By now, most Internet users are familiar with the concept of online virtual communities, colloquially referred to as Social Networking.  At present, there many dozens of statistically significant social networking sites online, including several dozen in the Alexa Global 500 Rankings, and 15 that have made their way into individual countries top ten lists.

Despite the open and borderless nature of the Internet, such online communities still tend to cluster geographically.  In this map, we illustrate the prevalence of the ten most prevalent Social networking websites reported around the world.

As is the case with many top-ranked websites, a barrier to further growth exists in their ability to support regionally dominant languages.  In this sense, social networking websites such as Odnoklassniki and В Контакте have established themselves firmly throughout Russia and other former Soviet Union states.  Similarly, the website Skyrock.com- a social networking website launched by a popular French radio station with whom it shares its namesake- ranks highly in countries where the French language remains a dominating force, irrespective of geographical boundaries.  Friendster, another popular social network website, enjoys high rankings in southeast Asia, no doubt due to its high level support for regional languages such as Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and Vietnamese.

 Other patters are not so easily discernable.  For example it isn’t immediately clear that Hi5- the number fourth-largest social networking website in the world- maintains a dominant presence in Latin America.  However, despite the popularity of competing social networking websites Facebook and Orkut, Hi5 enjoys top rankings in the majority of the Spanish-speaking Latin American countries, and 2nd place status in the remaining few.

While language-centric social networking websites is interesting, the lack of such sites is equally relevant.  For example, Facebook enjoys market dominance in much of the middle east and eastern Africa, despite its origins amongst United States universities and its “west-centric” culture.  To date, no clear Arabic-language social networking website has expressed any level of dominance.

But in some cases, logical explanation may be harder to come by.  For example, Orkut enjoys popularity Brazil, Estonia, Ireland, and the Indian subcontinent, despite the vastly different languages and cultures, and geographical disparity.

Lastly, we see several countries where Social Networking websites do not even rank within the top ten.  The reasons for these may vary widely, from a lack of a clear victor (as is likely in western Europe and the southern tip of South America) to government filtering (as may be the case in countries such as China, Iran, and Libya).

• What explanation can be given to the exceptions to Hi5’s dominance in Latin America and the Caribbean, in particular, Panama/Colombia, and Bolivia/Chile?
• Why is Orkut a favorite in Estonia instead of it’s more regionally centric Odnoklassniki and В Контакте?
• There appears to be a tight race between Friendster, MySpace, and Hi5 in southeast Europe.  Why?
• Is there any cultural explanations that could suggest low market interest in Social Networking in Spain, Germany and Japan?
• What assumptions, if any, could be made about the unreported segments of Africa?

Read the news nowadays and you might think that the Google search engine is the only search engine in existence.  While the Mountain View, California search giant clearly exerts dominance as a percentage of market share on a global scale, its leadership isn’t so well defined at a regional level.

This map is particularly interesting in that, more so than other maps, the geographical boundaries of market dominance is much clearer.  While no rule can be expected to encompass 100% of the scenarios, it is immediately clear that the lines between success and mediocrity can be drawn on language boundaries.

Consider the case of live.com, the revamped search engine operated by Microsoft which grew from its predecessor, MSN Search.  As of early 2008, MSN continues to show strong showing throughout the much of the Americas, western Europe, and Nordic states.  On the other hand, yahoo has grown roots in much of the rest of the world.  What is not clear is if this is because if the Microsoft search engines inability to adequately meet the needs of speakers of non-latin based languages, or if yahoo instead offers something not available to live.com users.

What is clear however, is that Cyrillic and Chinese language sets appear to be the sole domain of google.com  Neither Yahoo nor Live.com possess #10 results in many countries where languages based on these alphabets are used.  Considering the dynamic and emerging nature of the economies where these languages are spoken, this may suggest further tough times ahead for the #2 and #3 ranked search engine providers.

• There appear to be “Islands of Resistance” to Google’s dominance in Colombia, India, and Indonesia.  Why?
• As you move west to east across Europe, the dominate players switch from Google/MSN, to Google/Yahoo, to Google alone.  Why?
• Why is there no defined “winner” between MSN and Yahoo in the Middle East?
• Why is MSN so clearly established in South America?
• This map does not include Baidu, an overwhelmingly popular search engine in China, Hong Kong, and Macao- far more so than even Google.  Considering this, what does this Chinese-language engine offer that even Google does not?

Many people may not be aware of the prevalence of one-click uploading services on a global scale.  In fact, such service maintain a silent foothold on the top spots in many countries, and their use is growing at an sprinters pace.

Despite this, their use is not necessarily popular on a truly global scale.  At present, the majority of countries were one-click upload services are popular can be found within a cone of countries with its apex focused squarely on the middle east, but extending well into the Africa, southern Europe, and the Indian subcontinent, with pockets of use along the western coast of South America and in portions of Indonesia.

• A sizable portion of internet technologies establish themselves in western civilizations, and from there spread to the rest of the world.  What dynamics cause one-click uploading services to spread roots using a different pattern?
• One proposed explanation of the growth pattern of one-click uploading services establishes a correlation between them and countries with lax or non-existent copyright laws, implying that such services are used primarily for the spread of copyrighted material, such as movies and music.  Is this a justifiable explanation?

Google maintains several properties that routinely enjoy high rankings in the country’s top 10 lists.  Besides the traditional Google search page (and country specific variations) Google also operates the Blogger.com Weblog service, The YouTube video sharing service, and Orkut, a Social Networking application. 

• Is it logical to conclude that the popularity of the non search products in Latin America also extend to other Google services such as Gmail, GoogleTalk, Picasa, and FeedBurner?
• Is at there a common reason why the collective package of services seems to be particularly popular in Latin America?

As a general rule, website owners are told to avoid vanity Top Level Domains and other domain hacks, and instead encouraged use more traditionally accepted .com and .net TLDs.  Despite this, a significant percentage of top 10 domains use country code TLD’s.  Interestingly, the frequency of ccTLD’s in the top ten appear to be greater in and around Russia and the Baltic states.

It’s worth pointing out that Google Search employs domain redirection for their search page.  That is, a search user in India who accesses www.google.com will be redirected to the Google search page specific to that country, for example, www.google.com.in.

Not all countries permit unrestricted registration of their associated ccTLD.  In many cases, the company must maintain some level of presence in the country in order to qualify for registration.

• What rationale can explain why ccTLD’s are so much popular in Russia and Eastern Europe than in the west?
• Has Google’s extensive use of ccTLD’s contributed (at some level) to its global success as a search provider?
• Does Google’s redirection tactic result in “double votes” with respect to their ranking in Alexa?