Social Networking Sites: What You Need to Know

Social networking is a new term used to describe social interaction between large groups of people, or "networks."

Social networking sites attempt to group people according to different social interests, from people who live in the same city or state, neighborhood groups, fans of movies or books, or any other social group you can think of. Different social networking sites use different means to attract and group people, and every social networking site is a little bit different, each one aimed at a different cultural subset.

Social networking today usually means using a website to communicate with groups of people -- but social networking as a concept has been around ever since the first caveman found another caveman who liked bashing in woolly mammoth's heads with rocks.

Social networking sites are popular because the Internet is essentially a social place -- millions of people get on the Internet every day looking to make connections with other people, find romance, talk about their favorite subjects, or share first hand experiences. Topics covered by social networking sites are as varied as the people who use them, so one social networking site may have a hundred different social "groups" for essentially the same topic, allowing people to pick and choose the social group they join.

Here is a breakdown of the most popular social networking sites.

Facebook

Recent estimates say that Facebook has more than 550 million active members. Facebook is such a phenomenon, it acts as a stand-in for social networks in general, and many people have come to believe the mantra that "if it doesn't happen on Facebook, it doesn't happen."

Myspace

Once the king of the social networks, Myspace has suffered from poor management, site overload, and the mega popularity of their main competitor, Facebook. Myspace still has a leg up on Facebook in one area -- music. Every garage band and wannabe musician in the world uses a Myspace page for the free music storage and playback feature.

Twitter

Quickly outpacing Myspace for membership, Twitter is a unique social networking site that limits communication to 140 characters or less. Twitter is used by celebrities, corporations, and pretty much any group that wants to get the word out.

Linkedin

A business-oriented social networking site, Linkedin has more than 75 million users across 200 different countries.

Social networking sites are online communities for people on the Internet. Socializing in all its forms has always been a big part of the Internet -- social networking sites use that to their advantage, attracting hundreds of millions of customers every day.