New social sites post more personal information

While many internet users are fretting about preserving their online privacy in the age of social networking phenomenon Facebook, a new breed of digital natives is actively stripping away the last vestiges of anonymity.

They are broadcasting their thoughts, plans and even their locations and purchases to the web, using new services that post intimate personal information in real time.

What began with status updates on Facebook and Twitter has evolved into services such as Blippy, a website which automatically publishes everything a user buys with a credit card to a short, Twitter-like feed for all to see. Launched in December, Blippy has gathered more than 10,000 users who share information on about $250,000 worth of purchases a day.

"There's a clear value proposition to sharing that data," said Ron Conway, a prolific investor who has backed Blippy. "People are curious about other people's buying habits and choices." Mr Conway said seeing what other people are buying and where they are going serves as a valuable recommendation and discovery tool on the internet.

Another new set of internet services allows users to "check-in" to locations via their mobile phone, broadcasting their whereabouts to the web. One of these, Foursquare, has about 160,000 users, while MyTown, a similar service, attracted 500,000 users in one month of operation.

The new services reflect a growing sense among technology's early adopters that it is safe, and even beneficial, to share private information.

Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook chief executive, articulated this ethos in a recent interview in front of Silicon Valley entrepreneurs. "People have really gotten comfortable not only sharing more information and different kinds, but more openly and with more people," he said. "That social norm is just something that has evolved over time."

Mark Hendrickson, chief executive of Plancast, a service which allows users to share their travel plans online, said Mr Zuckerberg's statements "reflected a common perception that people have become a lot more comfortable sharing information about themselves".

Concerns about putting one's itinerary online for public viewing are overblown, he said. "As people put more content about themselves online and push boundaries, they're finding it's not as dangerous as it might have been."

One advantage of these services can be to foster real world interaction, argues Dennis Crowley, Foursquare founder. "You're always in these different spots and missing people by a couple of blocks . . . What if you could see through walls or around corners?"

By knowing where one's friends are in real time - as Foursquare makes possible - or knowing where they are travelling to - as happens on Plancast - people have a better chance of connecting with each other at cafés, clubs and concerts.

The early popularity of the services also suggests that the knowledge of what friends are doing can inspire imitation. When Blippy co-founder Philip Kaplan bought tickets for a Lady Gaga concert, his followers on Blippy saw the purchase and bought tickets for themselves.