15+ Social Networks You Wish You Knew About!

Posted by Anees Jafri ||

August 12, 2008 ||

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I started researching on Social Networks and ended up writing about different types of Social Networks that exists. Over a period of time as the Social Networking space matured and evolved we started seeing social networks for selected few, targeting a niche. It certainly is/was a process of trial and error where lot of Social Networks were launched but only a few survived.

Image Source: FaceySpacey

Following is the list of what I thought were the best Social Networks serving their niche.

Books – Social Networks

Have you ever come across a situation where you wanted to read a specific book and couldn’t find it anywhere? or just wanted to read the review before you buy it? Below are some social networking sites for people who would be interested in BOOKS!

Shelfari.com – Shelfari is one of the most famous online social networking sites on books, and my favorite. On Shelfari members can create their own personal bookshelves of books they have already read, what they are reading and what they plan to read. They also get to rate these books and your friends on Shelfari can see what you think about the book.

It goes without saying that you can connect with friends on Shelfari to see which books you have in common. You can ask them for recommendations and also create a group where you can talk about different books.

Shelfari also gives you the option of finding the book you have been looking for and even see the top books in your favorite topic! You can search for books by title, author, ISBN and subject.

Revish.com/ – If you love reading and sharing your reading experiences than Revish is the right place for you!

Some of the features that Revish offers are listed below.

Write reviews of any books you read.
Maintain a reading list and share it with friends
Keep a reading journal – look back and see what you were reading at any time
Read reviews by other Revish members
Create and participate in groups, to discuss books, reading or anything else
Use the API and widgets to include your Revish content on your blog or website

Goodreads.com – Good Reads is another free Social Network for Book Lovers. It is like a large imaginary library that you can go through and also see other reader’s book shelves, their reviews and their ratings on different books. You can also post your own reviews on what you have read or are currently reading and also what you plan to read in the future.

On Good Reads you can also join a discussion group, start a book club, contact an author and also post your own writing and if you are an Author there is something else also that they have which is known as the Good Reads Author Program.

Cooking & Food – Social Networks

If you are a foodie and would like to share your passion about food and different recepies, you should definitely go through some of these social networking sites.

Bakespace.com/ – Bakespace is one such social networking site for people who are passionate about food.

On BakeSpace, recipes are just the beginning of a delicious and mouthwatering package. As the site says "Come for the food, but stay for the conversation". Once you find your favorite recipe or an excellent chef, it’s easy to share ideas and build new, longlasting and delicious friendships.

Join BakeSpace:

and create your own "virtual kitchen."
Browse recipes from other members (new ones are added daily). Also, check out member profiles to see what they’re cooking up. Don’t forget to visit the Pantry (forum) for tips and ideas.
Personalize your Virutal Kitchen by adding photos and other other interesting stuff and share it with your online friends.

Grouprecipes.com/ - GroupRecipes is social network for food lovers. Some of the unique features GroupRecipes provide other than writing recipes, tagging them, adding photos, commenting on other recipes, accepting comments and ratings from other users are listed below.

The Recipe Robot (aka Food Prediction Algorithm) learns about your tastes and predicts recipes you like or dislike.
The site also helps you in sharing & discovering great places to eat in your home town and this feature is available with integrated Google maps.
It has also created its own Stumbleupon – A toolbar that helps to explore recipes related to your favorite foods.
It gives you the option of exploring food by taste, mood, photo, ingredients, uniqueness, rating, and your compatibility.
On GroupRecipe it lets you Create your own food TV Show!

Thedailyplate.com/ – The Daily Plate is a site that helps you in keeping a track of what you are eating and how much your calorie intake is. On the start you need to enter your current weight and how much you would like to loose. On doing this the site would let you know how much intake of calories you should have on a day to day basis.

You need to search and add the foodstuff you ate and this would show the intake of calories you had. You can also let The Daily Plate know what physical activity you’ve performed. This allows The Daily Plate to calculate how many calories you’ve burned and it would subtract this from the total intake. The result of this is a calendar that helps you track your progress on a day on day basis.

How cool is that?

Movies – Social Networks

When it comes to watching movies, there is nothing better than a multiplex, the huge and humongous screen with truly digital surround sound and different varieties of popcorn to pick from.

We have our own ways of researching about the movies, asking friends who have already seen it, read the reviews in the paper or online. What if you do not want to waste that extra buck on the movie some people don’t suggest or have not rated accordingly? I have tried listing down some social networking sites which will help in deciding if Hancock is the movie I would like to watch over this weekend or not?

Flixster.com/ - Flixster is one such site which helps you in answering the above mentioned questions. Just over two years and the social networking site Flixster has grown into a huge online database of over a billion user-generated movie ratings. To rate a movie, you need to click on the Rate Now button next to that particular film. Please check the quiz questions, polls, actor bios, photos, movie trailers, and more. Create lists of movies to share with friends, or vote on the top news stories of the day.

Another feature which I really liked is the Flixster Wiki, which lets you add or edit content on the history of movies.

Criticker.com/ - Another such site is the Criticker, At Criticker you can rate movies on a scale of 1 to 100 and you will be matched with other users who have the same kind of taste in movies like yours.

In order to give each film you’ve seen a rating, run through the randomly generated lists of movies or search the site for specific films. Once you’ve ranked at least 10 films, you will generate what the site refers to as The Taste Compatibility Index (TCI): a measure of the similarity between two users’ tastes in films. A feature I really liked!

Listal.com/ – Listal is also a social networking site on which you can list and rate your movies and do much more than a lot of these social media sites. Let’s look at some of the feature Listal offers.

List your stuff
Get Recommendations
Friends
Meet new people
Groups and Forums
Widgets
Profile pages
Custom lists
Popular items
Messages
Import Data
Export Data

Music – Social Networks

Different people have different tastes in music, what’s your taste? I have tried collecting some social networking sites on music and I hope this is helpful.

There are a lot of Music communities online where people share their taste in music, rate new albums and also blog about their reviews.

Mog.com/ – MOG is a social network that helps you find people through music and also find different music through people. With MOG you can find, share and talk about the music you of your choice. It lets you share your songs, music library, videos and thoughts on music with friends and "moggers"…

MOG uses customer filters and makes it easy for you to find new music to listen to and also has personalized suggestions for you. The site also helps users with news, reviews and streaming videos.

Last.fm/ - If you are a music lover and have been on the internet for a while then you definitely know what Last.fm is all about.

Last.fm, keeps a track of the music you listen to using a music recommendation system called “Audioscrobbler” and based on this Last.fm builds a detailed profile of each user’s musical taste by recording details of all the songs you listen to and than helps you discover and also recommends new music of your taste. The site also offers numerous social networking features.

Listen to Music.
Find out about the artist you may like?
Get in touch with other people with similar music taste as yours.
Find out about live performances
Create charts that you can publish on your personal site
The site also allows new artists to upload their own music and videos and promote them for free.

Midomi.com/ - Like other music networks Midomi is a network that helps you discover new music and people, however, the way you can search in Midomi is a little different.

Ever thought of singing? On Midomi you can search for the music by singing or humming a part of the song for 10 sec or maybe a little long if your dont find what you are looking for. All you need is a microphone and you will be able to connect to your favorite music and to a community that shares your kind of musical interest. You can listen to other members, rate singers and buy music all at one place, Midomi.com

Sellaband.com/ – Seallaband is another social network which helps the artists and fans in several ways. One such feature of sellaband is that it turns its fans and followers into producers by asking them to invest in a band or artist they support. This gives the artist the recording opportunity and every single investor who supported the band or the artist a part of profit.

If you are an artist and want to know how the concept works, please read below.

Create a profile – Make your own Artist page on sellaband.com. Create a profile that will appeal to the potential followers. You can also upload a picture, biography and a maximum of 3 songs that represent you as an artist. You can also let your fans know where they can see you play live.
Raise $ 50,000 – There are 5000 parts of $10 each. Either you have to find 5000 believers who can buy 1 part or 2500 who can buy 2 parts or 1 believer who can buy 5000 parts.
To the Studio – Once you have raised $50,000, SellaBand will find an A&R experienced person to guide you through the recording process. With a top producer you get the chance to record a collection of your best songs.
Limited Edition CD – All your believers who have invested in you will recieve an exclusive Digi-Pack CD. This limited edition CDs will be sent to the believers.
Free Downloads – Three of your newly recorded songs will given away for free on SellaBand. This would be one of the way to promote your music. The other tracks recorded with SellaBand would be sold as paid Download and the net profit will be split evenly between you, your believer and SellaBand.

To read more you can always visit the How it Works section on SellaBand.com.

Travel – Social Networks

Geobeats.com/ – I do not know if this has happened with anyone of you but I have gone through this myself. When I was in the Philippines – Manila last year, my friend and I had several questions before landing.

What is the country like?
What would we like to see there?
What is the culture?
What mode of transportation are we going to use?
Important or Historic places we would like to visit?
What would I like to shop?

If these were the questions you had faced like we did, than GEOBEATS is your answer. Think about it? You are still planning to go to Philippines – Manila or anywhere in the world and you already have an answer to all the above questions by looking at the videos on GEOBEATS! As it says “See the Destination… Before You See it!

I am sure most of you would agree with me on this!

Travbuddy.com/ - Travbuddy is all about meeting other travelers and share travel advices. When I say meeting other travelers what I mean is “have you ever wanted to go somewhere and did not have a Travel Buddy or a Travel partner?”

If the answer is yes, then your search is over because Travbuddy helps you search a Traveler who is planning to travel to the same place as you are. Thats how you have a buddy!

All you need to do is create a free TravBuddy account, Share your future travel plans and meet a new travel partner going to the same place. Sounds Interesting!!

Travellerspoint.com/ – Have you ever come across a situation when you desperately wanted some information from that one person who must have gone to the place where you would like to go for your next summer vacation?

If “YES”, then you would love to know what Travellerspoint is all about. With 163329 members worldwide and still growing, read the travelers Blog’s and diaries or browse their trips or Photo galleries. Tell your stories to them, get all the advice you need to plan your trip and book it all without leaving your chair!

Do leave a comment and let us know if you know of any other social networks which are popular within their niche.

Tags: Books Social Network, Food & Cooking Social Network, Music Social Network, Social Networks, Travel Social Network

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