Minggl claims ‘redefining social networking’

Peter Dinham
Wednesday, 21 October 2009 13:32

IT Industry - Market

So-called social interaction manager, Minggl, has today released a new Web browser-based application with a bold claim that the app will do things others won’t do, such as allowing people to access multiple social networking communities simultaneously, manage privacy in different contexts, and socialise “quickly, easily and seamlessly” with friends and family across disparate social networks like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Digg, and Flickr.

Launching its Minggl 2.0 application, the company CEO, Dewey Gaedcke, said that while there have been “numerous products which aggregate friends’ and ‘news stream’ information from multiple networks, none have included inbox/email or privacy, and none are designed from the ground up to figure out who among your 100‘s of contacts are most important in your life right now.”

Gaedcke claimed that the core design of the Minggl product and vision is “unique in that it functions like an executive assistant who knows the ‘social-tie-strength’ of people in your network. 
 
“Future versions will be able to use this insight to automatically manage the level and importance of social media interaction, accurately prioritize information, and sort relationship contexts in a manner similar to human behavior.” Minggl says this latest application runs on both Internet Explorer and Firefox.

According to Gaedcke, Minggl’s “sophisticated software analyzes interaction patterns between people and can differentiate between those who might be casual contacts or close friends and family.  Minggl’s ability to differentiate social interactions will allow users to focus on people and information that are most worthy of their attention while filtering out the rest.”

Another “unique feature” of Minggl, Gaedcke said, “is its social annotation capabilities known as Minggl Notes, with which, he added, you can post a video, image or text message on any website and share it privately and securely with any of your Minggl contacts.

“In the real world, the human brain automatically prioritizes people and information based on agenda and social tie-strength. Every time you encounter someone, this prioritization dictates how (or whether) you connect with them (ie, a hug vs. a handshake or perhaps a formal introduction) and your brain doesn't care whether you’re connecting via Facebook, cell phone, email or at the grocery store.  The social web should mirror human behavior and function in a relationship-centric manner instead of a venue-centric manner.  This will let us filter news and communicate based on who people are, rather than where they hang out.”

In its new application announcement, Minggl points out that nearly two-thirds of the world’s Internet users visit social networking or blogging Web sites and account for almost 10 percent of the total time spent online, according to a March 2009 Nielsen report. 

The Texas-based company also says that, while social networks such as MySpace originally targeted younger Internet users, “they have become more mainstream and the audience has become older,” and stresses that this shift is due primarily to “adults using Facebook whose recent growth has come from people aged 35-49 years of age.   Between 2007-2008, Facebook added almost twice as many 50-64 year old users (13.6 million) as 18 year-old users (7.3 million), according to Minggl.