For A Social Site, Orkut Is Good At Making Enemies

from the trouble-everywhere-it-goes dept

Thu, Oct 12th 2006 8:04am — Joseph Weisenthal

As social-networking sites go, Google's Orkut is definitely something of an also-ran. It hasn't come close to capturing people's attention the way many of its rivals have, and the only significant activity it does see seems to come out of Brazil. And even in that market, much of the news is bad, as the site is seen as haven for drug dealers. This has lead to some unpleasant legal conflicts with Brazil's government. Even outside of Brazil, the site seems to be a magnet for trouble. A court in India has now deemed the site to be a breeding ground of anti-India hate, due to the presence of an anti-India user group, and an image of a burned Indian flag. Now we can understand the fact that MySpace is at the heart of many legal issues these days because it's wildly popular. But for how little Orkut means to Google, it seems to bring a disproportionate amount of trouble.

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Dan Oblak, 12 Oct 2006 @ 9:36am

Bigger trouble than they might imagine...
Perhaps the greatest amount of 'trouble' might be tied to the fact that until I read this article, I'd never even HEARD of Orkut.

Having long considered myself a rabid fan of anything coming from under Google's roof, this was quite a surprise to me. But I see that they are using the same 'invitation only' scheme that they used to slowly grow GMail.com; that could have something to do with it as well:

"orkut is unique, because it's an organically growing network of trusted friends. That way we won't grow too large, too quickly and everyone will have at least one person to vouch for them."

"If you know someone who is a member of orkut, that person can invite you to join as well. If you don't know an orkut member, wait a bit and most likely you soon will."

"We look forward to having you as part of the orkut community."
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Thiago, 12 Oct 2006 @ 9:51am

About orkut
Here in Brazil, the network system orkut is quite popular. Most of my friends, and by that I mean 90% of them use it. It's amazing how I can keep myself in touch with some people I met years ago and now we're back together by orkut system. They do have a law problem here not because drag's dealer (how the article say it) but mostly because of sex. Brazilian authority are very to thought about this subject and that's where all the problem came from.
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Thiago, 12 Oct 2006 @ 9:51am

About orkut
Here in Brazil, the network system orkut is quite popular. Most of my friends, and by that I mean 90% of them use it. It's amazing how I can keep myself in touch with some people I met years ago and now we're back together by orkut system. They do have a law problem here not because drag's dealer (how the article say it) but mostly because of sex. Brazilian authority are very to thought about this subject and that's where all the problem came from.
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arban, 12 Oct 2006 @ 10:03am

For some reason, I thought Orkut was it's own entity when I signed up. Then some time later, Google took it over. In any case, the last time I used it, the whole single sign on thing didn't work so well.

Re: Brazil
I get a lot of "invite to be my friend" from Brazilian users from out of the blue. Is getting as many "friends" as you can part of the fun? I must be out of touch with this whole social networking thing.
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Brad Eleven, 12 Oct 2006 @ 10:10am

Nice post, but...
...the past tense of "lead" is "led".
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Anonymous Coward, 12 Oct 2006 @ 3:58pm

Re:
I think orkut has always been a subsidiary of google. I believe it's named after the google employee who created it. It's been around for a while.
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Sean, 13 Oct 2006 @ 10:06am

Orkut Buyukkokten's janky app
So, now Orkut's user base includes white supremacists, Indian anarchists, and drug dealers. Considering that the site offers little more than glorified profiles and lacks virtually every feature of competing social networks, I think Google should just kill it and shop for something better.
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F, 17 Oct 2006 @ 8:03am

It also includes aprox. 40% of internet users of a third world country with 180 million people.
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Tiago, 23 Oct 2006 @ 9:33am

Re:
Just 40%? :-P
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SHAISTA PARVEEN, 17 Mar 2007 @ 7:26pm

doctor
i want a good job
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