Wow, what is it with anti-social people starting social networks? I long ago lost track of my collection of ridiculous quotes from the Friendster guy. But I still remember him being outraged that people were using it wrong by creating profiles for abstract things they loved (cities, parks, stores, brands) and then friending them. Like, buddy, when your users find new ways to use your product, run with it. Instead, he just got big mad and banned a lot of people.

Looking back, Friendster strikes me as the single biggest missed opportunity of that decade. He had a two-year lead on Facebook. In a network-effect business! But through careful focus and diligent effort, he managed to blow it.

To some anti-social people, building a social network might seem like a solution to make social interactions more manageable.

wasnt inability to scale a part of it tho? we didnt know how to architect for eagerly connected graphs then.