"The new Friendster seems a lot like Facebook," was the first thing I said to Ben Dunn, Friendster's Vice President for the Philippines and Global Head of Brand Experience. He approached our table right after his presentation at the Friendster Blogger Event held last December 3, 2009. Ben asked us what we thought of the new Friendster that he just showed us on video.
Like most Filipinos online, yes, I have a Friendster account and it was my first attempt at social networking. To be honest though, I have not logged on to my Friendster account in a year. My high school and college friends had all migrated to Facebook, and I found that I could not relate with the Friendster's younger user base.
According to Ben, Friendster's target users are in their mid-teens to their early twenties in terms of age, mostly students, and admittedly younger than the Facebook crowd. Aside from sporting a new green logo, Friendster now has games, gifting, classifieds, and a whole roster of features in addition to its photo sharing, blogging, and messaging capabilities. "The key here is really simplicity -- we're trying to keep things simple," says Ben. "By that we mean making everything easy to understand and use."
The Friendster Wallet is perhaps the most significant innovation that Friendster has come up with. You can load "Friendster Coins" via prepaid cards into your virtual wallet and spend these on gifts, games, goods, and services. Friendster Coin prepaid cards can be bought at convenience stores like 7-Eleven. The Friendster Wallet also comes with 1,500 "Friendster Chips", Friendster's play money which lets you try before you buy.
Friendster's new user interface was launched worldwide last Friday, December 4, 2009. I find it very Facebook-ish.
Ultimately, I believe your social networking site of choice will be largely determined by where majority of your friends are. Friendster, Facebook, Multiply, Myspace... there's no rule that says you have to stick to just one. In the end, it's still a matter of personal choice.
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