AOL Lifestream: The Next Social Innovation

AOL have just upped the social networking stakes with the launch of their Lifestream as a stand alone social aggregator . The concept is similar to that of Friendfeed , as it allows users to combine third party social networks onto one platform. At present the social networking sites working with Lifestream include Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Foursquare, Delicious, Digg, Flickr, YouTube and although Google Buzz is not yet included in this list AOL says it is soon to follow.

With Lifestream if you follow a Lifestream user you will then be able to see all of the content that user publishes on a variety of networks, and as Lifestream automatically pulls in the content from people you already follow on social networks, users aren’t required to create more friends lists. The benefit of this service is also enhanced by Lifestream penchant for “noise cancellation for social networks” as you can silence not only feed for certain sites but particular users whose updates fail to interest you.

With Lifestream users can actually publish onto their social networks through the one portal, and with so many people now using a variety on social networking platforms the benefit of this does not need to be spelled out. However what commentators are getting the most excited about is the Lifestream function allowing users to note their location in status updates using the GPS from mobile devices, or alternatively by adding it manually. From this users will now be able to follow locations in the same way they would follow friends. Not only does this show true innovation for users but the scope for marketers focusing on social networking sites just got even more interesting.

And the final seal of approval…..TechCrunch have been quoted as saying that Lifestream is ‘simple, intuitive and really, really useful’ as not only does it function as a social network on its own but is heavily integrated with the other major social networks.

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