Bebo

Bebo was the first social networking site that I came across; this was about five years ago. The main reason for joining this group was because many people in my college were joining.

If I had to describe bebo then I would describe it as a dated version of facebook. Initially I believed that bebo was launched before facebook because of how similar the features were and as I said before it looked quite dated however through researching I found that facebook was launched almost a year before bebo. I believe that the main target audience was for the age range between 14-17 (the age when I was interested in bebo) the main reason why I thought this was because of the applications. When browsing through the bebo site I came across the applications page and I was very surprised by the vast amount of applications that bebo has to offer; from what I saw the applications were created by users of bebo hence why there is such an extreme amount of applications.

I found the applications quite off putting, on the other hand unlike facebook bebo does not continually try and push these applications on the users, the users can add what application they want without being hassled. A good option that bebo has given the option to the user is allowing them to choose there profile design or ‘skin’ looking at the skins page they are regularly updated allowing the user to change there profile skin whenever they want.

Bebo was brought by AOL in 2008 where I believe changes were made form when I was a bebo user till now. With mobile internet growing more popular I feel that bebo recognised this and created ‘bebo mobile’ or ‘m.bebo.com’ a bebo designed specifically for your phone. I consider this to be a good idea and even though users can logon to there social networking accounts (facebooks) via phones already they haven’t designed a site specifically for a phone. With bebo they have combined the phone and site allowing for users to receive texts when a new comment or email is posted.

However it makes me wonder if bebo does this then how interactive will people be in the future. With internet access getting stronger all the time I feel that social networking is becoming a way of life rather then just a site build to keep in touch with fellow peers. So whether this application is a good or bad idea? I am still deciding.

Overall I think that bebo is a successful social networking site for the age group that it is targeted at but having lost interest in bebo now I don’t have any interest in it, maybe if more users that I knew were on bebo (main reason why I first joined) then I could still be using the site on the other hand picking different profile backgrounds and taking quiz’s just doesn’t appeal to me. I just hope that now AOL have taken bebo over they don’t cram the site with lots of advertisements spoiling the whole experience of bebo.