The GigaOM Network: Cleantech | Tech Insider | Gadget Gurus | Online Video | Open Source | Mac Love | Research | Live Events | About | Contact

Open Thread: Where’s Your Online Home?

December 19th, 2007 (11:00am) Mike Gunderloy 23 Comments

Twitter. Facebook. LinkedIn. Digg. SlashDot. Jaiku. Utterz. Seesmic. The list goes on. These days there are so many places to be on the two-way web that anyone who cares to can spend all of their free time generating and posting content for the rest of us to read, view, enjoy, and respond to. Given the social nature of primates, it’s not surprising that all of this has generated an explosion of chatty online communities.

Many of us in web worker land have tried out more than one of these potential hangouts – but it’s a rare person who has time to keep up across the full spectrum of social networks. Most of us tend to gravitate to one online home where we feel the strongest sense of community. So – where is it for you? If there’s one site that you’d hate to give up because it’s the spot where everyone knows your name, which site is it, and what makes it special? And is it one of the new Web 2.0 darlings, or perhaps an older and more established internet backwater?

Comments (23)

  • LinkedIn: Even thou I dont use LinkedIn like everyday, Still I think I cant give up LinkedIn. Because of the quality of the Network, Its not just another Social Networking site, Very useful for Us, Networking, Answering, Asking Questions, Finding Employers, Employees and Simply knowing People who are in the same Industry. And here is my LinkedIn Profile: http://www.linkedin.com/in/seosuresh

    Twitter is also nice, if we know how to use it wisely and take advantage of the latest happenning and posts from Experts right at that same time.

    Digg is good to find something intersting

    suresh11:55 AM on December 19, 2007 Reply

  • I use facebook to keep up with people but I’m really all about my blog.

    dawn11:57 AM on December 19, 2007 Reply

  • I wouldn’t exist ( digitally that is ) without LinkedIn, Plaxo, and Ma.gnolia.com

    Khürt12:12 PM on December 19, 2007 Reply

  • My home these days is mostly twitter, but I dabble in facebook & linked-in, flickr, utterz, seesmic.

    -Jeff
    http://twitter.com/zemote

    Jeff O'Hara12:20 PM on December 19, 2007 Reply

  • Of the new darlings, I’ve been hooked on Twitter since February and my use of it fills both personal and professional needs. But I’d say that the rest of my online time is really split between our internal artist community at EBSQ and my live journal communities where I can geek-out with my fellow Doctor Who and Battlestar Galactica girls. (can’t believe I just admitted that in public, but there ya go)

    Amie Gillingham1:30 PM on December 19, 2007 Reply

  • Embarrassing to say, but mine is still somethingawful.com

    David Fauber1:42 PM on December 19, 2007 Reply

  • Flickr, Del.icio.us, jumpcut … and my own blog(s) :-)

    Y! Fanboy — 2:21 PM on December 19, 2007 Reply

  • Facebook. I and all of my college friends have been using it since before Facebook opened it up to non-students. Facebook is largely an umbrella of smaller more exclusive social networks (e.g. individual universities) where people actually know each other in the “real” world. I like that.

    Jamie — 3:05 PM on December 19, 2007 Reply

  • LinkedIn and more recently Expert-Exchange.com

    Anthony

    Anthony Russo3:31 PM on December 19, 2007 Reply

  • I’d have to say that my primary social networking tool is Facebook. My reason is—quite simply—that most of my friends can be found there and nowhere else (except for MySpace… but it pains me to even utter that name). I also heavily rely on my Twitter account for keeping everyone up-to-date on my goings-on; I even use it to update my Facebook status. And of course, for keeping friends and family updated in a visual way, there’s always my home on Flickr.

    Nick Scheurich — 4:30 PM on December 19, 2007 Reply

  • LinkedIn … StatCounter … my blogs

    junger5:21 PM on December 19, 2007 Reply

  • Facebook and twitter :)

    Dung Nguyen8:52 PM on December 19, 2007 Reply

  • I of course use all the popular ones, but I must say that the one I feel the strongest sense of community on is pomoworld.com I was personally welcomed by the community ambassador, there are hot people and they’ve all got some really interesting stuff to say. The forums have seriously meaningful stuff to say about our personal experience of life, each other and our potential as human beings. Maybe a bit heady for the tech-oriented audience if this site, but a refreshing space nonetheless in the deluge of social networking sites these days. It’s also built on Ning for you tech-curious folk reading this.

    Morgan Sully9:45 PM on December 19, 2007 Reply

  • My blogs and Facebook.

    Blue_Chi10:29 PM on December 19, 2007 Reply

  • I spend most of my time on Twitter using my phone to send and receive messages. Second is probably Facebook and then LinkedIn. At least weekly I use Flickr, Marzar, Ecademy, and a few of the communities at CollectiveX. A few times a month I might visit Ning, Pownce, and Jaiku. I don’t really enjoy Digg even though I have an account and I’ve been trying to get a Seesmic invite for weeks now.

    Christopher Johnston5:43 AM on December 20, 2007 Reply

  • I work a lot in music and concert promotion so Myspace is still king in that ring, but on a professional note Facebook and Twitter control most of my time. (Even though the Google Reader is open all day).

    Greg Rollett6:25 AM on December 20, 2007 Reply

  • All about LinkedIn. I’ve reconnected with many old friends from highschool and college b/c of this tool. It has also become a new source of leads for my communications company.

    Ted — 8:12 AM on December 20, 2007 Reply

  • It’s funny but I guess Jaiku is my home. But I rarely log in. I have a lifestream there, anything I do… video, photos, blogging, twitter, seesmic; It all ends up in Jaiku… er! except Facebook (which I love by the way). But that is Facebooks very worst point, everything in… nothing out!

    dc crowley2:34 PM on December 20, 2007 Reply

  • I keep coming back to Livejournal. Even though I’ve never met most of my LJ ‘friends’, I find LJ to have a strong sense of community and mutual support. If there is any truth on the adage “A problem shared is a problem halved”, then LJ is the place to do it.

    chris b — 3:36 PM on December 20, 2007 Reply

  • Shame to admit it, but definitely Facebook. Once upon time it was LinkedIn, but that was bit hard to sell to my less business-oriented friends.

    Facebook has its flaws. For example you have to keep constantly ignoring all kinds of stupid requests from your friends. And I’m not even mentioning privacy here.

    But Facebook works as a great social hub. The Events application rocks by making it easy to see who is going and where and when. Plus the whole thing eases making closer contact with your acquaintances in meatspace. That’s the added value.

    The real value, however is that it’s widely used, known AND it’s easy to integrate your other networks into it.

    Twitter, Flickr and Amazon.com are far more important for me than Facebook, but as these are mostly obscure services (save Amazon) for most of my friends, Facebook works as a great mediator.

    Lasse Rintakumpu10:59 AM on December 23, 2007 Reply

Linkbacks (0)

Subscribe to comments feed

Leave a Reply

Sign up for our daily email:

Watch videos at Vodpod and more of my videos