Do you join MySpace?
 
Online social networking websites saw their ranks  swell¹ and values soar this year as everyone from moody² teenagers and mellow³ music lovers to mate-seeking seniors joined online communities.

Google's freshly released "Zeitgeist 2007" reveals that seven out of the 10 hottest topics which triggered Internet queries⁴ during the year involved social networking.

A Top Ten list compiled by the world's most-used search engine includes British website Badoo, Spanish-language Hi5, and US-based Facebook.

Video-sharing websites YouTube and Dailymotion are on the list, along with the Club Penguin⁵ online role playing game where children pretending to be the flightless birds "waddle⁶ about and play" together.

Virtual world Second Life, where people represented by animated⁷ proxies⁸ interact in digitized fantasy settings, is the final social networking property in the Zeitgeist Top Ten.

The world has only seen "the tip of the iceberg⁹" when it comes to online social networking, says MySpace vice¹⁰ president of business development Amit Kapur.

"It is a natural step in the evolution of the Web," Kapur said.

"The Web is getting more personal. I think you are going to see much more of that happen on every website across the Web."

MySpace aspires¹¹ to become people's homes on the Internet, with profile pages serving as online addresses as well as springboards to online music, video, news and other contents conducive¹² to their tastes and interests.

Industry statistics show Facebook membership more than doubled in the past year to about 55 million, while MySpace grew 30 percent to top 110 million.

One in every four US residents uses MySpace, while in Britain it is as common to have a profile page on the website as it is to own a dog.

“在线社交网站”今年人气大涨、“身价倍增”，因为在这一年中，从情绪多变的青少年到舒缓音乐的爱好者，再到觅偶人士，都加入了在线社交网站。

全球用户最多的搜索引擎Google近日公布了“2007年度十大热门搜索排行榜”。该榜显示，其中七大热门搜索都与社交网络有关。

“十大热门搜索”包括英国的Badoo社交网站、Hi5西班牙语社交网站以及美国的Facebook网站。

Youtube视频分享网、Dailymotion网站以及（面向儿童的）“企鹅俱乐部”角色扮演游戏社区也榜上有名，孩子们在“企鹅俱乐部”中都扮成小企鹅，它们“摇摇晃晃地走来走去，一起玩耍”。

“第二人生”虚拟社区名列“十大热门搜索排行”第十位，“第二人生”社区是一个数字化的虚拟世界，社区用户都有一个动漫化身。

MySpace业务拓展部副经理阿米特•卡珀说，这些还只是社交网络的“冰山一角”。

他说，“这是网络发展的必然结果”。

“随着网络的日趋个性化，这一热潮将席卷各个网站。”

MySpace致力于成为人们的网上家园，社区内用户的个人主页既是在线联系地址，也是分享在线音乐、视频、新闻和人们感兴趣的内容的平台。

据业内统计数据显示，今年Facebook网站的注册用户增长了一倍以上，达到约5500万，而MySpace的用户数量则增长了30%，已超过1.1亿。

美国有四分之一的居民是MySpace的用户，而在英国，拥有网上个人空间就像拥有宠物狗那么普遍。

Vocabulary:

swell:become greater in intensity, number, amount or volume（增强、增多、增大）