Tech Startups links to the NYT article on Friendster development after the investment:

"I think Friendster really missed their big opportunity," said Mark J. Pincus, who is an investor in Friendster and the founder of Tribe Networks, a budding social networking Web site that hopes to capture some of the print classified advertising market. "They weren't quick to turn on new functionality, where a company like MySpace kept innovating and adding new features."

In the fall of 2003, when social networking first became all the rage in Silicon Valley, the looming question was whether these new sites were viable businesses or the kind of phenomenon that generates headlines but no money."

Quite a good article - read it all.