Seems like every startup these days is launching a new product or service with "social networking" features. And predictably, every old-school web property is either retooling their current offering (or acquiring another company) to provide similar features and functionality. So what gives? Why has everything suddenly become so... social? And more importantly, what does it mean for us as a species?

In the old days of the Web, one of the key selling points of this great new technology called the Internet was anonymity. For the first time ever, you could get access to, what seemed at the time like, an unlimited amount of information, without anyone else knowing what you were up to. Initially, this basically meant two things: porn and bomb-making. At least, that's what my peers were really excited about back in '94. But things really exploded when e-commerce came along and suddenly you could buy virtually anything anonymously, including everything from clothing (lingerie) to hardware (sex toys), to books (porn) and movies (more porn). Oh, and of course you could finally complete your childhood collection of ultra-rare Star Wars action figures. Life was wonderful back then, and none of your family, friends, or colleagues had to know about it.

Then along came the Dot-com bubble, and with it a whole slew of newfangled websites that actually encouraged users to divulge every possible personal tidbit of information for the whole world (or a "trusted" network of friends and colleagues) to know - and whaddya know, it actually caught on! And truth be told, I'm still scratching my head a bit as to how it all happened so quickly. The fact is, it didn't happen very quickly but it did happen very steadily.

First there was Amazon. From its humble beginnings as an online book-store back in 1995, Amazon actually deserves some credit for convincing people that sharing information about their buying habits was a good thing. After all, the benefits of the "People who bought this book also bought these books" feature was revolutionary. And very subtle. Because on the surface, it still feels like you're shopping experience is anonymous. But the fact is, it's anything but. Amazon has a VERY detailed picture of each and every one of its customers based on their historical shopping and browsing habits.

Then along came eBay that same year (1995). Wow, eBay pretty much set the stage for personal accountability on the internet. Suddenly every buyer and seller had a rating by which others could judge them before engaging in a transaction. Strike two against online anonymity.

Then came Blogger (and blogging) in 1999. We now had access to tools that allowed anyone to publish their thoughts, their lives, and their identities online. Suddenly thousands and eventually millions of everyday web users were detailing their lives online - essentially creating public diaries for all the world to see, and comment on. Airing your dirty laundry online was now officially trendy.

Then came Friendster in 2002, which really deserves credit for popularising the social network phenomenon, and paving the way for MySpace, LinkedIn, and Facebook, among others. This latest batch of websites were ultimately responsible for encouraging people to divulge as much personal and professional information as possible with the incentive being that users would get to know each other better, and somehow in so doing become "closer" despite any physical or geographic barriers. You could almost feel the love zipping around the globe.

More recently we've seen the rise of niche-networking sites: Flikr (for sharing photos), Delicious (for sharing bookmarks), YouTube (for sharing videos), GoodReads (for sharing books), LastFM (for sharing music), GroupRecipes (for sharing recipes)... you get the picture. Going one logical step further, and perhaps sensing the inevitability of this trend, the Data Portability Work Group seeks to bring together all the above-mentioned sites in addition to the major email providers like Yahoo!, Microsoft/MSN/Live (or whatever it's calling itself these days), and Google, to allow web users to "connect, control, share, remix" their data amongst all websites.

So everything is now being shared, everyone is being networked, and any memory of online anonymity is rapidly fading away and nobody seems to care. At least not until their identity is stolen and their bank accounts are drained.

But the question I'm not hearing anyone ask is: is all this social networking technology a good thing?

Honestly, I don't know. But I am concerned, and you should be too.