Since web browsing has been the latest trend in gaining information today, social network sites have a big role in communications. These sites will help us re-connect with friends whom we haven’t seen for a long time, get updates from friends and relatives from distant countries and meet people whom we have same interests with. Because of its demands nowadays, social networking sites have increase in numbers but there are those network sites that are phenomenal and very useful in networking and communicating.
Here are some social networking sites that you should join to help you connect with friends and network with other people.

Facebook- is one the most visited social networking sites in the world. It has 70,278,000 unique visitors as of May 2009 according to comScore based on US Internet users. Facebook focus more on interactions and usage of their sites. Users can create profiles including photos and lists of personal interests, exchange private or public messages, join groups of friends, become a fan of the fan pages and even play games (Mafia, Poker, Farm Town, Pet Society, etc.)

MySpace- is the largest social networking site in the world. It offers networking with friends, personal profiles, blogs, groups, photos, music, and videos for all ages internationally. MySpace focuses on the music industry so users can get updates to concerts and albums of artist and look for bands or singers that they like. Unlike Facebook, users can customize their MySpace profile according to their taste.

Bebo- is a social networking site that is more popular in Ireland and UK. Most of their users are from younger generations. Bebo’s profile is also customizable which includes the “About me” section, comments section, photo albums, friends list and other modules of you favorites and interest.

Hi5- is a social networking site that is currently the twenty-fifth most popular website according to Alexa Internet. Like Bebo and MySpace, users can also customize their profiles according to their taste. Users profile also display user information, interests and comments from friends.

Tagged- is one of the fast rising social networking sites. Users can customize profiles, send messages, leave comments, post bulletins, customize status, browse photos, watch videos, play games, give gifts, give tags, chat and make friends.

Orkut, a social networking site operated by Google which is designed in order to create an active and exciting social life. It helps the users to gain new buddies, maintain current relationships through messages or images. By simply logging in with your Gmail account you can have full access with Orkut’s social network. This service was developed through the effort of a Google employee named Orkut Büyükkökten.

Like any other social networking sites, Orkut comes out with different features:

• Scrapbook – users can put photos, audio/podcast, widgets or Youtube videos to share with their friends by just simply copying and pasting the url or its embedded code.
• Communities – anyone can create their own community at Orkut: post new topics, testimonials or events, create polls and even playing games.
• Applications – Orkut’s applications just began last April 16, 2008. Their app includes Chat Rooms, PhotoBuzz!, Chakpak Movies, IQ Test and a lot more. Users can also send their own suggested application.
• Profile – there are three divisions under profile page: social, professional and personal
• Other features are starting up or adding a group, adding friends, becoming a fan of a fellow friend or even evaluate a friend like “cool”, “trustworthy” or “sexy”.

These are just of the coolest facets Orkut has to offer to its users. Orkut is originally hosted in California but their mass numbers of users are coming from Brazil and then followed by India. The social networking site is now under the management of Google Brazil for the reason that greater percentages of users are Brazilian. 

But if this social networking site will be promoted well to the public, it will attract users worldwide because they have the X factor to compete with other social networking sites.

Four Social Media sites get rank on the top ten most traffic sites worldwide today base on alexa statistical record. This sites are You Tube, Myspace, Facebook, Orkut.

• You Tube –A video sharing community network site that grab the rank of top number three most traffic site worldwide and the top number one site in Social Media (Web 2.0) category and one of the most number of active user worldwide.
• Myspace – Social Networking Site that got the rank top number six (6) most traffic site worldwide.
• Facebook – a social networking site that launched in 2004 come to rank number seven (7) most traffic site worldwide.
• Orkut – Social networking and discussion site operated by Google, it is popular networking site in Brazil and India and rank at top number nine (9) most traffic site worldwide.

Top rank sites base on their number of traffic.

Alexa Internet Inc. - base in California, USA and a subsidiary company of Amazon.com that provides information about the web traffic to a websites.