Want to start your kids out in the social networking game in a smaller, more controlled way than just throwing them on Facebook? New social networking sites like path.com may be the way to go. Path is one of several new social networking services that allows users to share pictures, videos and messages with a small group.
Small group sharing like this is starting to feel like the wave of the future. Even Facebook is quickly realizing the value of the idea and has set up Facebook Groups, an easy way to set up a limited group of people to share with.
“We realized there wasn’t a way to share with these groups of people that were already established in your real life — family, book club members, a sports team,” Peter Deng, director of product for Facebook Groups told the New York Times. “It’s one of the fastest-growing products within Facebook. Usage has been pretty phenomenal.”
Other small group sharing sites include GroupMe, Frenzy, Rally Up, Shizzlr, Huddl and Bubbla. These new sites do their best to mimic offline social relationships more closely than sites like Facebook and Twitter can.
Shizzlr, for example, was dreamed up by two graduate business students at the University of Connecticut after they realized how hard it was to organize plans on Facebook. ”You put out a status about weekend plans and, all of a sudden, you get your uncle commenting that he wants to go hiking with you and your friends,” said Nick Jaensch, who created Shizzlr with Keith Bessette.
After you’ve established your group on Shizzlr, the service grabs a list of coming events from Yelp, Google and Facebook and lets group members discuss their options. The groups reach capacity at 20 people.
It will be interesting to see which of these new sites survives. Will you use the new small group sites with your family?
