Founded in 2002 – during the dark times of the Internet – Friendster became one of the pioneers of the social networking space. The company quickly got traction and even attracted the interest of Google (NASDAQ: GOOG). But, of course, MySpace and Facebook had ultimately beat out Friendster.

Yet, the plucky website hasn't given up. In fact, the company has announced a $20 million round of venture capital. The investors include heavyweights like IDG Ventures, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Benchmark Capital, DAG Ventures and Founders Fund. In all, Friendster has raised $50 million.

Actually, Friendster is ranked as the 9th most trafficked site in the world, with a heavy penetration in Asia where it is the #1 social networking platform. There are about 75 million registered users.

Interestingly enough, Friendster has a broad portfolio of patents, which perhaps can be used as leverage when combating its rivals. What's more, the company has done quite well in terms of adding features and providing a good user experience.

To help keep things on the right track, Friendster has hired Richard Kimber as its CEO. He was formerly a regional managing director of South Asia for Google. Apparently, he'll be spending much of his time in Asia, trying to put together partnerships.

While social networking seems to be maturing in the U.S., there still are great opportunities in foreign markets. Furthermore, with $20 million more in the bank, Friendster can broaden its footprint and perhaps be a hot property for an acquisition.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and The Edgar Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements. He also operates MergerBook.com.

Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) wants to see if the attention span of its YouTube users can be stretched a bit. According to this Fortune article, YouTube seems to think that short clips might not necessarily be the backbone of long-term growth. Instead, longer videos might make the site more valuable. Why is this? Well, the article intimates that the founders of the site, Chad Hurley and Steve Chen, think there's a market out there that might want something more than simple, user-generated content that focuses on the banal side of life for about three minutes per clip.

I see the point here. Google wants to figure out, once and for all, the best way to monetize its YouTube investment. This isn't the easiest thing to do, since users of YouTube are, in theory, only interested in seeing short content as fast as possible. They don't want to be burdened by ads. But YouTube is betting that maybe, just maybe, by going against theory and putting on longer material of better quality, the eyeballs will become more intrigued and will perhaps be willing to view a greater quantity of videos. It all comes down to the quality of the content.

I read an interesting article over at CNBC about News Corp.'s (NYSE: NWS) MySpace asset. It seems that the social-networking site wants to do something about the fact that it won't succeed in booking $1 billion in net sales before the conclusion of the conglomerate's fiscal year. MySpace will undergo an aesthetic overhaul to make the site more appealing. As it is now, many users might find the site too busy and not so friendly in terms of navigation. The changes will take place over time, beginning this week and concluding in the fall.

The question on my mind now is, did News Corp. really need MySpace? Sure, the site has a heck of a lot of registered users, well over 100 million worldwide, but now people are wondering how effectively these users can be exploited in terms of generating economic value. The article mentioned the disappointing results so far from an advertising deal made with Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) back in 2006, one which had a $900 million figure attached to it.

The problem here for News Corp. is that users are fickle and may eventually find another MySpace in the future (obviously, Facebook is an example of how social networking continues to evolve and how any big brand in this arena can be challenged at any time). That wouldn't be good for long-term growth. Another problem cited is the fact that active MySpace users just want to socialize with their friends and/or network; they don't care about the ads. There's a lot of truth to this claim, and it's a huge issue going forward.

Who am I? I'm wondering after having been utterly unable to log in to my very-long-time LinkedIn account using my own email addresses (all of which feature the words "sarah" and "gilbert" prominently). While it's true I keep no extraordinarily private data in my account profile (the fields for "social security number" and "mother's maiden name" aren't yet a feature of the social networking site that's been valued at $1 billion), still, when I discovered that a complete stranger was accessing my account using her own very different email address (her first name is "Kristin" and we have a few friends in common, but absolutely nothing else), I was rattled. This is both bizarre and troubling.

She found my email address through one of our common friends, and sweetly sent me her password, so I could actually be me for a bit. I approved a couple of pending connection requests. I sent an urgent, full-of-exclamation-points email to LinkedIn. [As of mid-afternoon on May 27th, I've still heard nothing from LinkedIn, and a scan of recent Twitter messages showed scattered problems.] I asked my friends if they'd heard of anything like this, and found one similar problem (as far as I can tell, it was unresolved). I'm so fortunate that it was a friendly connection and not someone bent on masquerading as me (which could have ranged in dangerousness from the mild -- wildly recommending people I don't care for, maybe -- to the seriously fraudulent). What if Bill Gates had his identity gifted to someone else? Salacious, no?

However mild or serious the result of this security breach, it's not something to be taken lightly; and a bug like this could turn off professional users who trust LinkedIn with their resume; it's certainly not befitting a billion-dollar company built on the concept of identity. News Corp., are you still interested?

At the Warrillow conference – which focuses on small business – I saw how a variety of companies are making attempts to enter social media.

Take CDW, which is a mega information technology (IT) distributor. About a year ago, the company launched Conduit. Basically, it is a social networking site focused on small business IT pros.

According to Lauren McCadney – who heads up the effort – the site has grown organically, as members have connected with each other to solve problems. This is important since small companies usually have one or two IT pros in their organization. So yes, things can get isolated and loney.

But there were risks. After all, user-generated content can be tricky. What if members make bad comments about CDW?

"Members have good manners on the site," said McCadney. "It hasn't been a problem." In fact, there is a separate section, called CDW Talk, where members can vent.

Conduit has also found ways to monetize things, such as through sponsorships. For example, there is a makeover contest; that is, a small business can win up to $50,000 in services and support from Intel (NASDAQ: INTC), Hewlett-Packard (NYSE: HPQ) and Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT).

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and The Edgar Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements. He also operates MergerBook.com.

This post is part of our Battle of the Brands feature. Let us know which brand you prefer, and check out other Battle of the Brands posts.

While I won't claim the title of Most Hip Person on the planet, I do have a fair bit of "new media" credibility. And I think it should be instructive that I've finally embraced (or at least given a friendly pat on the back to) Facebook, whereas News Corp.'s (NYSE: NWS) MySpace continues to horrify. Where Facebook pokes, MySpace cackles wickedly; where Facebook exposes me to unwelcome questions from first grade classmates, MySpace exposes your children to unwelcome advances from questionable adults. Facebook is silly; MySpace is spooky.

The two social networking sites sprung up at about the same time, but focused on vastly different niches. Facebook was originally meant to monopolize electronically on the popularity of the "Freshman Facebook," a publication put together by most colleges displaying the faces of the new students and immediately hoarded by upperclassman hoping to find their one true love (at least for tonight). Why not bring the desirability of fresh faces to a much wider audience? At first the network was limited to college students, but soon the barely legal founder was pitching his product at a bigger market. And then my boss asked me to join and the rest is writing on my wall.

MySpace, on the other hand, was initially marketed to indie bands (although it wasn't meant to be a niche, its developers were active in the LA music scene and thought that would be a great way to attract other users) as a way to spread the musical love and relieve struggling artists of the need to sink money into building a website. The concept was a virtuous circle -- musicians attract fans, fans attract musicians, and so on forever.

Now musicians are still on MySpace, and college students are still on Facebook, but while Facebook seems to have (if not transcended at least) risen above its origins to attract "networks" and "groups" whose affinity ranges from a common employer to a favorite politician or social cause; MySpace has sputtered, devolving ever more into awful allegations and truths. Pedophiles are reported to find victims through their MySpace pages, and the site is notorious for cyberbullying (scary!). On the other hand, there is a big kerfuffle over Scrabble on Facebook (silly!).

I reluctantly set up an account on FaceBook several months ago, and now it's moderately interesting as a way to reconnect with friends from 1st grade, and occasionally peek in on the lives of my college and business school classmates. It occasionally bugs me with its "pokes" and "candy corn" (what the heck?) but it's not riddled with often obscene and sometimes frightening content, as is MySpace; the space that's not mine, at all.

Vote in our poll for MySpace or Facebook as your preferred brand, and let us know in the comments why you love it.

Investors don't seem to be losing their appetite for social networks -- at least for the top ones. The latest funding comes from Ning, which recently raised $60 million. Apparently, the valuation is a pre-money $500 million or so.

The company has lots of pedigree. That is, the co-founders include Marc Andreessen -- who is the mastermind of Netscape -- and Gina Bianchini, who is a former Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (NYSE: GS) investment banker. They launched Ning back in October 2004. And it was good timing.

Basically, Ning allows users to easily create their own social networks, with blogs, videos, photos and so on. It has become a melting pot of creativity.

Google, Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) continues to dial up its efforts in the Chinese market. Having increased its position against the country's leading search engine, Baidu (NASDAQ: BIDU), it is now looking to rapidly expand its presence in China's social networking community. Although Google's efforts in social networking really have not paid off in the U.S., that's not the story in China.

Part reality and part competitive trap (perhaps), Google is making the world think that social networking is ripe for expansion in China. At the same time, China's government wants to ensure all these communications are kept under control (it's a communist country, right?), which would make one think this: how on earth can any company bring social networking to a market ruled by an iron fist when it comes to communications?

Kai Fu-Lee, the former Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) employee who defected to Google recently under intense scrutiny, indicates that the typical Chinese internet user is 25 years old -- making the market perfect for increasing market awareness and share of social networking efforts. But Baidu may be used more often by kids looking for pirated audio and video content more than anything else -- not for "talking and socializing with friends" as social networking is typically described. Is Google really wanting a piece of that, or is it trying to torpedo competitors? Hey, the world's largest internet search company did not arrive where it is today by being stupid.

It's always interesting to see what online audience and traffic measurements have to say about overal web use; traffic, number of users, website loyalty, etc. Now that Time Warner Inc. (NYSE: TWX) AOL is acquiring the UK-based social networking site Bebo.com for some $850 million, the site measurement companies are showing their own data. Notice that every one generates a different result.

When you look below, you'll see that all web measurement tools and methods generate different results.

It was just an average Wednesday night for me-researching potential stock plays, working on some blog posts and catching up on many overdue emails, all to further my goal of becoming Cramer 2.0-when I saw a post on EliteTrader.com that linked to The Smoking Gun exposing Governor Spitzer's call girl "Kristen" as 22-year-old Ashley Alexandra Dupre. Apparently, Kristen was/is her professional name. Always one to jump when opportunity knocks, I raced to dig up everything I could on Ms. Dupre to post on my blog and break some news of my own. What happened next might or might not blow your mind.

Several websites had already linked to her MySpace profile (owned by News Corp. (NYSE: NWS) so I went there and grabbed her photos to add to my story. The other sites had used the photos, too, but the pictures were all tiny and spread out over multiple pages (no doubt to increase their hits and subsequently their Yahoo! (Nasdaq: YHOO) ads, so I saw opportunity in providing them all on one page just as they were. But I didn't stop there.

I also searched other social networks like Facebook and bingo, she had a profile there! That would be "my exclusive." A few more clicks and the post was published. Within minutes, Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) has indexed my article and while I was late to the party, my "Facebook Exclusive" made my story unique and the hits tumbled in. I'm used to 200-ish visitors/hour, but thanks to this one simple post, 1,500 people visited my site within the first 45 minutes. And that's when things got interesting.

Time Warner Inc. (NYSE: TWX) doesn't look like it is slowing down on the deal front for AOL. Just when everyone is wondering if AOL will be sold, AOL has announced that it is paying out $850 million to acquire the social networking site Bebo, "a global social media network which combines community, self-expression and entertainment to enable its users to consume, create, discover and share content."

Bebo is also one of the leading social networks in the U.K. and is supposed to ranked number three in the U.S. Its users view an average of 78 pages per day.

Bebo has a total membership of more than 40 million worldwide. The press release notes that together with the AIM and ICQ network, AOL will have 80 million unique users in the world of social media.

For $850 million in cash as the purchase price, AOL probably just added a serious site that it can convert rapidly into advertising profits with Platform-A (Advertising.com and more). Its giant ad platform that still ranks number one on many ad metrics.

So while $850 sounds like a lot, it may well prove to be a bargain ultimately for AOL.

With revenues of $16.5 billion and a cash hoard of $14 billion, Google (NASDAQ: GOOG) is certainly no longer a scrappy startup. In fact, Wall Street is getting somewhat concerned about the company's prospects, as seen with the recent decline in the once mighty stock price.

So it's no surprise that some of Google vets are leaving for other opportunities.

According to The Wall Street Journal (subscription), the latest to make a move is Sheryl Sandberg, who was the vice president for global online sales and operations (actually, her bio is still on the Google site).

Her next stop: the popular social networking site, Facebook.

So what if Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ: MSFT) is getting rude? That's the attitude at Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO), which is continuing to plug forward on its business.

For example, this week the company unveiled plans for a new product: oneConnect. Basically, it's part of Yahoo!'s mobile platform and has capabilities like instant messaging as well as a "socially connected" address books.

Huh? Well, users can use GPS technologies to alert you when a friends are nearby (or, I'm assuming you can set alerts for people you want to avoid, which may be an even better feature).

Yahoo also realizes that there's an opportunity to use oneConnect to help organize the clutter in the social networking space. To this end, the platform integrates with Facebook, Bebo, LinkedIn, MySpace and so on. And, of course, Yahoo! is working on a version for Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL)'s iPhone.

It seems every day I get a pitch for a new-fangled social networking site. For example, I saw one that is for people who like food. Oh, and there was one for people who are over 70 (I'm not kidding).

Hey, with the huge success of MySpace and Facebook, I can see why entrepreneurs are jumping on the bandwagon. But are things getting out of control? And more importantly, is there really much money to crank out of social networks?

From what I can tell, it looks like the space has been a bust. For example, on the recent quarterly conference call for Google (NASDAQ: GOOG), there were some comments that indicated the disappointment with the monetization of social networks.

The Wall Street Journal [subscription required] has a piece on this today. What are the issues?

I'm a big fan of LinkedIn, which is a social network for professionals. In fact, the service has helped me get sources for some of my stories.

But competition is starting to emerge, the latest comes from Hoover's, a part of Dun & Bradstreet (NYSE: DNB). Hoover's has acquired Visible Path, which develops an enetrprise-class social networking platform.

So what makes Hoover's Connect different? Essentially, it's a LinkedIn for individual companies and the system integrates with Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT)'s Outlook and other products.

Perhaps the biggest key, however, is privacy. After all, if you are a major executive (who has the power of the checkbook), do you want your contact information freely available?

Hoover's can also leverage its large base of business customers. For example, it is possible to use the system to develop referral paths for various companies, making it to make it easier to make a connection. Actually, according to a study from the University of Chicago and University of North Carolina business schools, it is 16 times more likely to get a response from a trusted source versus a cold call.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook. He also operates DealProfiles.com.