Hey Scott, it's a valid question and it comes up quite often in my conversations as well. I have two responses, both of which warrant full posts.
First, users may want some walls. MySpace is a mess, and savvy users would rather spend their time in communities with a better signal:noise ratio. Walls afford that.
With walls, users have a nice, quiet space full of unfreaky like-minded people. The second answer, for people who want to spread the word a bit, is to create an "Open Portal" with easy-in/easy-out tools:
OpenID and good import tools get people in easily
Widgets/apps and content syndication allow users to carry content beyond the borders of the community
You can read more about it on Eric's blog, but it's something I'd like to write about in greater detail. Open Portals are the next evolution of Widgets and OpenID, it's just a matter of someone implementing them intelligently.
Niche != walls
Hey Scott, it's a valid question and it comes up quite often in my conversations as well. I have two responses, both of which warrant full posts.
First, users may want some walls. MySpace is a mess, and savvy users would rather spend their time in communities with a better signal:noise ratio. Walls afford that.
With walls, users have a nice, quiet space full of unfreaky like-minded people. The second answer, for people who want to spread the word a bit, is to create an "Open Portal" with easy-in/easy-out tools:
You can read more about it on Eric's blog, but it's something I'd like to write about in greater detail. Open Portals are the next evolution of Widgets and OpenID, it's just a matter of someone implementing them intelligently.