Mediaboss Marketing

Facebook wasnt built in a day.

Neither will WT:Social, the upstart news-focused social network that no-one would ever notice, except that Wikipidia founder Jimmy Wales is behind it. And Wikipedia is a fairly successful project ... its ranked ninth in global internet engagement according to Alexa.

So its getting some attention.

Sportsfile for Web Summit via Getty Images

That attention might be a bit early, however. Im one of the first 200,000 users of the site, and not much is happening yet at WT:Social. Not a lot of news, and not a lot of social.

I already have 53 friends, but Im not sure how they became my friends. And Im following 55 people (again, not quite sure how that happened).

Updating my account header photo took three tries, and the second time it become some random persons me-with-my-muscle-car pic. My feed includes 10 Strange Ways To Get Locked Up In The USA and Fighting Misinformation/Fake News: A Historical Perspective.

So yes, its a little weird right now.

One friend, analyst and thought leader Jeremiah Owyang, bought a paid membership for $12.99 to skip the WT:Social waiting line. (WT:Social will not have paid ads, but will rely on donations and subscriptions, like Wikipedia, in an attempt to avoid the issues that Facebook has platformized (fake news, paid fake ads, and election engineering).

Another friend skipped the waiting list instantly without paying, while one sat in the list for three days. Personally, I was offered the opportunity to contribute yesterday, declined, was put in a waiting list, and then magically today made it in.

Perhaps not shockingly, WT:Social looks very much like a wiki.

Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales' new social network

Theres a list of subwikis (think Groups in Facebook) to join, a place to post something, a social/news feed, a list of wikis you decide to follow upon joining. Oh, and a widget to invite more people.

I cant say its visually appealing, and not all functionality works.

Its buggy ... I tried to create a new group and it 404d pretty hard.

More than anything else, it feels like a socialized news network kind of a low-volume Twitter which makes sense, given Wales focus on news.

WikiTribune becomes a social network for people like you who still have faith in the truth. We are here to create better connections and develop productive discussions around everything that is happening in the world and is important to us.

Its interesting to establish a social network with a similar ethos as Wikipedia, but theres a lot of work to be done. Theres not much news available yet, and theres not much social happening. Theres no obvious private messaging capability, and the interface is designed pretty much to share links first.

Theres also the somewhat confusing opportunity, familiar to those of us who are Wikipedia editors, to add an edit summary or to briefly describe your changes to your social updates.

Sill, theres potential here.

Wikipedia grew from a dream to an experiment to a global phenomenon. If Jimmy Wales can repeat the trick, we might get some real competition in social media. Dont hold your breath waiting for your parents to join, however. WT:Social will likely never be that kind of social network.

If you want to join me in this experiment, here I am on WT:Social.

Read the original here:
Wikipedia Founders Facebook Competitor Is Basic And Buggy (But Interesting) - Forbes