The competition between social networking sites never ceases to slow. As fast as these sites can change and develop features, other social medias are not far behind. Remember Bulletin Board System (BBS) or Friendster before Myspace and Facebook? And Facebook before Twitter?

While our different networking sites do have their aesthetic as well as functional differences, they do seem to be converging.

Facebook has developed an entire new interface to step up the competition…

This simpler, no-extras alternative is aimed at users around the world that are new to social networking as well as to those users with low bandwidth. It also may appeal to users tired of all the distractions and unused non-essentials on the regular interface.

Not to mention, Facebook also added Twitter-like features to its established version. Users can now “tag” friends or companies that they mention in status updates with the same “@” tag. Tagging on Twitter allows us to interconnect and expand our networks quickly and easily. It provides a real-time index of our contacts and Facebook was
smart to adopt the same capabilities.

The question remains, is it a partnership or a competition that drives the two together? Last fall Facebook made an unsuccessful attempt to acquire Twitter. Facebook spokeswoman Meredith Chin played down the appearance of competition saying the changes are simply in response to the “evolution of how people are communicating online”. Still, others argue that the two social networks are threats to each other and they are in direct competition. Twitter founder, Biz Stone says: “Our services are complimentary to mobile networks, social networks, search engines, software platforms, television networks and maybe a few more we haven’t thought of yet.”

Check out this NY Times Article titled, “Facebook is Going for Some Twitter Sensibility.”

In an effort to acquire those who prefer the simplicity or real-time aspect of Twitter, Facebook has got us thinking… will there ever be a “one-stop” social networking site?

Check out the new version and let me know what you think.