Week 6 Reaction

The article Social Network Sites: Definition, History, and Scholarship made a lot of good points about social network sites. One being that these social network sites are not based on latent ties but rather to connect with the people we are already connected with. However, after ready through the article one thing really stood out to me and interested me…and that was how different sites become popular among different demographics of people and different countries.

Reading through the article, it kept listing different social networking sites, and who they are popular among. Friendster became popular of Burning Man attendees, bloggers, and gay men. Orkut became extremely popular in Brazil. Mixi in Japan, LunarStorm in Sweden, and many many more.

This just got me really interested, because I was thinking how and why certain groups are drawn to certain sites. I would have understood it more if the social network site was created in the country and for those people, but Orkut wasn’t created in Brazil, it just became popular there. And my question is why?

I would love someone to do research on the reasonings behind why certain groups of people gravitate towards certain social network sites, even ones that aren’t designed to be for a specific social group. It would be really interesting if someone did research to tell us what certain aspects of a certain social network sites draw Brazilians, homosexuals, or corporate.