If it is an excellent tool by itself, then it has a much better chance of acceptance. That is, if you yourself can't stop using it regardless of who else is using it, it is a stronger product. del.icio.us is like that- I started using it because it was a nice central place to store bookmarks regardless of who else was using it. It was only later that I started noticing how many others were bookmarking and even started using it as a search engine. Flickr- same thing. Youtube & myspace- still kind of the same- say I was the first user of youtube, I may still like it so that I can put my videos in one place and shoot off an email to my buddies to go have a look. The point is the tool better be compelling without a community or you'll never be able to grow a community. Even here the content coming from one poster is compelling (enough) even before a dozen users started commenting and posting, etc. Focus on the tool. I couldn't agree more.
