A recent article on ReadWriteWeb tries to gaze into its crystal ball as it also analyzes reports about how social networking on the internet will evolve.

"Social media" was the term du jour in 2008. Consumers, companies, and marketers were all talking about it. We have social media gurus, social media startups, social media books, and social media firms. It is now common practice among corporations to hire social media strategists, assign community managers, and launch social media campaigns, all designed to tap into the power of social media.

But social media today is a pure mess: it has become a collection of countless features, tools, and applications fighting for a piece of the pie.

Facebook is a mess. Certainly a reflection of the world but users really must be aware that at some point this place they call "home" will want some rent. They will certainly not charge users as that would be suicidal but they need to convert people into profits. "Facebook Plans to Make Money by Selling Your Data" spells this out with crystal clarity. For the moment, they are largely acting as a covert market research agency for their clients. But what they cheerily call Engagement Ads will become more and more prevalent. Perhaps they should be called Entrapment Ads - like those irritating ads that crawl across your screen as you desperately try to find the button to clear the bloody thing - well that worked!

The new buzzwords in social media will be meaning and connection. Nice and vague enough to sound meaningful to those whose job it is to interface between all things digital and those with the money. 'Social networks' is always in the plural and this seems to be the main problem. There are over a thousand bookmarking sites to choose from, there are hundreds of social networking sites - there are also hundreds of more applications trying desperately to make some kind of coherence for the user. We may well have different circles of friends in our lives but that doesn't mean, unless we're hiding something, that we have a different mobile for each group. However, the experience of platforms like Facebook and Myspace are coming to the conclusion that part of a meaningful existence is to have meaningful categories rather than being part of one collective mind (or mess).

The rant continues at Worthless Advice - Far from the Madding Web.

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