Who Has the Most Friends on Avatars United? (And Will Their Network Lead to Twitter-esque Fame and Influence?)

Linden Lab's new social network Avatars United has been running as a Linden property for nearly two weeks, and I'm curious how effectively it's, well, uniting avatars. One data point for that is looking at accounts with the most friends. Not only does this number suggest how large the total social network is, but if previous social networks are a guide, how much influence the top networkers will accrue. MySpace, after all, gave us the concept of a social network celebrity, who becomes famous mainly by the amount of network friends she has. I say "she" because I'm thinking in particular of Tila Tequila, who parlayed her million-plus MySpace friends into a TV and recording career. (Though ironically, was all ignored but when she set up shop in Second Life.) More recently (and more importantly), the Twitter users with the most followers have a status that also gives them influence and commercial value.

All that said, which avatar on Avatars United has united the most avatars?

A brief survey suggests the Resident with the most connections is fashionista Tenshi Vielle, at the moment with 642. That's only slightly less than company CEO M. Linden, who currently counts 692. Is there anyone else with a wider circle of connections? And do you think the strength of their network will influence the larger social circles of Second Life?

Update, 11:35am:

Wow. In Comments, Lalo Telling notes that fashion content creator Veronique Snook has nearly 2600 AU friends. Reader lufpleh and Eboni Khan point out that mentor and land baron Dirk Talamasca has just over 2000, from a current total of 6973 Second Life-related Avatars United accounts.

Comments

[Peter Stindberg]

I have countless contacts on AU - I simply accepted all request. But since you asked for FRIENDS - probably 10.

[spyvspyaeon]

I found so annoying having tons of people, (who I don't know who they are) that I've deleted my account. So 0 friends there. btw (didn't found anything interesting on Avatars United). Maybe it is me but "what is that for?.

[Arcadian Vanalten]

I've been spammed for adds from people I've never heard of. I don't get that behavior; why would you want to friend someone with whom you have nothing in common and no joint interactions ever?

[Foobar Merlin]

quote: "what is it for?"

The same as Facebook, Myspace, [insert other social network site] is for. Just not for "real" poeple, but for avatars. ;)

[Crap Mariner]

Zero. Deleted them all and killed the email alerts.

Wake me up when it's out of early alpha and actually has some utility to it.

-ls/cm

[lufpleh]

Dirk Talamasca spanks 692 with a grand total of 2001 out of a registered 6968 accounts associated with Second Life

[Hamlet Au]

Interesting, Lufpleh! What's the source for that registered accounts stat?

[lufpleh]

From the Avatar United website Search

On the AU search page enter a space as the search term, then select Avatar tab then the appropriate drop down boxes and click Filter results.

When I checked last week Wow had approx 22k accounts, Eve 5.2k & SL about 5.7k. Now Sl @ 6973

The remainder of the the 42k accounts are spread over the other various platforms. No idea how many are active/dead accounts.

Dirk just friended "MJ Linden" whoever that may be!! lol

[Eboni Khan]

http://www.avatarsunited.com/avatars/dirk-talamasca

2006 friends, right on his profile page

[Lalo Telling]

I received a request this morning from Veronique Snook, whoever she is, who has 2572 names on her list.

- - - - -
The source for number of total avatars registered can be found here:

http://www.avatarsunited.com/search?page=1&q=&section=avatars&world_id=3&world_realm_id=0&world_region_id=0

With Teen Grid registrations filtered out, the total as of this moment is 6974. Add the Teeners, it's 7030.

[Nightbird Glineux]

"Who Has the Most Friends on Avatars United?"

Slow news day?

[Arcadian Vanalten]

Yup. Ms Schnook was one of the random add-spams I got, too. Which means I guess I now have common ground w/ Lalo *grins*

[Sidney Smalls]

I'm not sure how spamming random people with invites will result in "influence." Mostly it will result in them being unfriended as soon as they actually post anything, because really nobody wants to hear it.

The whole site is annoying and frankly downright pathetic.

[Veeyawn Spoonhammer]

I've also received a TON of friend requests from people I don't know. If you're out there and I don't know you, don't ask to be my friend.

As for AU in general, I can only hope for tighter integration with SL in general.

[Talia Tokugawa]

I religiously ignore any unites from people I don't know unless they come with a good introduction (eg. last unknown I accepted had a 300+ word intro). I have four accounts registered there and Veronique has hit all four. (two pretty much unused avatar, one "collectable" and Talia)

I have to agree with crap over the alpha comment. Saying it's beta is very very optimistic and things get worse when you start getting into the developer side of things. User authentication should have definitely been sorted out before LL made the announcement.

That being said. Once things do get sorted and there are more/better applications there I can see it being a very good place to keep a lot of info about SL all in one place. I have several apps in development that at least for me I see as essential to it's long term appeal.

[Tateru Nino]

There's only a handful of people on AU who'll turn down a unite, so - like most social networking tools, the folks with the most connections are the ones who asked the most people.

Few of us would know or recognize the names of 9 out of 10 of the people we're united with on AU in practice.

The less practical it is for bi-directional social communication, the more likely people are to accept invitations. That seems to hold true across the board.

[Uccello]

Since joining AU at it's inception I've accepted three "unite" requests, all but one coming since The Lab bought the service. I have declined nearly two dozen requests, all from people that I have never met nor even heard of before. What's the point? Is there a contest I missed? Is it "She who dies with the most friends wins"? The only reason I joined at all was to keep my avatar name. As yet I have not seen a single useful purpose for the service.

[Fuzzball Ortega]

I usually check the profiles of the one's who request a "Unite". Some I go ahead and approve, seeing as how I know them in world.

Usually, if someone is in a same group, like the RFL of SL group, as I am, I'll go ahead and accept.

Still, there's more to do on Facebook and Myspace than on AU.

[YP]

I thought Veronique Snook was only my friend, I'm well miffed.

[Robward Antwerp]

Clearly we have to ask what is meant by "friends" in this context. Given I've seen folks with 6000+ friends listed... There is no way that is anything other than spam. No other connection. Don't get me wrong... I have a blog, use twitter, facebook and am a long term sl resident... but I choose my friends (even unsolicited friends requests) based on what I know about them. So far... of the many many request I've gotten in AU none are known to me in any way. The 9 I have listed are there only because I haven't cared enough to go in and delete them. If LL hopes I/we will use this site in even a "facebook" like manner... they need to rethink how it currently is working.

[Jura Shepherd]

I don't really see how I can be harmed by uniting with someone I don't already know. I see it as kind of the point actually. On it's own, SL is mostly socially myopic so AU could have potential even if it's just to meet a few interesting people outside my own social group.

That said, AU feels a bit sterile and removed so far and I don't really feel compelled to use it over other things like twitter or moolto. I'm not giving up. I'm just sayin'

[Hitomi Tiponi]

Thanks for pointing out some of the people who are gaming the system and clearly have such low self-esteem that they need avoiding (no matter how famous or talented they are).

[Opensource Obscure]

I'm currently accepting almost all unite requests, hoping to meet some new interesting people.

However, I'm also "de-friending" those contacts I don't really know .. the same moment they send me an invite to a group I'm not interested in.

[Hamlet Au]

To get a more meaningful scan on influence, we'd need to know how many of these friendship requests were offered to the account holder, as opposed to by them. (That's why Twitter's "followers" metric is so compelling, it measures how many people *want* to know what the person being followed is Tweeting.) But I doubt the Lindens will cough up that data.

[Ann Otoole]

Well if something isn't done about the group spammers soon the entire concept of AU is going to forever evaporate as everyone goes and deletes all unites and never accepts another so the banner ads won't show on profiles before accepted.

[Veronque Snook]

Hello to all.

I am Veronique Snook and contrary to what you think I am a real person :))). You can contact me on the site where in Second Life, I am happy to know you :)

kiss all :)

[SecondLie]

Veronique Snook?
Dirk Talamasca?

Pffft. Posers.

Here's the deal: make me the avatar with the most friends on Avatars United, and I give $100US to SL Relay For Life.

http://www.avatarsunited.com/avatars/secondlie

DRINK FROM THE SOCIAL MEDIA FIREHOSE!

Love,
SecondLie

[Dedric Mauriac]

about 1700 friends here, but i stopped inviting people about a week and a half ago.

[Tateru Nino]

I offered about four or five 'unite' requests. All the rest I accepted, pretty much indiscriminately. Ms Snook was apparently one of the latter.

[Arcadian Vanalten]

"Influence" is an interesting concept. Having contact w a zillion or so others is not the same thing as having credibility. There are those Twits I keep up with, but mostly out of morbid curiousity to see what train wreck they're gonna get into next. Does NOT mean I'd seriously give weight to their thoughts.

Popularity does not equal significance.

[Nexii Malthus]

Hm, wish I could delete/destroy/exterminate the unites made with these "friend collectors", unfortunately there is no way and I regret my previous decision to accept the unites.

I wonder how many other hapless people accepted the unites and expected the ability to remove/mute these spammers in the future if they turned to be annoying.

There is also the question about the value of the friendship system in AU. What purpose it serves, what it means socially.

Hamlet: Did you ever get my email? I put the question about the ToS on AU, which states strictly no commercial operations allowed, no advertising etc. Which means 80% of the groups on AU would have to be queued to be deleted and banned, as well as the avatars designed for commercial activities such as ToonTopia etc.

[Angela Talamasca]

I pretty much only log in over there to update my 3rd Party Poll stats & ignore friend requests from ppl I've never heard of. Thank god for small favors that ppl have finally stopped spamming group join requests (*knocks on wood*).

All things considered, afaics, AU has turned into a complete waste of time. Even though I did upload some backgrounds. Then again, since the 1000 coins was a freebie result of their site probs, I figured I may as well "spend" it on something. *shrugs*