Social Networking Can't Be Stopped!

Nielsen Online, which measures web traffic, said the number of minutes on social networks in the United States rose 83 percent in April from the same month a year ago, but found users were quick to move on and sites could quickly fall from favor.

The total number of minutes spent on Facebook surged 700 percent year-on-year to 13.9 billion in April this year from 1.7 billion a year ago, making it the No. 1 social networking site for the fourth consecutive month.

News Corp's MySpace was second most popular but the number of minutes spent on this site fell 31 percent to 4.97 billion from 7.3 billion a year ago, although it remained the top social networking site when ranked by video streams.

Blogger, Tagged.com and Twitter.com came third, fourth and fifth respectively, with the number of minutes spent on Twitter -- that lets people send 140-character messages or Tweets -- rocketing 3,712 percent in April from a year ago.

Nielsen Online spokesman Jon Gibs points out that socnet popularity can be ephemeral. And that's true. Still, I wouldn't use that fact to erroneously conclude that social networking itself will have a brief shelf life. Clearly the kinds of features and interactions that socnet sites offer resonate with millions of Internet users. That won't go away. But brand loyalty always will be low when the cost of conversion is low. So yes, there will be winners and losers among the social networking providers as new applications and cool toys hit the market. And yes, many users will be short-term dabblers. However, overall social networking use will continue to grow at a rapid pace in the foreseeable future.