Is Social Bookmarking At It's Peak?

Any sense in creating new platforms?

[Heartlander]

After reading about how the most popular social bookmarking sites are selling off for tens of millions of dollars, and new ones pop up every day, I got to thinking.....

Is it even worth it to come up with the "next big thing", or is this market saturated?
We have all seen the attempts at creating clones, with little "vote-up-widgets"...but in reality few if any truly succeed.

Will the newcomer survive in this market?

My thought is that it would likely take tens of thousands in advertising to even get close to the front-runners.

Your thoughts?

[ratman7]

I think that social networking is the industry's attempt to create another bubble, at which they have succeeded at to some extent. Nobody knows whether Facebook will be profitable, because nobody knows how usage patterns will evolve. People in their teens and 20's can't live without MySpace or Facebook, but I question whether that won't change as they get older and adopt different priorities. It will be interesting to watch, at any rate.

[Insomniak]

There will always be room for "the next big thing" if it provides a new and useful service to users. I don't see anything new in simply imitating what the big boys have already accomplished.

I have to disagree that the web 2 is a manufactured bubble ready to burst. Unlike the first dot bomb that was based on hype the new model has actually been successful in attracting millions of users based on providing services of value to them.

No amount of advertising would have made facebook or myspace a success if they didn't also provide a useful function. Many dot bomb ventures burned through all their VC before even launching.

[ratman7]

I have to disagree that the web 2 is a manufactured bubble ready to burst. Unlike the first dot bomb that was based on hype the new model has actually been successful in attracting millions of users based on providing services of value to them.

I was commenting on the social networking aspect of Web 2.0 in particular. I think that Web 2.0 has brought about some valuable improvements, particularly in usability. In my opinion, the web became interesting again with Web 2.0.

That said, 2.0 is in part a manufactured phenomenon, as VC's have been waiting for years to find a concept which they could hype. I also question the 'useful services' aspect of Web 2.0 -- personally, I don't find a lot of the 2.0 stuff very valuable at all, though I know that others do. The question really is if the people that do find it valuable will continue to find it valuable. Time will tell.

[rogerd]

Today, the opportunity may be better for building on existing social networks rather than trying to start something entirely new.