AOL made the announcement on Monday, saying that the business opportunity for the website has declined drastically in the last couple of years.

“Bebo, unfortunately, is a business that has been declining and, as a result, would require significant investment in order to compete in the competitive social networking space,” AOL said in a statement.

It will be recalled that AOL paid over 557 million pounds for Bebo, which then had more than 40 million unique users all over the world. The social networking site was very promising back then, forming a younger generation audience compared to its larger rival Facebook and MySpace.

To date, Bebo has only 12.8 million users left worldwide.

With the announcement of the sale, many experts believe that AOL would only be able to fetch a fraction of the price it has paid for the said website.

Experts also believe that the social website is most likely to be closed down rather than being bought by anyone.

“AOL will have a hard time finding a buyer for Bebo, especially with the disappointing turn out of its users for the past years,” a technology expert said.

Bebo is a social networking website that allows its users to create profiles where they can share videos, photos, and messages.

The social networking website also gained momentum in Europe, particularly in the UK, than in the United States.

Based on records, it is still the fourth most popular social networking site in the UK next to Facebook, Youtube, and Twitter.

Meanwhile, Bebo’s following in the US continued to drop as survey companies reported that there are only 5.1 million users as of February 2010, a relatively low turn out compared to more than 209.7 million Facebook users.

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In issuing the warning, Swinton cited the alarming increase in number of burglary cases in UK that were related to people posting updates about their properties and vacations in the social networking sites.

The home insurance provider said that many of the criminals are now browsing social networking accounts of people in Facebook and Twitter to see if they can take advantage of the holidays while people were far away from home.

Swinton also said that online users should limit the information they post to social networking accounts like Facebook and Twitter to just their phone numbers and address. More sensitive data should be kept in private to avoid such scenario.

Meanwhile, in a separate statement, the Association of British Insurers said that the danger in the use of social networking has increased further as people posting sensitive information also grew bigger.

They said that some 40 percent Brits has the hobby of posting updates about their holiday vacation. They also said that these people are unwittingly giving away information to the criminal minds lurking online.

Also, one out of every three Brits always post updates about their weekend breaks,

“Posting personal details on social networking sites, such as when you are away on holiday, are advertising your home to thieves which can result in burglaries that could otherwise be avoided. To keep content insurance premiums down, social network users need to be extra careful when revealing personal information,” Steve Chelton, insurance development manager at Swinton said.

Swinton is UK’s largest high street insurance retailer with over 580 branches nationwide.

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But with the advancements in the tools, plugins, widgets, and other applications, people are becoming more and more hooked up into social networking fever. Many of the online users visit or use social networking sites much more than they needed to.

What they did not know is that they are now addicted to the presence of social media, which can greatly affect their social lives and office productivity. Here are several tell-tale signs that you are addicted to social networking:

1. Updating Facebook or Twitter account whenever you are going to do even the simplest of things like drinking coffee, reading news, or leaving the office for lunch.
2. Spending more time on social networking conversations than you do in real life. This includes chatting with friends or sending tweets to your followers.
3. Considering photos as Facebook updates and not for a special keeping.
4. Instead of replying “laughing out loud” to the person who tells you a joke, you send “lol”.
5. You have more than 1, 000 friends on your social networking accounts than those in real life.
6. Using Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter as your main communication tool with friends.
7. You can type faster than two months ago. Sometime, you can even type faster than you can talk.
8. Even if you are away from the computer, you can hear something familiar or synonymous with social networking like “ping” sounds.
9. Buying a Smartphone just so you can update your social network accounts every minute even if you’re away from home or on vacation.
10. Feeling lonely whenever you missed feeding your pet fish on fishville or plant your crops on Farmville.
11. Somewhat feeling the withdrawal syndrome.
12. Instead of handing down your phone or cellphone number to your newly meet friends, you give them your Facebook or Twitter account.

Once you are experiencing this signs, then you are now a certified social networking addict.

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The new feature, which is called Google Buzz, includes many of the popular characteristics that can be seen in Facebook. These familiar features are also the reason why Facebook is so dominant in the social networking world.

However, the new Google Buzz will not be readily available to more than 176 million Gmail users. But they can opt to acquire the new service just by clicking the service button on the top left of the page.

Google has launched the new Gmail channel less than a week after Facebook initiated several changes in its homepage interface.

Like the new Facebook homepage, Gmail also has the same chatting window placed on the left side of the page, where users can see who among their friends are online.

Like the one in Facebook, Google Buzz will allow users to post updates about themselves and the activities that they are doing at the moment. Users can also choose which friends can view their thoughts and comments.

Google Buzz will also allow users post video, photo, and web links for their friends.

Also, the new Google Buzz also host the same feature as to those of Twitter, which gives users added communication tool that can send 140-character messages to their friends. But the Buzz is only limited to the people within the same vicinity as those sending the updates.

It will be recalled that Google had already tried its fate in the social networking arena with the launching of Orkut some six years ago. But unlike Facebook and Twitter, the social networking site failed to gain traction from the online audience.

This time, Sergey Brin, one of the co-founders of Google, said that Google Buzz will be a success, citing the new capabilities of the new application.

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Cautious but excited Chinese users were surprised when they suddenly found themselves browsing the webpage of the social networking websites that has been banned by their government as part of the strict Internet control called the “Great Firewall.”

News of the outage spread like wildfire with estimated number of  users in China reaching more than 200 million were able to check out websites that has long been scrutinize by the Chinese government.

One of the bloggers who broke the news to other people was identified as EfanZh. He said that he was surprised to see that the websites were open and has no restrictions like several months before.

“It’s finally unblocked, reasons unknown. I hope nothing gets blocked anymore. I can’t take it any longer,” EfanZh wrote in his blog posts.

However, several hours after his first glimpse of Facebook and Twitter, the Great Firewall has been reconstructed restricting anew the websites.

“By the time I woke up, strict restrictions had returned. Error messages once again flashed across computer screens for sites blocked by the nation’s censorship filter. It seemed just like a dream,” EfanZh wrote after several hours.

Meanwhile, Michael Anti, a social critic and an advocate for the anti-Great Firewall, expressed disappointment anew to China’s grip to its people. Anti was among the thousand of users who “tweeted” the development.

Based on reports, the outage in the Great Firewall was because of some maintenance works being administered by the government and its Internet provider, China Unicom.

Several reports also suggested that the downfall in the restriction was brought by heavy snowstorms in Northern China, which has blanketed the entire region with more than three feet of snow.

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Internet is widely known to be the third media and hence it is a tool that is used for communication. This medium is now being used all over the world and it is also the easiest and most accessible way to reach your family or friends abroad. As a communication tool, internet, as the most advance communication technology has reached billions of people and has given hundreds of reasons to use such tool. Besides from communication, internet has also been a marketing tool for network marketers, online shop for shoppaholics, a story board for webloggers, online dating tool for people who are seeking for love and relationship with different nationalities, friend finder for those people who loves to join social portals or networks, game tool for gamers and the likes. These were just few of the reasons why people tend to use the internet always and one capability of the internet that we’re about to focus on this article would be the social networks online

Social network or portals were websites that allow a person to find his recent friends and even meet new ones through the features of the website. Netlog.com is one example of a social network that lets a person to have his own profile and add his friends to it. In using Netlog a person will be able to find and meet and communicate with other people or members of the website. This online website also allows a member to upload hi or her own pictures so that everybody will be able to see his or her photographs. Videos and music can also be added so that you can share them to other members.

It is a fun way of knowing or meeting new people and communication with them even though they are located at some far parts of the world. A member will have a chance to interact with different people (different nationalities, culture, traditions and values) and so it is possible that you might learn about different way of life from one country to another. It is an easy step to help a person learn how to adopt with other people even if they are not located in the same country.

This online social portal that was established by Netlog NV in Belgium was made directly for European youngsters so that they may be able to connect with other people and have constant communication with their social network. Today this website has around 20 different languages and has over 35 million members in Europe itself.

In signing up for the online network, the first thing that you have to do is create your account; make your own profile and put information about yourself. Write some informative background that would definitely explain who you are and what your interests are. Then invite some friends to join the network so that you may be able to expand your social network. After doing this you may start uploading your photos or pictures that you want to share with other members, you can also upload your favorite music and videos; all of this exclusively done on netlog.com.

Link | Netlog.com

Get the latest news about Netlog:

Connect with Windows Live - Wed, 01 Sep 2010
Now you can easily share your Netlog activities on Windows Live. Updates will appear in Messenger and Hotmail. Connect your Netlog and Windows Live account now!

Edit your privacy settings - Wed, 11 Aug 2010
Did you know you can choose who has access to your profile, who can send you private messages and who can see your public activity? Did you know you can choose to first moderate comments before they are visible on your profile? Did you know you can choose whether you can be found in the search results or not?
Manage this and a lot more in your Settings!

New ‘HotPrints’ photobook service now ready for members - Mon, 21 Dec 2009
Starting now, Netlog members are able to create a fun HotBook from HotPrints, the web-to-print specialists.

From their Netlog account, members can create and personalise a physical photo book in a few clicks, using photographs not only from their personal collection, but also those of their friends.

The easy-to-use drag-and-drop application is a great way to share special memories with friends, family and loved ones at little cost. For a limited time the first book is free for Netlog members. Thereafter, members can purchase a HotBook for only £1.99, the same price as many greetings cards.

Each 16-page book picks up the tags from the chosen photos, automatically adding the names and captions under each image. These high-quality photo albums are delivered to your doorstep worldwide, bringing the sharing culture of Netlog offline and into the home.

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