Bebo, MySpace, Piczo, Facebook: they all betray that desperate attempt to corner the yoof market that can only have come from the brain of a middle-aged Silicon Valley marketing executive. They all scream “we’re young, we’re hip, join us, you won’t regret it”, with all the honesty of a retired politician who has decided to take up a career as a used car salesman.

So Sneak was glad to read the other day that old people are getting their own social networking sites to, um, network with the rest of society. SagaZone was set up by the eponymous travel and insurance firm and offers users the usual tools – live chat, photo uploads, blogging and so on. When Sneak had a look at the site it was refreshingly simple to navigate, with text about the size of a human fist. No flash gimmicks, no absurd applications. And online forum topics along the lines of “Countdown – what went wrong?”, “20 things we hate about hoodies”, “why young people are wrong about everything” and “hands up if you fancy Thora Hird’s starlift?”.

05 Nov 2007