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It's startling to realize that my three year toddler is almost the same age as Myspace and older than Facebook. In just a few short years they've come to dominate much of the online world, especially with under-25 users. The kind of independent blogs that dominate a sites like Livejournal and Blogspot don't have the web of cross-connections--what I called the "folksonomic density"--of the new social networking sites. It seems appropriate that Myspace was founded by spammers: who knows more about sucking people in?

The question: will the net have room for independent niche sites? Myspace is changing its architecture to disable key linking features of third-party embedded plug-ins like the from the popular video site Youtube. The big search sites also want a piece of this market--new features on Yahoo local and the geotagged maps on Yahoo's Flickr are impressive). It all reminds me some of the debates about local food co-ops versus enlightened supermarkets: is it a good thing that organic produce and soymilk can be purchased at the local Acme, even if that cuts into the independent co-op's business? Don't we want everyone to have access to everything? In the end, philosophy won't settle this argument.