How does a social network that has been around since 2006, with limited
social media cred make an impact in today’s Web 2.0 world? Well,
perhaps if a well known mobile phone company with the resources of
Nokia was will willing to invest in it!
While Plum.com, which some call a micro-social network, consists of small groups of friends, classmates and even family members that like hitting the road together might to be a virtual unknown in social media circles, I’m sure Nokia was able to pick it up for a few plum nickles.
Plum began life as a social bookmarking site, and then evolved into the social networking space. It now consists of so-called Plum Groups for those who want to share the more private parts of their lives with small groups of people they are close to, according to a blog post by Hans Peter Brøndmo, Plum’s CEO and co-founder. It fills the need for "private" sharing and conversations, he wrote.
Back in 2007, when Brøndmo first introduced his new Plum network, he described it as a "simple idea" that makes "searching" for info online social!
Nokia has been beefing up its social media expertise for some time. In 2008, the company acquired the Berlin-based Plazes, the location-based social network (see my previous blog on the TOP TEN location-based social networks). Plazes lets friends update each other about what they are doing when and where, resulting in a Twitter-like activity stream that also includes integrated geo-tagging.
While I’m still not convinced why Nokia zoned in on Plum as it social network of choice, I can only guess it had something to do with "a bird in the hand…" mentality. Time will tell if the company is plum crazy, or their acquisition was really a peach of a deal when their line of smartphones launches the Plum Network later this year!
