Burda bought a whopping 1,323,041 shares for €36.50 each (which works out to about $72.3 million).  It controls a 25.1 percent stake in Xing as a result.  This wasn’t any sort of hostile takeover, though.

Stefan Gross-Selbeck, the CEO of Xing, wrote in a blog post, "I’m very excited about this participation and the future cooperation with Burda.  It’s a match made in heaven: Burda Media as the leading European media group and XING as the leading European business network."

Gross-Selbeck next went on to describe Burda as a long-term investor with an interest in international matters.

What we have here, then, is a significant gesture of confidence in Xing and the business networking field.  Along with what may be a sign that Xing will try harder to challenge LinkedIn in the U.S., or at least expand into other parts of the world.

In case you’re curious: Xing currently has 8 million members who handle their online networking affairs in 16 different languages.

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He also mentions one I’ve not thought of as a social network – Viadeo. It seems to me to be more of a news portal. Plus no mention of MySpace, still the giant of social networks.

But I’m sure Lunn will turn out to have made some pretty good predictions. He has some good arguments on developments by marketers in monetizing social networks as well as what might happen in a marketplace that’s rapidly changing through a mixture of acquisitions, investments, combinations and evolving offerings.

As a member of some of these social networks, I’m not sure I find any of this appealing at all.

I’ve been a member of LinkedIn and Xing (previously known as OpenBC) since 2004, MySpace since 2006 and Facebook earlier this year. I had a flirtation with Plaxo a few years ago that never went anywhere.

Facebook is currently my network du jour although I’m becoming quite disenchanted with what’s going on there regarding the Beacon advertising opt-in/opt-out debacle, a disastrous idea that seems to be gaining more negative commentary every day.

Basically, my trust in Facebook is rapidly diminishing.

And it’s all about trust, isn’t it? If you can’t trust the people who run the places you participate in, you’re going to leave.

Looking at much of what Lunn predicts I get the feeling that anyone who’s a member in any of these big social networks is seen as a commodity, a number to be marketed at, sold to and generally regarded as just another notch on a marketer’s scoreboard.

Well, count me out in that case.

In July, I wrote about Facebook versus other networks and relevance concerning what you want to put in and get out of being a participant in a social network.

This is to do with niche networks – those social networks that are small, and tailored to specific interests that aren’t necessarily mainstream.

In my case, I’m referring to niche networks like MyRagan.com and Melcrum’s Communicators Network, both relevant to my professional interest area of organizational communication. Both of those networks are growing fast.

In that July post, I also talked about why Facebook was so compelling, which focused on its ease of use, cool applications and informality.

All important things, to be sure, yet nowhere near as important as trust.

In July, my conclusion was this:

[…] Sooner or later, a crunch may come where I decide to go with the one that provides all I need in one place – the opportunities to connect and the opportunities to collaborate.

I wonder how long that will be.

I think that moment has arrived.

Ironic, really, as I meant that conclusion to be about moving closer to Facebook. The meaning for me today is not towards Facebook and other big networks but away.

Here’s my prediction for 2008 – we’ll also see a rise in niche networks, well outside the frame of the big ones Lunn talks about.

The ones that become successful – which certainly doesn’t necessarily mean the ones that are biggest – are the ones you trust.

Comments

This may lead you to think of the word “copycat,” and if so, you’re probably right.  The spread of features is pretty common, though, and should make for a better overall environment.  (Imagine, to make a car analogy, if you could only get power windows in a Nissan, adjustable seats in a Subaru, and anti-lock brakes in a Lexus.)

Also, Xing has gotten an edge by learning from Facebook’s mistakes.  Facebook’s original launch was judged to be seriously lacking in privacy controls.  Xing states, “‘What’s new in my network’ is completely user-configurable.  XING members can decide for themselves which new developments they wish to be informed about. . . .  Of course, XING members also have full control over which of their own updates should be displayed to their direct contacts.”

All of this comes after LinkedIn’s CEO announced that it would take “a helluva lot,” i.e., more than $1 billion,  to acquire his company.  One has to wonder how much value the “What’s new in my network” feature will add to Xing.

Of course, the matter’s not as straightforward as a 100 percent increase in as many days.  “The Spanish networks Neurona (with over one million members as of August 2007) and eConozco, which were acquired by XING AG, have shown particularly rapid growth in their markets,” admits a press release.  “The eConozco business network, which was only acquired in March 2007, has doubled in members to more than 360,000 since its purchase by XING AG.”

Still, growth is growth, and one need look no farther than Google’s countless acquisitions to confirm that companies of all sizes like to buy it.

Xing also points to “a substantial rise in the number of email invitations sent from the platform by XING members,” and, in comparison to the mess created by Quechup’s invites, it’s a credit to the network that people would want to tell their friends, family, and coworkers.

I owe a hat tip to Mashable’s Stan Schroeder for word of Xing’s progress.  At the same time, one of his coworkers, Pete Cashmore, puts it in perspective with the headline “200 Million MySpace Accounts.”  And for perspective on that story, Cashmore adds, “Some are even real people.”

Xing, ZoomInfo Partner

First off, the details of the arrangement.  “The partnership will provide XING’s 2 million-plus members with immediate access to profiles on nearly 36 million business people and 3.8 million companies directly on the XING platform,” states a press release.  Similarly, “ZoomInfo’s 4.5 million unique monthly visitors will also be able to join XING’s business network directly with a simple two-click process.”

Now, on to the more sensational stuff.  Xing competes with LinkedIn, and the chairman of LinkedIn, Reid Hoffman, shared his thoughts about the partnership with VentureBeat’s Matt Marshall.  “Zoominfo has scraped 36 million profiles (with lots of duplicates) and used datamining to figure out email addresses,” Hoffman began.  “Essentially, what this deal does, is allow Xing’s users to send email or call without permission of the people that Zoominfo has scraped…I’m not sure that this is something to crow about.”

Ouch.  While Hoffman’s comments are far from personal insults, business people don’t usually get quite that testy while on the record.  ZoomInfo’s COO responded, however, and kept the exchange from devolving.  Kudos to Bryan Burdick, the COO in question, for remaining civil, even if the alternative would have made for a more exciting story.

“ZoomInfo searches for information publicly available on the Web, and simply tags and organizes it so that is more useful for searcher,” paraphrased VentureBeat.  “ZoomInfo doesn’t look behind firefalls [sic] or bot stoppers, and doesn’t license any information from third-parties. . . .  In other words, if your contact information is out there, say on your corporate Web site, it will be in ZoomInfo.”

And there you have it.  This partnership should greatly strengthen Xing’s presence in America (the company is based in Germany), and, of course, ZoomInfo also stands to benefit.

Reid Hoffman himself – LinkedIn’s CEO – dropped in on the “Comments” section of a GigaOm article to “help clarify why we raised money . . . .” (That money, by the way, came from venture capitalist entities such as the Bessemer Venture Partners and the European Founders Fund.)

Hoffman gave two (seemingly) simple reasons for passing the hat: “(a) we will be expanding internationally this year and (b) we want to start marketing the Linkedin use cases – e.g. how every professional can use Linkedin today to make themselves more effective at their jobs.”

The implementation of (a) may not be as easy as it sounds, though. Despite LinkedIn’s impressive accomplishments in the U.S., a company known as “Xing” has a strong foothold in Europe. Headquartered in Germany, Xing, like LinkedIn, is an online network for professionals, and would act as a direct competitor.

Yet that fact didn’t scare Keith Rabois, LinkedIn’s vice president of business development, when he spoke to MarketWatch’s Bambi Francisco. LinkedIn is about “a year behind popular social network Facebook in generating sales, according to Rabois. That means Linkedin is set to generate between $45 million and $60 million next year,” Francisco concluded.

Bessemer and the European Founders Fund were surely inspired by that statement. The venture capitalists were probably even more encouraged by the following line from Francisco’s article: “Linkedin CEO Reid Hoffman boldly predicts the company will hit $100 million in 2008.”

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Doug is a staff writer for WebProNews. Visit WebProNews for the latest eBusiness news.