Orkut.com Social Networking Engine in affiliation with Google

[nileshkurhade]

Orkut.com is an online community that connects people through a network of trusted friends. [searchenginewatch.com...]

All employees at Google are allowed to spend twenty percent of their time working on personal interests, a policy Google has to encourage creativity. Buyukkokten had an interest in social networking and so developed his service, Google says. Now the company has decided to open it to the public.

The move comes in the wake of rumors that Google wanted to buy social networking service Friendster last year and just a day after Eurekster launched, a social network service that refines search results. Is this a sign that Google plans to use social networking for search?

[GoogleGuy]

Orkut is a nice guy, so I'm glad he did something fun with his 20% free time (the article explains more about the 20% thing).

[NeverHome]

Pfft! "Membership to orkut is by invitation only. If you have a friend who's a member of orkut, have them invite you to join."

GoogleGuy, would you kindly ask Orkut to invite me? Please. :)

[markus007]

yikes, now i'm going to be competing with yahoo and google...

[t2dman]

So Webmasterworld is what you do with your 20% Googleguy? Or you do it on top of? :) If only the 20% could explain Florida. Oh well.

[GoogleGuy]

WebmasterWorld is probably a chunk of my 20%, but I usually end up posting more after work and on weekends.

Wait a minute. I think I'm getting the short end of the stick here. I need to post more during work hours. :)

[lazurus]

The main goal of our service is to make the social life of yourself and your friends more active and stimulating....

Don't geeks have to be surgically removed from their seats :o) Shouldn't be too hard to "stimulate" the life of a internet junkie?

[vitaplease]

..hot market of online social networks..

Related thread on Google flirting towards the social network Friendster: [webmasterworld.com...]

[WyrdoManx]

The logo highlighting and fading effect is really nice. Very pretty.

He'll have to watch though. White text on white background is SEO spam (as it initially appears as) and his site may be punished once Google (this search engine I've heard about) detects the tactic!

(Warning: This post contains humour)

[Marcia]

I've always thought Google should start a dating site, they've got almost everything else. I still think it's a good idea; it could be called Snuggle.

Added:
And a jokes site, like the news. Then we'd have Froogle, Snuggle and Giggle.

[takagi]

Other examples of illegal or unauthorized uses include, but are not limited to:
...
* using any robot, spider, site search/retrieval application, or other device to retrieve or index any portion or the orkut.com service;

Source: orkut.com Terms of Service [orkut.com]

But hey, they forgot the 'robots.txt' file (gives a 'page not found' error). Not something you would expect from a site in affiliation with Google.

[ThatAdamGuy]

Hey GoogleGuy,

Just curious, but is Orkut the only one who has worked on this service? And in general, are Google-20%-projects usually conceived of and worked on solo, or are they sometimes team-based?

Oh, and amusingly, from what I know of Orkut... unlike the Friendster guy, Orkut doesn't need an app like this to enhance his social life :D

[Loki99]

How does Orkut.com not infringe on Friendster’s patent?

[patft.uspto.gov...]

[nileshkurhade]

orkut.com is still PR0 :-). Lets see how long it takes to get PR. Since the content in the public(non-members) area is almost non, we would also get a idea how important content is.

[badtzmaru]

I want an orkut.com account so bad I can taste it!

[uioreanu]

this is part of the experiment

[webdude]

I lke the snuggle idea, although my wife would kill me if she read this post. :oD

[NazaretH]

oops. nightmare for us. huge competitor expected.

[WyrdoManx]

I want an orkut.com account too! (Need!)

Email. We've had rumours about Google email for a while now. Orkut strikes me as a perfect platform for it. Emails between Orkut members could easily be a web interface with [username] @ Orkut addresses.

[martinibuster]

Very exciting! I just love the way Google rolls out new things. Cool to see them move away from search and start doing things that require "user registration."

What's up with the competition? They move slower than a zombie in a monster movie.

[DrDoc]

Membership to orkut is by invitation only.

If you have a friend who's a member of orkut, have them invite you to join.

LOL Let's just hope Mr. Orkut made himself a member before employing that policy. Otherwise it would turn out being a nifty place, with no members ;)

[richardsi]

I would love to see an alternative to Friendster that consistently works. There are some serious performance issues with Friendster, which is why I haven't used it that much.

[GoogleGuy]

Muhahaha, posting during work hours on my 20% free time. ;) Most people do their 20% projects as solo things rather than team-based. It's a pretty flexible concept though. Some people get on a project for a long time where they have to work hard; then you might have to save up the 20% time for a little while. And there are parts of Google where people are working hard are the time. I'm not sure how to help make sure that every engineer gets/takes their 20% time, but I think it's good for every person if they get the chance to tinker. Several 20% ideas have turned into things that you see on the main Google site (esp. projects on Labs).

[celerityfm]

Muhahaha, posting during work hours on my 20% free time. ;)

Oh no we've created a monster! heh.

So GG any projections on how quickly this thing will get to the levels that say, other.. similar services are at? I mean- since its invite only it can only grow as fast as its members invite people. Until orkut opens its doors like friendster has now.

Didn't friendster originally used to be "sixdegrees" or whatever?

[Ruben]

OrKut.com?

Kut means 'Female area' in dutch :-) Would someone be so nice to invite me to OrKut.com now? :-)

[edited by: Ruben at 8:34 pm (utc) on Jan. 23, 2004]

[Clark]

What does "Or" mean in Dutch? Eh, also, you may want to edit your post. I'm not sure but I doubt that language is ok in here. You may also not realize how strong it sounds in English. Maybe they'll let you say Kitty or "Female area"?

[Ruben]

Or means of :-)

[badtzmaru]

googleguy - hook us up with invites to orkut.com! I even emailed them whining for an invite and they said "There may be an orkut member lurking among you." Now if that isn't a description of you I don't know what is!

[Wynter]

I wonder how one goes about getting an Orkut membership if you do not know anyone who already has one? How did the first people get their membership? ;-)

[ThatAdamGuy]

What's up with the competition? They move slower than a zombie in a monster movie.

You know, I've honestly never understood the appeal of Friendster. I guess it's purely first-mover, er, first-biggest advantage.

Aside from Orkut, there are a slew of social networking sites that:
- are 100 times faster
- have TONS more functionality
- have significantly more potential, given their structure
- have management with more of a sense of humor, yet still manage to keep their sites useful for business-networkers

I guess it really is the "well, all my friends are on [x]" syndrome, a la AOL/AIM. Similarly, there are many other more robust instant messaging solutions, but AOL/AIM is where "all your friends are," so, well, there you go.

Given that Orkut.com is supported by Google, though, and so much of Google-touched stuff becomes successful... I have high hopes for it ;)