It will sound strange to you, for me to write that social media is on a constant downward slope. Reading articles through the likes of Mashable you will undoubtedly hear that there has been x amount of growth for y social media service lately and blah blah blah. Its exponentially simple, the greater the user base, the greater the amount of eyes, and the greater determination that people will have to use it as a profit generating medium. 

This "medium" will them be utterly ruined for the people who valued it originally, based on its functional merit, and not on its potential. Sure, the biggest driver of social media to the masses is awareness first and foremost, but the life-cycle of any new social platform on the internet has become relatively predictable (and as follows):

  1. Launch 
  2. Early Adopters 
  3. Enthusiasts 
  4. Spammers
  5. General Masses 

Launch should be obvious, this is where the product hits the market, and becomes available to anyone who would like to use it. Most platforms that have social aspects as their primary reason for existence will find new users without anyone to talk to. 

Example: GoogleWave
Commonly seen phrase: "Have you tried X ?" "Yeah, I got on there, but nobody that I know uses it, and I haven't went back since." 

Early adopters will be the type of people that see merit in the functionality, and continue to use the service. Either that, or they are making an investment of their time with the consideration in mind that this service may gain popularity, and they will be considered a pioneer.
Example: Friendster in the US
Commonly seen phrase: "Have you heard about this new site called X" (p.s. I love the "this new site called" ... everyone has heard that before)

The Enthusiast era will see a large growth % of users, but not a large growth in the grand scheme of things. Here, you will have new users connecting for the first time because they have either been assigned by their workplace to check it out and see if it is worth investing into ... or noticed that someone they respect as an industry face is using it, and went to follow suit. During this time, the service has become more of a household name, but still has not yet popped. 
Example: MySpace circa 2004-5, FourSquare
Commonly seen phrase:  "Do you have a X account ?" or "Are you on X ?" (perhaps I should use Y)

Spammers will of course then set in, because after all, anything with a large enough audience will undoubtedly become fresh meat to spammers and frauds. Show me anything that may have new users who barely understand the concept, and I will show you a target rich environment for spammers. This phase could also be called "Early Adopter Corporate Edition" as this is when large companies begin to consider adding it to their marketing arsenal. At this point it begins to become a numbers game to users because the spammers and undesirables are making the early adopters seem less relevant.   
Example: Twitter circa late 2008, Facebook circa early 2007
Commonly seen phrase: "Look at how many followers I have."

Finally, the General Masses step in and demolish their previous traffic figures. Here you will see celebrities using the service, commercials saying "follow us on X", and of course late adopter spammers. The sound barrier on this era breaks when your mom uses the service for the first time. 
Example: Twitter after Ellen and Oprah, and Facebook (now), and MySpace (now), etc. etc. etc.
Commonly seem phase: "What do you mean you don't have an X account ?"

Surely there is a final era that is not listed here, but it really depends on where you fell in line. The community behind some services revert to their prior social ways once the general masses are "kinda over it" or "bored with it". Others become more niche, see: MySpace Music. 

Lets get back to being social. If you see me out there floating around on the interwebs, give me a wave ... just not a Google Wave. 


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