Social networking sites are a growing phenomenon partly due to the way in which they increase the efficiency of users’ communication. Posted for the masses are members’ personal profiles that may take the form of text, images, and music for other members to enjoy, comment on, and share. Users can be social at the time of their choosing, independent of the initiating communicator. The one-on-one communication of email, text messaging, and phone is outpaced considerably by social networking platforms.

Friend Connect hopes to become the product that anchors all major social networking websites together.

Internet conglomerate Google has staked its claim to a prime piece of social networking real estate with the creation of Google Friend Connect. Google Friend Connect intends to do exactly what their name states– connect. Friend Connect aims to bring the built-in functionality of interactive social websites to any website owner. Friend Connect promises to be more than simply another flat social networking site; Google designed Friend Connect as a forum that allows for any single website to become a hub for social networking or, at the least, to utilize features and applications that were previously exclusive only to typical social networking sites already in existence. Additionally, Friend Connect hopes to become the product that anchors all major social networking websites together.

Sites like MySpace, Facebook, and LinkedIn are distinct entities in and of themselves. Users can interact with other users on each specific website– creating the need for separate names, passwords, and accounts. Social networking sites have varying degrees of diversity among their demographic. Jack Flanagan, executive vice president of comScore Media Metrix, a company that measures internet audiences for advertisers, has stated that “MySpace has the broadest appeal across age ranges, Facebook has created a niche among the college crowd, Friendster attracts a higher percentage of adults, and Xanga is most popular among younger teens.” LinkedIn is geared towards professionals, seeking to forge personal and professional connections. With Friend Connect, Google hopes to interconnect the preexistent social networking websites while introducing social networking aspects to other less traditional “social” sites.

Users of existing social networking sites may find it refreshing to sneak outside of the walled garden created by the early oligopoly of the social networking industry. With Google Friend Connect, they will be able to check out photos on Facebook, comment on a friend’s LinkedIn updates, check out a YouTube video, and read their pal’s latest MySpace blog– with the use of only one username and password, under one account.

Web site owners, as well, may find Friend Connect useful. By simply adding a snippet of HTML code into their website, they can gain features such as bulletins, blogs, message posting, video sharing, and more. Musicians can share music through applications such as iLike, and freelancers can blog to their friends on multiple sites at one time.

According to Google, the Google Friend Connect will allow website owners to “insert social features to make any app, any site, any friends, a reality.” A May 12th, 2008 press release announcing the preview of Google Friend Connect states that visitors of “any site using Google Friend Connect will be able to see, invite, and interact with new friends.”

So how does an application such as Google Friend Connect break down barriers and engage users? It encourages users to interact across the internet, and not just on one specific website or another. It can drive up traffic across the internet, and increase actual interaction with website coders doing little work on their part. Google Friend Connect strives to shy away from the static version of the existing social networking sites.

Michael Arrington of TechCrunch.com thinks that regardless of the Google Friend product, users will eventually gravitate toward the one site that they like the best. So how will Google Friend be effective in their long-term goals?

One way is to bring on partners. MySpace, for example, partners with Twitter, eBay, Yahoo, and PhotoBucket. Facebook is partnered with Digg, among others. Google has partnered with smaller social networks like Plaxo and orkut, and have incorporated Google Talk, as well– but they have yet to announce any impressive partners for the Google Friend Connect product. Google has launched not only Google Friend Connect but also Data Availability and Facebook Connect– all products aimed to securely send personal data to third party applications.

Google formally introduced Friend Connect to the world on May 12th with a preview. The official website (www.google.com/friendconnect) is still in “preview” mode but lists five example sites that employ Google Friend Connect gadgets. An educational Bible quiz site, indie rock band My First Earthquake’s site, musician Ingrid Michealson’s site, a guacamole cooking site, and a filmmaker’s site are functioning examples of the Google Friend Connect tools that can integrate users across the web.