DISQUS

Hi -- I think you bring up some good points -- I think the biggest thing is simply that there are now SO many people on the net (1.2 billion, last count) that there can be many, many social networks and social experiences with hundreds -- thousands -- millions -- or even tens of millions of users. So I'm not sure there's actually a practical limit from where we sit today when social software and social networking is still so new. Even MySpace has less than 15% of the total Internet user base, and that's with a generous interpretation of their user count.

Fun times :-).

Hi -- you raise a great point and we think we have a good answer -- which is that built into Ning is the ability to import your address book from Gmail/Yahoo Mail/Hotmail (with other options coming) and send invitations to your friends or colleagues.

Each of them in turn can do the same thing and invite their friends and colleagues.

The invitations are branded with the identity of your social network.

What we are finding is that this is allowing very rapid viral adoption of individual social networks around specific topics/locations/categories.

Give it a shot and see what you think!

Ivan -- damn, too many Marc's :-).

Hi Ivan -- I'm not sure how you've been trying to reach me but I haven't seen any messages from you! You can reach me at pmarca at my company name dot com.

Robert -- thanks for the late night post -- and btw we love what Marc Canter is doing as well!

You bet when can be used to build a site like Craigslist...

See http://anytownlistings.ning.com/ -- you can clone it and customize it for any location or category.

Best,
Marc