Are we approaching social media saturation?

Besides reading a set of news sites and blogs, I blog, am on Facebook, Linkedin, and Twitter, and to be quite honest, that’s about all my attention span can handle. Sure I watch my Youtube videos and check out the Digg list like everyone else, but I don’t actively upload anything to Youtube or Digg anything, which hardly makes me an actual participant.

Everyday I find out about another social media/networking tool and am constantly amazed at the people who seem to have the ability to engage in all of them. But are people like me the anomaly or the rule?

At this point, I don’t even have the energy to join something just to check it out. There’s just too many of them. If I am somehow convinced to join another social network, I’m going to have to dump one of my existing ones. I do still need a life away from screens.

I am by no means a power user or expert in social media, but I think I’m a relatively tech savvy and engaged individual, and if I’m feeling overwhelmed by it all, I image a lot of people are too. All of which makes me wonder about the future of Web 2.0 companies who all seem to be banking on ad revenues for their business model. Sure there is talk about twitter selling services to power users and corporations rather than relying on ads but the jury is still out on whether that will be enough to sustain it.

I just think there’s a limited amount of time and attention out there and it’s not enough to justify or support all of these companies. To be honest, I fully expect most of these companies to go the way of the dodo, especially those who have arrived late in the game and whose product is only a slight variation of what is already out there (and there are many of you).