Social Networks in the Infrastructure

Was musing after yesterday's post about where the future of Social Networks is going, and after kicking it around at Tuttle today I am increasingly thinking that it will be an enabling technology like email or web browsing, i.e (apart from the early frothy IPOs), a true Zero Billion Dollar industry. I went down this thought line:

1. It seems to mee that the we are way past the huge innovation of the early adoption phase, in fact it may even be that phase is coming to an end as reports of Facebook usage dropping in its early markets picks up.

2. The next stage is commoditisation, this is typically brought about by a mass move to a de jure or de facto standard that then becomes used by all, and is very low margin if not free so easily affordable.

3. The last stage is when it beomes embedded in the infrastructure (like email and web browsing now is) and "just works". Once upon a time the Internet didn't "just work", nor did email, or printers, or WiFi, nor did web browsing when Mosac first came out....now these all do

Email and Web Browsing both went this way (as did SMS), initially they operated in wa;;ed gardens, the walled gardens were then broken by interconnection (driven by outsede emergent open standards) and then taken over by open technology.

Seems to me that is going to be the path of Social Networking, so I expect to see my Stage 2 emerge over the next few years, and in 5 years time it will just be there, like web browsing and email, ignored unless it doesn't work, embedded in the Infrastructure