Ning CEO @ Davos on Social Networking

Bianchini with TechCrunch on social networking – it doesn’t take much time to get to the real point of the interview, which is “Isn’t Social Networking a Zero Sum Game for Rival Technologies?”

Bianchini’s answer, which those in the trenches of development have also realized a while ago, is that different social networks and social networking tools are used by the *same* users in different contexts, for different reasons. For example, LinkedIn for professional networking, Facebook for “friend” networking, and Twitter for “broadcasting” like an RSS feed.

This is undoubtedly true in the short term – these technologies are, more broadly, *collaboration* technologies. So the context is very important, for security and for efficiency of collaboration. But also, different technologies or media appeal to different people.

A very thought provoking video.