When you include rules & rankings in a social system, you're laying foundational elements for an emerging culture -- and communicating what's valued within that culture. As the recent brouhaha over Orkut deletions demonstrates, the absence of clear rules can lead to confusion, anger and lots of energy spent exploring the boundaries of acceptable behavior. Given that Orkut is still in Beta, this is arguably a useful and necessary part of the 'debugging process' - i.e. the members are helping Orkut debug and fix their Service Agreement and Code of Conduct, as well as their software. However, all that energy is NOT being spent on building relationships -- and the strength of those relationships will ultimately drive Orkut's success. So, bending & breaking the rules is one kind of meta-game -- but if you step back, squint your eyes and look at the experience of navigating a social network, you can see an exploring game where finding people and learning more about them is the core activity. What do people do in a first-generation social network? Browse profiles, follow links, collect friends, join and create groups, and search for people using a variety of criteria. Sounds kinda like a social exploring & collecting game to me :-) Computers allow us to create navigable 3D worlds -- and our sense are exceptionally well-tuned for operating in a physical space. Computer games like RPGs and MMPs allow us to embody a character and explore a fantastic 3D world -- but there's something equally fanstastic about exploring a fast-growing, ever-changing networked 2D world of people and relationships. Like MUDs, social networks are lightweight, easy to change, and leave lots of room for your imagination. Although they're not 'games' per se, social networks offer a new kind of entertainment experience that's centered around connecting with like-minded people. I can't wait to see what next-generation social networking apps look like -- I'm hoping we'll see some breakthrough products that redefine what a networked entertainment experience can be.