I’ve probably seen 1000 social networks around the world. No, I’m not kidding. Maybe more. But the thing is:of all the social networks I’ve seen, I only use Facebook. Now, a new social network has just flashed on my radar, and really looks promising, and perhaps could make it into my list of top 10 social networks.

Named after the word tsar/czar: Russian emperor), tSarite (still on beta) is a social utility site that is based on ELGG, a flexible, and fully customizable social networking platform.

With this platform, users of tSarite have a digital repository of artefacts which can be private or shared within communities. The site allows users to join up and create a variety of communities. All elements and artefacts can have access privileges attached determining who can view them.

What are the features?

tSarite has a video sharing tool just like Youtube, where people can upload, share and view videos. You can even own your own channel.

The site integrates Facebook Connect which allows you to sign in with your Facebook ID, in case you just want to be part of tSarite and dont feel like creating a personal profile. You can also invite your friends from Facebook easily to come network with you on tSarite.

You can get mapped breaking news from different parts of the world as well as from Nigeria. There’s also a downloadable toolbar that helps you stay in touch with news, advanced search, toolbar chat and instant message from your browsers toolbar.

What is Unique?

One feature that I would love to use is the tSarite Map which utilizes GMap API to bring the social network up to street level, thus making locating stuffs easy. It would be launched on February 28th, and would be integrated with the u12 Drive solution, where you can see live video details of traffic by clicking on locations.

It’s still on test running and can be viewed here. With it, users can socialize by map.

My take

This is a giant stride into the social networking scene in Nigeria that in my opinion is already saturated. I think the site’s strategy of releasing at least one outstanding feature (as add-on) to the website per month could make it compete favourably with giants like Naijapals.

tSarite which was released for testing on January 20th now has over 250 active users and about 90 active Facebook connections. Once launched, I think tSarite could grow to become one of the hottest social networks we have from Nigeria. It’s not just a social network, it’s a social utility!

And it could just make it into my list of top 10 social networks for 2009. We’ll see…