 "So long, Orkut")
The author writes a final 'testimonial' to the platform that introduced us to social networking
It's been really long since I logged on to Orkut. It has changed drastically during that time. The design, settings were all redesigned. What has also changed is Orkut's relevance. A website that presented users around the globe with their first "social networking" experience is now slowly edging towards extinction. Come September 30, Google will finally pull the plug on its "20 per cent project".
It is interesting to note that Orkut and a certain Facebook were both launched in 2004 - in fact, the former started a month before, in January. It's been a decade of existence for both these social networking entities, yet the numbers paint a completely different picture for both of them. Orkut is ranked 6,101 on Alexa (as on May 2014), while Facebook stands tall at rank 2 on Alexa. While Google's Orkut has petered out, Facebook has 1.28 billion monthly active users. Orkut's popularity stock has clearly fallen. In March 2004, more than half the traffic on Orkut was from the US. As of May 2014, the most number of users on Orkut are from Brazil and India.
Before there was the "Seflie" there was the profile picture. Your profile picture (the display picture or DP, as some of us call it) was your identity of sorts on the social network.
The scrapbook was your wall - a place where your fellow Orkut users could leave you 'scraps'. Your scrapbook was the one place where conversations would go on for an eternity, leaving behind a long trail of scraps.
The status message would speak out your frame of mind. These were bound to change every day!
The communities culture started right here on Orkut. Users would join the community of their favourite bands, video games, sports and so on. But it would be fair to say that apart from the banal stuff, there were many other communities that would be really helpful to users.
Your friends would often write you testimonials. These would appear on your profile, or rather 'add' to it. Such was the craze behind testimonials, that I remember getting messages from fellow Orkut users to write them a nice testimonial - they would, of course, return the favour.
One of the most interesting features of Orkut was the who viewed your profile option. Essentially, a user would get to know if someone had visited his or her profile. Users would be excited at the prospect of a stranger visiting their profile. Eventually, Orkut did come up with an option where you could prevent someone from seeing whether you had visited one's profile - the only catch was that the same option would apply to you as well.
We uploaded hundreds of pictures and videos on our Orkut profile. Most of them are still there and you have the option to archive them.
It's a pity that I cannot access my account since I had joined Orkut with a Yahoo! ID - which I stopped using long ago. But I got a final look at my profile through a friend - a loyal Orkut user - who managed to locate me and was kind enough to send me screenshots. My profile has 1,216 scraps and 218 photos.
I joined Orkut because it offered something "new and different". And that is precisely why I left Orkut to join Facebook a few years later. Mark Zuckerberg's social networking juggernaut became popular rapidly. Suddenly, people were talking about how Facebook was the "next big thing". And before you knew it, people were joining Facebook, adding it to their social networking repertoire. Preferences changed in such a way that people visited Facebook once every day, and Orkut once a year.
Many Orkut users will archive their pictures and details from their profile, I intend to leave mine behind as a token of thanks.
Orkut has fallen down in the pecking order, but it will always be credited with bringing us our first, raw social networking experience. To quote the Google blog post that announced Orkut was going defunct this September: "Orkut helped shape life online before people really knew what 'social networking' was."
So long, Orkut!
It's been really long since I logged on to Orkut. It has changed drastically during that time. The design, settings were all redesigned. What has also changed is Orkut's relevance. A website that presented users around the globe with their first "social networking" experience is now slowly edging towards extinction. Come September 30, Google will finally pull the plug on its "20 per cent project".
It is interesting to note that Orkut and a certain Facebook were both launched in 2004 - in fact, the former started a month before, in January. It's been a decade of existence for both these social networking entities, yet the numbers paint a completely different picture for both of them. Orkut is ranked 6,101 on Alexa (as on May 2014), while Facebook stands tall at rank 2 on Alexa. While Google's Orkut has petered out, Facebook has 1.28 billion monthly active users. Orkut's popularity stock has clearly fallen. In March 2004, more than half the traffic on Orkut was from the US. As of May 2014, the most number of users on Orkut are from Brazil and India.
More From This Section
For once, let's keep all the analysis aside and, for one last time, look back at the features that made Orkut what it is and kept it going.
Before there was the "Seflie" there was the profile picture. Your profile picture (the display picture or DP, as some of us call it) was your identity of sorts on the social network.
The scrapbook was your wall - a place where your fellow Orkut users could leave you 'scraps'. Your scrapbook was the one place where conversations would go on for an eternity, leaving behind a long trail of scraps.
The status message would speak out your frame of mind. These were bound to change every day!
The communities culture started right here on Orkut. Users would join the community of their favourite bands, video games, sports and so on. But it would be fair to say that apart from the banal stuff, there were many other communities that would be really helpful to users.
Your friends would often write you testimonials. These would appear on your profile, or rather 'add' to it. Such was the craze behind testimonials, that I remember getting messages from fellow Orkut users to write them a nice testimonial - they would, of course, return the favour.
One of the most interesting features of Orkut was the who viewed your profile option. Essentially, a user would get to know if someone had visited his or her profile. Users would be excited at the prospect of a stranger visiting their profile. Eventually, Orkut did come up with an option where you could prevent someone from seeing whether you had visited one's profile - the only catch was that the same option would apply to you as well.
We uploaded hundreds of pictures and videos on our Orkut profile. Most of them are still there and you have the option to archive them.
It's a pity that I cannot access my account since I had joined Orkut with a Yahoo! ID - which I stopped using long ago. But I got a final look at my profile through a friend - a loyal Orkut user - who managed to locate me and was kind enough to send me screenshots. My profile has 1,216 scraps and 218 photos.
I joined Orkut because it offered something "new and different". And that is precisely why I left Orkut to join Facebook a few years later. Mark Zuckerberg's social networking juggernaut became popular rapidly. Suddenly, people were talking about how Facebook was the "next big thing". And before you knew it, people were joining Facebook, adding it to their social networking repertoire. Preferences changed in such a way that people visited Facebook once every day, and Orkut once a year.
Many Orkut users will archive their pictures and details from their profile, I intend to leave mine behind as a token of thanks.
Orkut has fallen down in the pecking order, but it will always be credited with bringing us our first, raw social networking experience. To quote the Google blog post that announced Orkut was going defunct this September: "Orkut helped shape life online before people really knew what 'social networking' was."
So long, Orkut!