Facebook to overtake Myspace in UK

Heather Hopkins - Hitwise UK: Facebook overtakes MySpace in Share of UK Internet Searches

The above link is to an interesting article profiling briefly the recent surge in Facebook's popularity in the UK. The actual metric being used the the increase of searches in the UK related to Facebook, which Hopkins says is a predictive indicator of the future direction that users will take. Last year, UK users were searching for Bebo more than other social networks, and Bebo is now the number one networking site in the UK. The same phenomenon is expected to occur in relation to Facebook.

In my opinion, all the recent success that Facebook has enjoyed has been the result of opening their platform to independent development. This is a huge step that suddenly made Facebook more than just a college-aged-party-friend-site. Now, there is serious potential to make money, mine real data about internet use, and expand the usability of just about everything, thanks to the development of the Facebook platform. In addition to the practical benefits of opening up the platform, the move helped put Facebook into the spotlight. People now have a new reason to talk about Facebook, whereas MySpace and Bebo are still the same as they were three months ago. So, the improved usability is the true achievement, but the notoriety has also benefited Facebook immensely in the short run.