The responses to A Look at 19 Social Activities Websites brought to my attention other new sites. Ironically, one of them, Vibely, is gestating right here in my own backyard, the DC metro area. Funny how the internet works that way.

Vibely released an alpha preview this week. Founders John L. Kim and Steve S. Zhou are active guys who found existing tools lacking in facilitating their social lives. Despite non-technical backgrounds - both come from finance - they decided to roll their own platform for making plans with friends. With open source, public APIs, and rapid development tools in full bloom, roll your own is becoming a frequent story. We reported a similar story for another social activities system, Planypus, last week.

For a quick rundown, the current alpha incarnation of Vibely resembles on the web side Dodgeball+Yelp: social networking with a heavy emphasis on activity relating to nightlife venues and restaurants. The main view is the individual profile and secondary are pages for venues and both are linked through individual reviews. Activity means reviews, promoting your social calendar, gauging venue "vibeliness" and earning "VIP status."

I think where Yelp is "Real People. Real Reviews." Vibely is more "Real Friends. Real Reviews. (Get Together.)" A personal calendar on the profile, framed as an opportunity to "Bump Into" on Vibely, is a feature that MySpace actually offers but rarely found used. When I tried it a while back I could not get it appear. Now with my custom profile design - the hallmark of MySpace's culture of chaos - it wouldn't appear even if their servers dish it out. In any case, I've seen it used on only one or two profiles ever: one was a band chaser, the other was a lecture chaser, and I construed neither instances of exhibitionism as real invitations to join them at any of those events. Whatever the actual adoption, calendars do serve as a good way of drawing attention to events that might otherwise escape notice. (For example, John's "Bump Into" has alerted me to a TechCrunch party in NYC on the 18th.)

"Vibeliness" is a blackbox metric for a venue that is probably based on subscriber reviews and "check-ins." "VIP status" for a subscriber isn't explained either but similarly it is probably based on participation; perhaps like on Yelp all you'll do is gain site status ("Elite Yelper") or like on ChosenVIP you'll gain actual entry into VIP areas at clubs.

Messaging hasn't been implemented yet, either mobile or intra-site. We don't know if they will attempt group messaging like Dodgeball. 3Jam and PartySync have APIs so Vibely could assimilate the best of breed without coding their own from scratch.

That brings us the last element, party promotions. Readers of these tech blogs tend to look for the next big thing, eg the next Friendster or YouTube, while there is plenty of value to be reaped from applying not cutting edge but relatively fresh ideas to mundane areas of life. In any reasonable city with a social life, there is an ecosystem centered around nightclubs and bustling activity by promoters and venues to get people to dance, drink, mingle and enjoy the music at their businesses. On the internet, most party promoters tend to use simple tools, eg forums, CMS based websites like Joomla or Mambo, or mailing and SMS lists to promote their clubs. Vibely founders are negotiating deals that could position their social networking/review platform as an an additional intermediary between clubs and patrons. Looks like that's where ChosenVIP is headed too.

Power laws and the proliferation of social network, review and events sites will cap the potential of new entrants like Vibely, though they could do well in profitable local niches now owned by party promoters. As the founders are based here, DC is ground zero for the service, but Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Miami, Philadelphia, NYC, and SF are also supported in this release.

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