The Imminent Death of a Great Friend

Friends, I wanted to take a second and pay homage to a friend that has been by my side for the last 3 years, who at one time, was full of vigor and life, but is now slowly battling a cruel and painful death. A friend who all of us know dearly, and who all of us have expected to be there with us until the end. A friend that has provided a window into the lives of others, companionship when we were lonely, entertainment when we were bored. A friend who would occasionally be unreachable, but you knew if you kept trying, he'd pop up and all would be right in the world again. This friend would always try to set you up with the guy or girl of your dreams, and didn't require you to show any kind of gratitute. This friend was never a gossiper, but always had the low down on your ex, your crush, your worst enemy or your best friend.

I'm talking about your friend and mine, Friendster.

I recently received the following article (which due to its length, can be found at the end of this entry) about the impending demise of our favorite social networking website. Why is this so important? Because it is the only way our generation is able to conduct proper due diligence on the people our parents are trying to set us up with, or the girl or guy you've come to love through the wonders of perfect photography. If Friendster succumbs, what will we do??

Lets face it: girls and guys alike have all spent countless hours adding their most flattering pictures, tweaking their (non-existent) interests, and carefully screening testimonials, all for one reason. We've added the idiotic "-" in front of our names so that our profiles are the first a Friendster surfer will see, we've added a period to a sentence in our "About Me" section so our profiles pop us as "Updated", we've searched high and low for someone we can add to our roster of friends to hit that magical 500 friends ceiling. Why? Because we all want to be sure that when Ms. Right comes along, she sees that we are handsome, social, worldly, and an all-around PERFECT catch. Not because we want our friends to see, not because we want to update our family members on our lives. But solely because we want to ensure that said crush will be so smitten that his or her mouse will unconsciously send us a smile (or a rose if we're really lucky). And smiles or roses from the unattractive she-males with mustaches, but from that one person you thought would never give you the time of day, but has somehow inexplicably "Viewed My Profile".

You say that this is not true in all cases, namely those who are in relationships or are married. You know what I say to that? When you're done lying to me, stop lying to yourself. If a guy or girl is in a committed (and presumably happy) relationship, what in God's name incites them to add a new head shot at just the right angle? So their significant other can marvel at how beautiful their main squeeze is? Bullshit.

Sorry to break it to you, but they're looking to trade up. You'll know who's committed and happy when you see that their last login was "more than 3 weeks" ago. Anything less, and they're desperately scouring the Friendster social network like the rest of us, hoping that their newfound interest in some obscure, famous-only-because-of-the-OC indie rock band might spark the burning loins of the guy/girl they've bookmarked and viewed 14 times in the last 3 days.

In any case, I know it and you know, our lives will be drastically altered for the worse if Friendster dies. So please, I implore you. Invite all the non-Indian people you know, cancel your MySpace memberships, and continue surfing for your one true love. Add a new photo, list your favorite cookie-cutter novel, mention you love Jack Johnson, long walks on the beach, volunteer work and puppies. Do whatever, but do something. If you don't, one of our closest friends might not live to see tomorrow. And we all remember how empty our lives were before Friendster, right?. Do you want to live in a world without it? I know I don't.

Holla.

Here is the article in its entirety:
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Friendster finds no love
by David Shabelman in San Francisco
Updated 10:17 AM EST, May-4-2006


Eclipsed by rivals MySpace.com and Facebook, Friendster has struck out finding a buyer, leaving the future in doubt for the Internet "social networking" pioneer.

Facing an eroding customer base and dwindling funds, Friendster in November hired Santa Clara, Calif.-based investment bank Montgomery & Co. to shop the Mountain View, Calif. company. But a Friendster spokesman said last week that the sales process has concluded, though he gave no additional details. Montgomery & Co. also declined comment.

"People just didn't find it strategically critical to what they were trying to do," said one source close to the situation.

Friendster's dimming prospects also is disappointing for venture capital firms Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Benchmark Capital, both of Menlo Park, Calif., which in 2003 led a $13 million financing round in the company. Kleiner Perkins, which recently invested an additional $2 million to $3 million in Friendster, did not return a call for comment.

Friendster was one of the first social networking companies when it debuted in 2002 with an online service that links users in a network of friends and acquaintances. But the San Francisco-based company could not build on its early momentum, eventually losing many users because of technical glitches that impaired access to its Web site. Once subscribers left, most didn't return.

According to one industry source who asked not to be identified, several companies that initially expressed interest in buying Friendster were reluctant to take on the company's roughly $6 million in debt. They also balked at the company's relatively modest $10 million asking price, which amounted to a fire sale compared with the $50 million to $100 million Friendster had hoped to get after hiring Montgomery last fall.

"No one wanted to acquire a company that is losing money and will continue to lose money," the source said. "It's one thing to be losing money and gaining market share, but Friendster unfortunately was losing money and losing market share, and that's not a great dynamic."

Despite such woes, David Hornik, general partner with Menlo Park-based venture capital firm August Capital, said Friendster could yet turn things around.

"To a certain extent social networks are driven by popularity and buzz, and that day may already have passed for Friendster," said Hornik, whose firm was an investor in social networking site Tickle Inc., now owned by Monster Worldwide Inc. of New York. "But at the same time they have a large user base, a name people recognize, and they've seen a lot of things that do and don't work. So I don't see why there isn't a good opportunity for them to build a business on."

In September Friendster launched its latest social networking application, Friendster 2.0, which emulated features offered by competitors such as MySpace. News Corp. bought it in September, along with parent company Intermix Media Inc., for $580 million. Friendster is now testing the service.

The upgrade has at least stanched the bleeding. According to Reston, Va.-based online measurement firm comScore Media Metrix, as of March, Friendster had 1.1 million unique site visitors in the U.S., up 9% from 975,000 visitors in March 2005. By comparison, MySpace, which focuses on teens and young adults, had 41.9 million unique users, and Palo Alto, Calif.-based Facebook, which is aimed at high school and college students, had 12.9 million unique users.

Hornik said that despite Friendster's problems and the soaring popularity of the top social networking sites, there is room for other such services to catch on. He cited Bebo.com LLC, Hi5 Networks and Tagged Inc. of San Francisco, along with Santa Monica, Calif.-based Tagworld Inc., as networking sites to watch.

"Friendster was the reigning champ when MySpace got started and quietly built momentum and eventually became a gorilla," he said. "I don't see why the same thing couldn't happen to MySpace. I don't think MySpace is this impenetrable beast that everyone should run from."
With online advertising booming, venture firms have kept their faith in the emerging Internet sector. Tagworld, which offers photo-sharing, social networking, blog publishing and social "bookmarking," in February received $7.5 million in Series A financing in a round led by Draper Fisher Jurvetson. Also that month Mayfield Fund led a $7 million round in Tagged, a site focused on teenagers.

James Scheinman, vice president of business development and sales at Bebo, said his company is in discussions with investors regarding additional funding. The San Francisco company last summer expanded from operating mainly as an online photo-sharing site to offer social networking, with an international focus that included six English-speaking markets.
Scheinman, who previously worked for Friendster, said Bebo already is the top social networking site in the U.K., Ireland and New Zealand, and second in Australia, gaining 6 million unique users a month since launching last summer. Scheinman said his experience at Friendster taught him the importance of having the technological infrastructure to handle such surges in usage.

"The only reason Friendster didn't work was because the site failed," he said. "The most important thing I learned from Friendster is to have a good engineering team to scale the database and servers and the right architecture. It's not easy. It's really hard to scale these sites this quickly."
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