Friendster was a

social network game A social network game (sometimes simply referred to as a social media game, social gaming, social video game or online social game) is a type of online game that is played through social networks or social media. They typically feature multipl ...

based in

Mountain View, California Mountain View is a city in Santa Clara County, California, United States. Named for its views of the Santa Cruz Mountains, it has a population of 82,376. Mountain View was integral to the early history and growth of Silicon Valley, and is the ...

, founded by

Jonathan Abrams Jonathan Abrams is a Canadian engineer, entrepreneur, and investor. He is best known as the founder of Friendster where he worked from 2002 to 2005. He then founded Socializr, where he worked from 2005 to 2010, and Nuzzel, where he stayed from 20 ...

and launched in March 2003.Eric Eldon, August 4, 2008.
Friendster raises $20 million, nabs a Googler to be CEO
VentureBeat. Retrieved December 4, 2008.Gary Rivlin, October 15, 2006.

" New York Times. Retrieved December 4, 2008. Later, the company became a social gaming site based in

Kuala Lumpur , anthem = ''Maju dan Sejahtera'' , image_map = , map_caption = , pushpin_map = Malaysia#Southeast Asia#Asia , pushpin_map_caption = , coordinates = , sub ...

Malaysia Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territories of Malaysia, thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two r ...

. Before Friendster was redesigned, the service allowed users to contact other members, maintain those contacts, and share online content and media with those contacts. The website was also used for dating and discovering new events, bands and hobbies. Users could share videos, photos, messages, and comments with other members via profiles and networks. It is considered one of the original social networks. After the launching of Friendster as a social gaming platform in June 2011, the number of registered users reached over 115 million. The company operated mainly from three Asian countries: the

Philippines The Philippines (; fil, Pilipinas, links=no), officially the Republic of the Philippines ( fil, Republika ng Pilipinas, links=no), * bik, Republika kan Filipinas * ceb, Republika sa Pilipinas * cbk, República de Filipinas * hil, Republ ...

, and

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, bor ...

, and over 90% of the site's traffic came from Asia. As of 2008, Friendster had more monthly unique visitors than any other social network in Asia.ComScore Press Release, June 30, 2008.
India and China Propel Internet Audience Growth in Asia-Pacific Region, According to comScore
", Press Release. Retrieved October 27, 2008.Ling Woo Liu, January 29, 2008.

", TIME. Retrieved October 27, 2008. Friendster remained notably popular in

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...

through 2012. On June 14, 2015, Friendster, citing "the evolving landscape in our challenging industry" and lack of engagement by the online community, suspended their services. Three years later, on June 30, 2018, it closed down as a company and eventually dissolved.

History

Friendster was founded by Canadian computer programmer

in 2002, before MySpace (2003),

Hi5 hi5 is an American social networking service based in San Francisco, California. It is owned by The Meet Group. Users can create a profile and provide personal information including interests, age, photos, and hometown. Users can also send f ...

(2004),

Facebook Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin Mosk ...

(2004) and other social networking sites. Friendster.com went live in 2003 and was adopted by 3 million users within the first few months. Friendster was one of the first of these sites to attain over 1 million members, although it was preceded by several other smaller social networking sites such as

SixDegrees.com SixDegrees.com is a social network service website that initially lasted from 1997 to 2000 and was based on the '' Web of Contacts'' model of social networking. It was named after the six degrees of separation concept and allowed users to list f ...

(1997) and

Makeoutclub Makeoutclub.com was an early social networking website, the first that catered to youth and indie music culture. Launched in 1999 by Gibby Miller, Makeoutclub introduced features and concepts (such as customizable user profiles with photos and int ...

(1999). The name Friendster is a

portmanteau A portmanteau word, or portmanteau (, ) is a blend of wordsNapster. Napster at the time was a controversial peer-to-peer file sharing Internet service that was launched in 1999; by 2000, "Napster" was practically a household name, thanks to several high-profile lawsuits filed against it that year. The original Friendster site was founded in

, and was privately owned. Friendster was based on the "Circle of Friends"

social network A social network is a social structure made up of a set of social actors (such as individuals or organizations), sets of dyadic ties, and other social interactions between actors. The social network perspective provides a set of methods for ...

technique for networking individuals in virtual communities and demonstrates the

small world phenomenon The small-world experiment comprised several experiments conducted by Stanley Milgram and other researchers examining the average path length for social networks of people in the United States. The research was groundbreaking in that it suggeste ...

. Friendster was considered the top online social network service until around April 2004, when it was overtaken by MySpace in terms of page views, according to

Nielsen//NetRatings Nielsen Media Research (NMR) is an American firm that measures media audiences, including television, radio, theatre, films (via the AMC Theatres MAP program), and newspapers. Headquartered in New York City, it is best known for the Nielsen rati ...

. Publications including ''Time'', ''Esquire'', ''Vanity Fair'', ''Entertainment Weekly'', ''Us Weekly'' and ''Spin'' wrote about Friendster's success, and the founder appeared on magazine covers and late-night talk shows. Friendster's rapid success inspired a generation of niche social networking websites, including

Dogster Dogster is a bimonthly magazine and website for dog lovers. Its sister publication is Catster, a bimonthly magazine and website for cat lovers. Dogster magazine (formerly Dog Fancy) has been continuously published since 1970, celebrating 50 yea ...

and

Elfster Elfster is a proprietary software application providing social networking features related to "secret Santa" style gift exchanges. It is available, without charge, as software as a service, via a website and via mobile apps for iOS and Android. ...

. Friendster had also received competition from all-in-one sites such as

Windows Live Spaces Windows Live Spaces was Microsoft's blogging platform and social network service. The site was originally released in early 2004 as MSN Spaces to compete with other social networking services, and re-launched in 2006 as a part of a shifting of comm ...

Yahoo! 360 Yahoo! (, styled yahoo''!'' in its logo) is an American web services provider. It is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California and operated by the namesake company Yahoo! Inc. (2017–present), Yahoo Inc., which is 90% owned by investment funds ma ...

, and Facebook. Google offered $30 million to buy out Friendster in 2003, but the offer was turned down. Friendster was then funded by Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield & Byers and

Benchmark Capital Benchmark is a venture capital firm based in San Francisco that provides seed money to startups. History The firm's most successful investment was a 1997 investment of $6.7 million in eBay for 22.1% of the company. In 2011, it invested $12 mil ...

in October 2003 with a reported valuation of $53 million. Friendster's decision to stay private instead of selling to Google in 2003 is considered one of the biggest blunders of

Silicon Valley Silicon Valley is a region in Northern California that serves as a global center for high technology and innovation. Located in the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, it corresponds roughly to the geographical areas San Mateo Coun ...

, the

Associated Press The Associated Press (AP) is an American non-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association. It produces news reports that are distributed to its members, U.S. ne ...

claims. In April 2004, John Abrams was removed as CEO, and Tim Koogle took over as interim CEO. Koogle previously served as president and CEO at Yahoo!. Scott Sassa later replaced Koogle in June 2004. Sassa left in May 2005 and was replaced by Taek Kwon. Taek Kwon was then succeeded by Kent Lindstrom, following a capitalization by Kleiner and Benchmark that valued Friendster at less than 5% of its 2003 valuation. In 2008, Friendster had a membership base of more than 115 million registered users and continued to grow in Asia.Press Release, October 21, 2008.
Friendster is the #1 Social Network for Adults and Youth in Malaysia
, Press Release. Retrieved October 27, 2008. According to Alexa, the site suffered an exponential decline in traffic in America beginning in 2009. From a peak 40 ranking, it dropped to position 800 in November 2010. Most people have since attributed this decline to the rise of Facebook, a rival social networking site. In August 2008, Friendster hired ex-Google executive Richard Kimber as the CEO.Heather Havenstein, October 28, 2008.
Friendster Opens Platform to Developers
", PC World. Retrieved October 27, 2008. Kimber focused on Friendster's expansion in Asia. On December 9, 2009, it was announced that Friendster had been acquired for $26.4 million by an internet company based in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia named MOL Global. MOL's ownership of Friendster patents including one for a "System, method, and apparatus for connecting users in an online computer system based on their relationships within social networks" and Friendster's other core technical infrastructure patents, were bought by Facebook for $40 million in 2010. In June 2011, the company re-positioned itself as a social gaming site. It discontinued user social network accounts, but Friendster accounts had not been deleted, and users could still log in using their existing passwords. Users' contact lists were preserved, along with basic information. Friendster said that the focus would now be on pure "entertainment and fun", and the aim was not to compete with Facebook, but rather to complement it. On June 14, 2015, the site and all its services shut down indefinitely, but the company did not officially shutter until the end of June 2018.

Financial history

The company was founded in 2002 with a $12 million investment by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers,

, and private investors. In 2003, Friendster management received a $30 million buyout offer from Google, which it declined. Friendster received another $3 million in funding in February 2006 from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Benchmark Capital.Dawn Kawabata, August 21, 2006.
Friendster scoops up $10 million in funding
" CNET News. Retrieved October 23, 2021. In August 2006, Friendster also received $10 million in funding in a round led by

DAG Ventures DAG Ventures is an American venture capital firm based in Palo Alto, California. DAG Ventures works with startups in providing early stage and growth stage funding. Since its founding in 2004, by Tom Goodrich and John Cadeddu, the firm has backed ...

, and Friendster announced in August 2008 that it had raised an additional $20 million in funding in a round led by

IDG Ventures IDG Ventures is a global family of venture funds with approximately $3.6 billion under management. All of the funds were originally sole-source-funded by International Data Group. The first fund was created by IDG in 1996 and was located in ...

. Prior to its acquisition by MOL Global, Friendster was backed by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers,

, IDG Ventures, and individual investors.

Awards and recognitions

* In July 2006, Friendster was awarded Key Social Networking Technology Patent. * In 2007, Friendster was selected by AlwaysOn Media as Top 100 Private Company Award Winner. * In April 2008, Friendster became a

Webware A web application (or web app) is application software that is accessed using a web browser. Web applications are delivered on the World Wide Web to users with an active network connection. History In earlier computing models like client-serve ...

100 winner. * In 2009, the site was the subject of a satirical portrayal by The Onion News Network of the site's discovery as an archaeological relic, untouched since 2005.

Services

In November 2009, Friendster announced a global partnership with MOL AccessPortal Berhad (MOL), a leading payments provider leveraging a network of over 600,000 physical and virtual payment channels worldwide, to power the Friendster Wallet and a payments platform enabling micro-spending for over 115 million registered users on Friendster. The Friendster Wallet was designed to support a variety of payment methods including pre-paid cards, mobile payments, online payments and credit card payments. Friendster also had content partners, including game developers and publishers who provided monetization solutions on the Friendster platform using MOL's payment channels and Friendster's large user base. Sub-brands of Friendster included "Friendster iCafe", a cybercafe management system, and "Friendster Hotspots", a free

Wi-Fi Wi-Fi () is a family of wireless network protocols, based on the IEEE 802.11 family of standards, which are commonly used for local area networking of devices and Internet access, allowing nearby digital devices to exchange data by radio wav ...

infrastructure for retailers.

Languages

Available languages include English,

Filipino Filipino may refer to: * Something from or related to the Philippines ** Filipino language, standardized variety of 'Tagalog', the national language and one of the official languages of the Philippines. ** Filipinos, people who are citizens of th ...

, Thai, Malay,

Vietnamese Vietnamese may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Vietnam, a country in Southeast Asia ** A citizen of Vietnam. See Demographics of Vietnam. * Vietnamese people, or Kinh people, a Southeast Asian ethnic group native to Vietnam ** Overse ...

, Indonesian, Chinese (both Traditional and Simplified),

Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspor ...

Korean Korean may refer to: People and culture * Koreans, ethnic group originating in the Korean Peninsula * Korean cuisine * Korean culture * Korean language **Korean alphabet, known as Hangul or Chosŏn'gŭl **Korean dialects and the Jeju language ** ...

, and

Spanish Spanish might refer to: * Items from or related to Spain: **Spaniards are a nation and ethnic group indigenous to Spain **Spanish language, spoken in Spain and many Latin American countries **Spanish cuisine Other places * Spanish, Ontario, Can ...

. Users can also enter content on Friendster in any language. Friendster launched all

language Language is a structured system of communication. The structure of a language is its grammar and the free components are its vocabulary. Languages are the primary means by which humans communicate, and may be conveyed through a variety of ...

support on a single domain – www.friendster.com. Friendster was the first global online social network to support Asian languages and others on a single domain so that users from around the world were able to talk to each other.

Development

Friendster has been an open site since August 2006 when it first began allowing widgets and content to be embedded in user profile pages through its developer program. Catherine Holahan, May 22, 2007.
Sharing the Widget Wealth
" BusinessWeek. Retrieved December 4, 2008. In 2007, roughly 40% of Friendster's users had widgets on their profiles. Friendster gave software developers access to

API An application programming interface (API) is a way for two or more computer programs to communicate with each other. It is a type of software interface, offering a service to other pieces of software. A document or standard that describes how ...

s that utilized content and data within the Friendster network to build and deploy customizable applications on and off Friendster. Friendster's Developer Program was an open, non- proprietary platform with an open revenue model.Lawrence Coburn, November 3, 2008.
Widget Summit: Hi5 vs. Friendster
" Sexy Widget. Retrieved December 4, 2008. Friendster was the first social network to support both the

OpenSocial OpenSocial is a public specification that defines a component hosting environment (container) and a set of common application programming interfaces (APIs) for web applications. Initially, it was designed for social network applications and d ...

and the Facebook Platform. In December 2009, Friendster relaunched its website with a new

interface Interface or interfacing may refer to: Academic journals * ''Interface'' (journal), by the Electrochemical Society * '' Interface, Journal of Applied Linguistics'', now merged with ''ITL International Journal of Applied Linguistics'' * '' Int ...

Patents

Friendster held some fundamental online social networking patents: *A system, method and apparatus for connecting users in an online computer *Method of Inducing Content Uploads in a Social Network *System and Method for Managing Connections in an Online Social Network *Compatibility Scoring of Users in a Social Network *Method for sharing relationship information stored in a social network In August 2010, Facebook confirmed that it had acquired all patents from Friendster for a reported $40M, effectively rendering the company an arms length subsidiary of Facebook.

Site transformation

In June 2011, Friendster shifted from social networking site to a social entertainment site with a focus on gaming and entertainment. Previous users' accounts are unchanged. However, all the photos, messages, comments, testimonials, shoutouts, blogs, forums and groups that the users may have had in the past may no longer be part of their Friendster account. An exporting tool is provided to back up the information of the user account. This tool has the ability to export photos to Flickr and Multiply. The deadline given to users to export their photos was extended to June 27, 2011. Photos which were not exported before the deadline were removed and are no longer retrievable. In the two months after the new Friendster relaunched, the site attracted more than half a million new users and included over 40 games. Daily and monthly active users increased by 50%, with more than 90% of new users coming from Asia. At the end of 2015 Friendster closed the website and related services and on July 1, 2018 it officially ceased to exist as a company.

References

External links

* {{Online social networking American social networking websites Blog hosting services Defunct companies of Malaysia Defunct social networking services Defunct video game companies of the United States Internet properties disestablished in 2015 Internet properties established in 2002 Malaysian websites Video game companies disestablished in 2018 Video game companies established in 2002