New Social Networking Site Now in Business
by SvtNiacorps
Social networking isn't limited to the time-wasting antics of kids on  Facebook and Friendster. A new Web site aims to turn business  networking on its ear.
A prime tenet of all social networking sites is simple, a play  on the six-degrees-of-separation meme: If everyone is only a few  friends distant from everyone else, that girl you like — or your future  boss — is just an e-mail away. Tracked.com wraps that concept in data analysis, creating a weird hybrid the company hopes will transform how business gets done.
Want to see which companies other widget manufacturers are  investing in, or stay on top of trades of your company's performance?  Curious about which stock the executive board just traded? The site lets  you track activity in a certain industry or for a particular company,  even for a specific person, and create custom feeds of data along the  same lines.
At Tracked.com's heart is a massive database of information on  public and private companies, including news, financial data, executive  compensation, and more — the type of data you would find at sites like  Yahoo, TechCrunch, or Google Finance.
It's somewhat unclear just where all that data comes from,  especially the reams of information Tracked.com provides about private  companies. Founder Michael Yavonditte told TechCrunch that he has “begged, borrowed and stolen” the data from other structured data sources and mashed it together.
But the data sources themselves are less interesting than what you can do with it all.
Tracked lists not just company performance but people who work  there, as well. Drill down on Microsoft, for example, and you'll see  the board of directors, founders Bill Gates and Paul Allen, and a  lengthy list of key employees such as vice presidents and product  managers. Other sites won't tell you that Microsoft's chief software  architect Ray Ozzie is 53 years old, share his recent stock trades  (unsurprisingly, Ozzie trades Microsoft), or show stories in the news  about him.
The site also lets you pass along "objects" such as quotes, charts, public filings, and people with your connections.
The real value of a social networking site lies in the user  base, of course, so Tracked's main obstacle is gaining market share in  an already crowded market.
But for folks looking for more in a social networking site  than a place where they can stay in touch with old friends and post  their latest baby pictures, Tracked is literally in business.
source :  http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,569181,00.html
 


