Since there has been microblogging there has been the Microblogwars.

The original war was between Twitter and a service called Jaiku, which launched a few month before Twitter but has since been closed to the public by Google. A number of social sites also include microblogging as part of their service. These are often called status updates and can be found on Facebook and MySpace.

Pownce, created by Digg founder Kevin Rose, also joined the fray just recently. Along with Spoink which includes all forms of multimedia blogging. Even Plurk is considered a contender for the Microblog Crown.

One of the most recent additions has been Identi.ca. Identi.ca is an open-source service, which means that not only is it free, it also makes all its code public. However, the look and feel of Identi.ca is almost indetical to Twitter which made it a huge competitor during Twitter's down time. Identi.ca had record sign-up in its first 24-hours. Many disgruntled Tweeple at least tested the service, many more simply reserved their name and waited to see what would happen.

Since Indenti.ca's opening it has stayed mostly under the radar. Little buzz has continued about Identi.ca "replacing" Twitter. This may be due to a number of small glitches from Identi.ca.

But why is there a need to compete? Is one service really better than the other? MySpace and Facebook really offer two different services yet they are always lumped together and compared? The same thing happened when Plurk got hot. Die-hard Twitter fans raged that Plurk was a copy-cat out to ride on Twitter's famous coat-tails. Are they really offering the same service? I think not. Identi.ca has a lot of similarities with its cousin Twitter, but if they begin to offer something extra (as foretold in the wondrous FAQ), they will have earned their place among the Microblogging Nobles.

Though the true colors of Identi.ca have not yet been revealed. Whether Identi.ca's extreme replication of Twitter's interface will help or hurt has yet to be seen. But, I think the one of the joys of the internet is being able to access and experiment with numerous social sites. Then you can test and try them and find a personal fit. Plus, a little healthy competition never hurt anyone.

Tags: Identi.ca, Microblogging, Twitter

This entry was posted on Monday, July 28th, 2008 at 9:35 am and is filed under Trends, Veribatim. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.