Microsoft reveals So.cl social networking site

Once logged into So.cl you will see more graphics than texts. If you’re visual person, chances are you will find this approach to social networking very intuitive and fun. Another very different approach to So.cl is that it constantly streams other So.cl user’s search queries to your So.cl homepage. You might find this interesting because you are seeing what’s the ‘hot’ and what’s ‘not’. However, you might also find it quite annoying if you don’t really care about what other people are searching for.

So what is So.cl? According to the official So.cl FAQ:

“So.cl (pronounced "social") is an experimental research project, developed by Microsoft’s FUSE Labs, focused on exploring the possibilities of social search for the purpose of learning.

So.cl combines social networking and search, to help people find and share interesting web pages in the way students do when they work together.

So.cl helps you create rich posts, by assembling montages of visual web content.

To encourage interaction and collaboration, So.cl provides rich media sharing, and real time sharing of videos via "video parties."

We expect students to continue using products such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and other existing social networks, as well as Bing, Google and other search tools. We hope to encourage students to reimagine how our everyday communication and learning tools can be improved, by researching, learning and sharing in their everyday lives.”