development of online networking
besides livejournal, & tribe, i have been participating in okcupid & linkedin to some degree for the past few years; and i had to at least register my screen name @ myspace, so that no one else would take it.
some really amazingly progressive virtual communities have developed during this time... from facebook, flickr, & 43 things, to del.icio.us, digg, & stumbleupon... not to mention things like bittorrent, youtube, voip, skype, & podcasting!
there's a great list of "23 things" (excercises) that 2.0librarians have developed "to encourage (people) to experiment and learn about the new and emerging technologies that are reshaping the context of information on the Internet today."
as people ramp up to web2.0, we are starting to see the appearance of sites as diverse as lang-8, instructables and couchsurfing... and there are still a number of issues that need to be addressed in order to help global social networking grow into the next stage.
i wonder how long it will take for the web to develop self organizing properties... 'cause after i have been in a research trance for 13 hours, i start feeling similar to what PKD described in VALIS!