Social Software’s need More Social Networks

Buddyping is like any one of dozens of other social software’s I no longer keep track of.  There are a couple differences though – one, it’s mobile; and two, it runs across and has access to all 4 networks in the UK.  At last October’s LBS World Forum, Phil Derry of Trackaphone Ltd educated the audience on how all UK carriers got together to sort out premium wholesale location access for any developer to get access to.  He noted that the US, while far advanced when it came to positioning, lacked the attitude to cooperate to offer location wholesale so that applications can extend and operate across networks.  Buddyping is the only example of a social software application I’m aware of that can serve all users across networks.  One would think that in order for a social software app to be successful and reach the masses it must run on all networks, but today networks in the US aren’t that open.  US carriers differentiate from their competitors by protecting their offerings with app exclusives that only run on their network.  That’s not very social.  If Myspace, facebook, LinkedIn, or some other social software provider hopes to be able to accomplish the same as buddyping did with context additons through Location, they better help networks (i.e. the carriers who run them) become more social with incentives to do so…   

This entry was contributed by Jonathan Spinney