Social software is a whole new world in many ways and people everywhere are trying to figure out how to design effective and compelling applications. I offer for your consideration today three recent attempts to articulate social software design best practices. Let's discuss.

The recommendations include things like "focus on the 30-second experience; before distracting the user with expert features or sending invites, slow down and give the user a simpler taste of what your application is about." That's good advice that a lot of startups could benefit from considering.

Factory Joe, also know as Chris Messina of San Francisco consultancy CitizenAgency when he takes his cape off, maintains an excellent collection of screenshots on Flickr. He saves all kinds of good examples of contemporary interface design in the social software world. I point people to it all the time, now you can too.