Last month a Twitter comment from Chris Heuer led to a discussion here at Social Media Club about when social media would cross into the mainstream.

I was surprised by the question. At the latest, social media crossed over in July of 2005 when NewsCorp bought MySpace. In fact, social media is so deeply ingrained in the mainstream that no self-respecting media company would launch a new online property without significant social functionality built in. Witness the beta launch yesterday of the inelegantly named Disney Xtreme DigitalSM–a social networking site for tweens built around ever-popular Disney characters and content.

Disney’s site offers social media “lite” functionality–profiles, customization, chat, message walls and, most importantly for Disney, and most interestingly for the social media biz, parental controls governing chats, discussion participation, and file uploads. Parents have to establish accounts linked to those of their children–which adds a lot of steps to the registration process and may be a drag on member acquisition. Still, one can’t imagine a Disney tween site without airtight protection.

The Disney effort, launching in beta on the heels of the Digg fiasco yesterday, offers an illustration of the two-tiered development of social media as it goes mainstream. Pure play social media properties–which do nothing more than offer tools to members looking to connect with one another and share media–have the kind of credibility that attracts users but have struggled with monetization and executive control. Content-centered social media properties have the advantage of highly attractive entertainment media as a calling card. But in trying to control how the community uses the content, these sites at best present a corny, out of step public profile–like Frank Sinatra singing Nirvana songs–and, at worst, face the kind of user revolt that Digg experienced.

For now the mainstreaming of social media looks a lot like the mainstreaming of MP3 file sharing in the 1990s. Traditional media players at the time tried to shut down the competition with lawsuits while simultaneously launching their own services with strict controls. The result is a universe in the 2000s in which user directed illicit file sharing co-exists with successful, controlled, industry digital music offerings. Social media in the next decade may look very much the same–with a two track ecosystem of corporate controlled media businesses offering social functionality, and white label social networks where anything goes.

Link Love:

Exclusive: The Digg CEO Jay Adelson Interview
Wired News interview with Digg CEO isn’t much of a read, but at least its from the horse’s mouth

HerFabLife is Bookmarking for Trendy Women
Prepare yourself for a flood of niche social media properties like this one, a social bookmarking site for young women interested in fashion and entertainment

Cisco: Social Networks will Define Media Consumption
One of the most interesting goings on in the social media business is Cisco’s attempt to reinvent itself as the builder of The Human Network (as opposed to the router network). Dan Scheinman, senior vice president of Cisco Systems’ Media Solutions Group, delivered a keynote address at the Digital Living Connection Conference in Santa Clara, in which he proclaimed:

“It’s the beginning of new era. Consumers are driving the next set of value creations…Enterprise is last now. We have 1,500 employees on Facebook because we don’t have the internal tools to provide community…. A lot of the enterprise has been behind in adopting all these tools.”