Friends, Reunited: the founders of the first big social network are back to try to save it

10 August 2014updated 01 Jul 2021 12:13pm The three men at the centre of the first social media phenomenon of the millenium tell the story of how Friends Reunited boomed and busted –and how it might rise again. By Ian Steadman The first social network to impact on popular consciousness (in the UK, at least) was conceived around a kitchen table in Barnet 15 years ago. Friends Reunitedwas hugely popular, and profitable –enough to convince ITV to buy it for £120m in 2005. The newspapers of the time were filled with stories of jilted husbands and wives blaming the site for their divorce, and at its height, in 2007, Friends Reunited claimed 55 per cent of all British adults were members.Yet few of its users were active users (unlike then-surging Facebook’s), and 2007 was when growth slowed – by March 2008, when the site responded by removing its subscription fee, active user numbers hadalready dramatically fallen. It turned out to be difficult selling the site to a new generation of users,...