Phonebook as the social network

Update 09/06: Aka Aki: Mobile Social Networking “Auf die straße”

“First heard” from Om Malik, at the GigaOM Show ep 3:

When you come to think of it, at the end of the day the only […] social network that really matters, is the […] people in our cell phone.

Like, hell yeah. Well, probably even I had heard this concept before, but now was the time for it to finally crystallize in full extent and clarity—and, ah, it’s so dead simple. Once again, so funny how the most obvious things are so hard to spot. It’s amazing how this realization took this long.

Ayo, technology! The only technical issue with the concept is to get your phonebook to the web—for which at least just about all Nokia phones already contain an adequate over-the-air synchronization solution. It’s actually scary how trivial this’d be.

Also, Jaiku is definitely in the prime spot for this; they already pwn your contact list so it’d be trivial for them to bring it to the web (although their technology may currently be limited to Nokia phones.) Albeit, for me Jaiku is still merely a microblogging platform and less of a Facebook, but it’s probably just me once again. (Or, perhaps do some minor brand tweaking in the future?) They must have thought about this a lot as Jyri is a social systems heavyweight.

And if Jaiku’s not willing to head this direction, I’m sure it’d be fun and interesting to build such a system—just ask if you need some technology or extra hands. :)

Btw., also the note about “IM chat list” by Joyce was delightful. Although, I’m sure these lists will soon converge into a single contact book. (Like, d’uh.)

Tags: Social, Mobile, Web, Future