Land Barons and Land Grabs

Social networking cha cha and the land grab

Some land barons say they are open to the idea of a Web without boundaries, but the business reality is collecting as many users as possible and keeping them fenced in, grazing on each other's social media. APIs and emerging standards, such as microformats and OpenID, will enable more semi-permeable boundaries, but for the foreseeable future users will be not be able to engage in the network of social networks.