Virb, Raising the Bar for Social Networks

Chris Messina recently turned me on the the new social network Virb. I must say I’m pretty impressed. There are a ton of great features and the design is really nice. It features Flickr integration, VirbTunes (an iTunes plugin) and a beautiful widescreen video player with a nice lightbox effect. A Twitter module is in the works as well.

Virb gives you the ability to easily customize your profile and if you don’t like someone’s customizations, they have a feature that allows you to remove it while viewing their profile. Looking at their blog, they seem to be pretty busy rolling new features and functionality. It will be interesting to see how this service develops over time.

A place that lets you put all of the things that make you you – photos, videos, blogs – in one place. So you can find friends (and friends can find you).

More specifically, VIRB° is our vision of a social community – done right. A website that combines you, your interests, your friends and the things you like with music, art, fashion, film and more. Stay connected with your friends. Find new music. View and upload good videos, photos and more.

Just for kicks, let’s compare Virb to MySpace using the profiles for the band Scissors for Lefty. Here they are on MySpace and now on Virb. Which one would you spend more time on? To quote Derek Powazek “Oh, so that’s what MySpace would be like if they’d ever hired a designer”.

Like Flickr, Vox and Facebook before them, Virb has now raised the bar once more when it comes to social networks. Here’s Laughing Squid’s profile on Virb.