New social network – ‘This Moment’ Will it take off?

Two years ago the talk was all about the growth of social networks appealing to niche interests, but more recently with (especially) Facebook, Twitter, MySpace et al sucking up all the oxygen, the environment to launch new networks has got a lot tougher.

I say this as Reuters Media File reports on the launch of a new venture, thismoment.com.

The man behind it is games entrepreneur Vince Broady and the idea is to – as the name implies – ‘moments.’ So you group together any digital content, whether that be pictures from other sites like Flickr, You Tube etc, to create what I’d call instant memory snap shots or happenings.

Not surprisingly, at time of writing the site is filled with Michael Jackson tribute moments, but other ‘moments’ include travel, graduation, pets, firsts – it’s obviously also tailor made to host scrap books for people who want to document their kids growing up.

In a field crowded with ‘me too’ competitors, there is always a danger that when launching a new site like this you will fall flat on your face.

Having said that, while you could in theory also create digital scrap books elsewhere (especially with Flickr allowing video), the site looks good and there is a need for it. The New York Times is also apparently on board to provide content and I could imagine brands – food and travel brands in particular – coming on board to create their own ‘moments.’