding CommuntyZero.com. It used to be a free service when it first launched back in 1998 but went to a fee-based service around 2001. We at Ramius (the providers of CommunityZero) do have a new service coming out soon that will be free. I'll keep you posted when we launch so you can add it to your list.
Best,
Melany Gallant
Director of Marketing
Ramius Corporation
Hi Melany,
Thanks for the clarification. Please keep us posted when the new free service is launched.
Thanks
thank you Ryan for sharing…
[...] most common types of social media are: social networks, blogs, wikis, forums, nanocasts, webinars and podcasts. These social platforms have revolutionized [...]
[...] by Kevin Muldoon from System0 on January 22, 2008 | 0 Comments Free Social Networking Sites - Gavin from Ryan Shamus provides a large list of social networking [...]
[...] Social Networking - Create a network of friends, make new friends, find old ones. Who knows… they may be interested in you mlm opportunity. [...]
Very informative list of social networking sites. There some new ones on this list that I will check out.
this is also good networking for social networking bookmarks.
Just thought I would mention lokl.com, a community based social networking site in vancouver
I use Badoo as it's very popular with my friends in Austria. Also since Im here in the states and my g/f is back home I enjoy waking up to her wake up messages on Sleep.FM . Another one I have heard of but have not tried is Hive7.
There are a ton of networks, but I only use the ones mentioned, plus Facebook and Last.FM (looks like u left that 1 out).
Hi Joseph, Thanks for letting me know about the other sites, I will add them to the list.
Hi Ryan,
Please feel free to check out our new free online entertainment/business social networking platform. Please see http://www.exclusivelondon.co.uk for more information.
Best,
Rajan
This is a great list of social sites. Thank you for sharing there are a lot on there I didn't even know existed.
thanks for these links, great list. thank you.
[...] you, helping you to create increased blog traffic for your business. Click here for my list of Free social networking and blog sites. [...]
This social news media site is targeted to work at home.
Hi,
Thanks for your list, I recently discovered this new social cummiunuty site. It is a site where users can make a profile which is more like a music taste list. Based on this list you will see with whom you match. But not music only, also books and movies. It's still small, but looks fine.
http://www.10tune.com
Bernard
[...] of the top social networking sites offer numerous advertising opportunities. After you have chosen the sites that you would like to [...]
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While hi5 maintains its strong hold in Central America, it faces tough competition in Asia from many social networking sites. Hi5.com comes in first ten ranking in http://www.alexa.com/data/details/main?url=www.fortunehotels.in Alexa.com.
Hi Ryan, great List, thank you for this post.
I wonder if you have found any more SN sites besides Yuwie that pay it's community to interact? Such as a revenue share model like Squidoo, Hubpages, Revver, and many other Web 2.0 properties offer?
I've got a huge library of revenue sharing sites and I'm always looking for more. We should share notes sometimes so feel free to write when you get a chance.
Hi Luke,
I haven't found many SN sites like Yuwie. If you find any, please let me know.
Feel free to post your list of Rev Sharing sites in a comment to help others. It would be a great resource.
Thanks!
I suggest this site: http://www.classifieds.tao01.com/en/
It is the first classified social network.
[...] some new ones on this … Click here for my list of Free social networking and blog sites. … …http://ryanshamus.com/web-20-techniques/free-social-networking-sites/List of social networking websites - Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaRetrieved from " [...]
You should add vigster (www.vigster.com) to the list. Its a social network for video gamers.
Consider adding http://www.newhobo.com a brand new animated social networking site.
just came across a new one - http://www.mybuzzle.com with some bee like theme…sounds interesting!
Also our new social network
the icarecafe
http://www.icarecafe.com
Aoimed at patients their carers and supporters
I'll also add a site called PicCat ( http://piccat.com/ ). It's for cat owners and there you can share your cat pictures and get comments
WOW - you have quite a collection there. Here are a few that are missing from your list - some are paid networks like Yuwie: http://www.squidoo.com/socialprofessionalnetworks