Orkut don't care about you

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Orkut members launch Orkut Paranoia
community about Orkut TOS on Orkut

Orkut members launch Orkut Paranoia
community about Orkut TOS on Orkut 02/10/2004 10:42 PM
Geez. My head is spinning. Anyway, BoingBoing reader Adam fields points us to a new "Orkut community" (one of many online affinity groups within the social networking service), called "Orkut Paranoia" (link requires free membership). Adam says, "This formed out of some interesting discussion we've had about what's going on... summarized in this blog post:"

1) Orkut claims irrevocable unlimited license rights to everything you post. Most people don't understand what that means. One example of this is that many of my friends have posted pictures that I've taken. This is probably not a problem, generally, but they've granted Orkut a license to use them without consulting me, and created a legal tangle should I have a problem with that, forcing me to have to perform a legal struggle with Orkut, because of their unwitting actions. I think this is rude behavior on the part of Orkut, but their prerogative to demand.
2) Orkut may share personal information with Google in an unrestricted way. Google is unwilling (so far) to discuss what use they may make of that information.
3) Google's privacy policy possibly has some holes in it with regards to data collected by way of means other than use of the google.com website.

I suspect that Orkut is a way for Google to gather personal information about their clientele for marketing purposes, and to try to form a more solid relationship beyond "I just use Google for search because it's convenient". This is not terribly nefarious, but the kind of data that could be collected to do so has wide potential for abuse, and people should be aware that that's what's going on. Some may not care, but many people I know are signing up without reading or understanding the implications of the above three points.

Link

Company Claims Orkut Stole Orkut Code

Company Claims Orkut Stole Orkut Code 06/30/2004 07:19 PM
It's not like it's particularly difficult to write a social networking systems. These days, at the rate new ones are coming out, it practically seems like a typical first year CS student's project. Still, a company named Affinity Engines that builds social networking products for universities (that just so happens to have been founded by Orkut Buyukkokten - the creator of orkut.com) is now suing Google for stealing their code. From the article, it sounds like they have a pretty solid claim. First, it's obvious that Orkut had access to the code. He even continued to work on it while he was at Google. According to the lawsuit he promised repeatedly that he wasn't going to work on a similar app for Google, but then did so anyway. The real damaging point, however, is that Affinity Engines claims they've found nine identical bugs in Orkut that are also in their own system -- which certainly makes it quite likely the basic code is the same.

Orkut

Orkut 02/10/2004 02:53 AM
Well, this thing seems to be taking off. Nat threw in the first invite, so I signed up, and another half-dozen or so folks have fired off invites. This is another one of those networking site things, and I've decided that while I'll go accept invites from anyone I know (I really need to get a picture up--I'd throw the rainbow parrot pic I use for iChat, but the TOS seem to indicate that'd be ill-advised) I don't think I'm going to go to much trouble to actively go search people out. These things are always interesting to look at,...

Orkut

Orkut 01/23/2004 04:12 PM

I awoke this morning to an explosion of invitatons to a new social network called Orkut.

Lots of things to say about it - first and foremost that it's a really clean, functional and exciting site!

Second - when I tried to join Orkut - I clicked on the 'Join Orkut' button and it told me - "Sorry you have to be invited into Orkut."

"Oh" I said.  "Then why is there a button saying "Join Orkut?"

That's pretty strange.

Now - the next thing is that Orkut is (apparently) created by Orkut Buyukkokten, who works at Google and just happens to be the guy who created the oriignal social network for Stanford - which is now part of Affinity Engines (who have a new CEO - BTW.)

Orkut has a pretty conspicuos message at the bottom saying "In affiliation with Google" - so if I was a betting man, I'd say Google decided NOT to buy Friendster - 'cause they got their employee Orkut - to roll their own internal system - which (just happens) to be called Orkut.

That said - let's just hope that Orkut will support FOAF - so we all can live happily together.

Orkut has Communities in it - so I created a few myself.

Here we go!

 

orkut

orkut 01/23/2004 02:22 PM
social-networking site .. Orkut

orkut.com
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orkut - help

orkut - help 02/10/2004 02:54 AM
http://www.orkut.com/join.html Any orkut members out there? Me need Invite.... ;) UPDATE: Got a ton of invites. Thanks :)

R.I.P. Orkut

R.I.P. Orkut 06/10/2004 05:46 PM

Orkut is now a spam-filled waste and inappropriate for professional use.  What a waste of a good opportunity.  I am now starting to appreciate LinkedIn's more conservative approach.

"Orkut"

"Orkut" 01/23/2004 05:24 PM

Orkut the right way to go?

Orkut the right way to go? 01/26/2004 03:30 AM

Why Orkut Doesn't Work (Ross Mayfield).

January 25, 2004

Here's what I just posted as a comment on Many-to-Many...

Exporting from Orkut

Exporting from Orkut 08/11/2004 11:30 AM

Doc asks the same question we all want.....

Subtract

People are asking me to be their contact on Multiply. There was an error processing your request. Please try again. it tells me, with advice to "contact customer service." I'm not a customer. I don't have the time. But I do wonder why we need yet another one of these things.

Ah, one friend just told me Multiply promised to import Orkut contacts, somehow. That's a good sell, if it can be done, I guess. If it has other advantages over Orkut, which has become too slow for me. In fact, it's busy not coming up right now.

[Doc Searls]

Me too! I wanna export from orkut - too!

But to export - we need to get explicit permission from each and every person - with them 'opting into' the export process. That will appear as a simple checkbox in folks' settings.

THEN Doc can use FOAFnet to import his social network into Multiply - theoretically. All Multipl has to do is support the FOAFnet.org spec!

That's EXACTLY why we created it!

Orkut Needs Permachat

Orkut Needs Permachat 02/10/2004 03:02 AM

A community without communication is a dead community and friendship is more than just a wall of faces.  Connections between people are born out of interactions between them and strength of connections are primarily based on the amount and frequency of interactions.

So it is communication that binds people and communities together yet there is little of that going on in Orkut.  Yes, there is the message feature but it's works more like radio and discourages interaction.  Communities have topics, but topics are little rooms one must make effort to enter and compartmentalized conversations within a group setting do not encourage others to join in uninvited.

To get around these problems.  I think permachats should be created centered around individuals and communities.  A permachat is like IRC except conversations takes place over much longer period, days even.  Visibility of permachat should be limited to friends or friends of friends only.  Amount is determined by rate of actvity.To promote interaction and to encourage the sense of conversation, sense of time is removed, leaving only faces and names next to each entry.  Amount of activity within past 24 hours should be displayed in the 'view network' and 'my communities' pages using color hints (i.e. red for hot).

Permachat allows people who know me to communicate with me as well as others who know me.  This in turns allows them to become friends over time instead of using more explicit introduction based social networking.  It also allows interaction without spammy messages invading private spaces and deteriorating sense of friendship.

For communities, permachat serves as the single thread that binds the community.  Topics is too focus-oriented to serve this function.  Permachat allows casual conversations, encourages interaction, and informs every member with minimal effort.  And, most importantly, permachat allows new friendship to be born out these intereactions among community members just as conversations among friends of an individual helps them form new friendships.

A working example of permachat is #joiito.  #joiito IRC channel not only binds the friendship network centered around Joi, but also builds a community in itself as people get to know each other.  Topics come and go just as Joi comes and goes, but the conversation rolls on and weaves its social magic around everyone.  I think Orkut use a bit of that magic.

Alternative to Orkut

Alternative to Orkut 02/10/2004 02:51 AM
OnePotMeal announces a new Artificial Social Network for those of us griping about Orkut: Urkel....

Orkut Follies

Orkut Follies 02/10/2004 02:51 AM
Michael O'Connor Clarke is writing funnily (here and here) about the foibles of Orkut. His Monopoly card reminds me of a fake screen capture I used when talking about Artificial Social Networks (ASN) such as Orkut. Click for larger view Just in case it's not obvious, the point is that you can't get over ASNs' inherent binary nature by adding more binary choices. That is, the problem isn't just that the choices are too precise; the problem is also that the choices are necessarily explicit. Social relationships depend on being implicit, hidden, dark and unspoken....

Why Google needs Orkut

Why Google needs Orkut 02/10/2004 02:49 AM
In all the discussion of Orkut I've seen so far, most folks are busy comparing Orkut to every other social networking web site around, typically they mention Friendster ("it's so much faster!"), but as we all know these sites are a dime a dozen these days. At least it seems that way. What surprises me is that nobody has looked at it the other way around: What problems might Orkut solve that Google would otherwise find significantly more challenging? Those...

Playing around with Orkut

Playing around with Orkut 01/26/2004 10:19 AM
shortcomings of Orkut .. Martin Roell .. 3

roell.net/weblog/archiv/2004/01/25/playing_around_with_orkut.shtml
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Orkut party

Orkut party 02/10/2004 02:47 AM

An yone go to the orkut.om launch party last night at Suite 181?. Did anyone go to the orkut.om launch party last night at Suite 181??? [The Social Software Weblog]

Sure - I was there.  Of course I was there!

I got to meet Orkut for the first time and I made sure that the FOAF meme was firmly implanted into his cranium.

A lot of people are hoping that Orkut will support FOAF.

Orkut goes International

Orkut goes International 06/20/2004 11:55 PM

So I get this message today.....

Hi Marc,

We've just launched a new feature that allows you to specify the primary language of your community.

Why would you want to do this?

1. So that everyone posts in one language! As orkut.com gains more members from around the world, it makes it easier for you and everyone in your community if people can read each other's posts. This is hard to do if everyone's speaking different languages. 2. So that you can search communities by language. This way, when you're looking for new communities, you'll always find ones that you can read and participate in.

I say - "right on!"

We all need to start thinking more international! I bet this is really gonna make Orkut take off even more. Now if they only had something to do in there.

HHHmmmm - maybe like Gmail, Blogger and Google News.....in the valley of the search.

Orkut in action

Orkut in action 02/11/2004 08:26 PM

I did finally meet someone who went on dates with three people she met on Orkut. So far so good she reports.

Orkut is supplying me with a life so, via orkut, I got comped into Etech, I got a meeting with VCs, 3 dates had, three arranged, and lots of people have walked up to me and said, "oh! hi!"

Orkut Experience

Orkut Experience 01/24/2004 09:27 PM

I just registered into Orkut, thanks to an invitation from Chris Pirillo -- thanks Chris!;-).  While the registration process was a bit tiring, Orkut UI and user experience were more pleasant than Friendster or LinkedIn.  It could use some improvements here and there, but at least it was pleasant enough for me to invited a bunch of friends and collegues, something I haven't done with other similiar services.

Hmm.  It might be interesting to mix PKI with social networking.  For example, I could issue Friend of Don certificates to my friends that basically say “I know this person to be trustworthy, smart, and nice enough to be my friend.“  What uses would such certificate have?  Nothing in the horizon but I am wondering what might lie beyond that...

If you are my friend and haven't received an invite from me, just send me an e-mail.  I just grabbed the names that were handy and definitely missed many of you whom I would be proud to call a friend.

Orkut datamining

Orkut datamining 04/25/2004 08:27 AM

Somewhat scary, but pretty interesting Orkut datamining. An Orkut density map and a Orkut Personal Network GeoMapper. Here's a map of my network. It doesn't seem to map my complete network. It's also too bad it's not global yet.

Via Sanford

Orkut for bitches

Orkut for bitches 02/11/2004 04:27 PM
Many people email me inquiring after the hounds. How are they? What are they up to? Do they rule? The answer, quite obviously, is that they're busy doing Social Software. Networking, as it were, via the might that is Dogster....

Orkut Circuit

Orkut Circuit 01/25/2004 10:32 AM

After my first lap (day) of Orkut, I got these to share.

It's supposedly writ ten in ASP.NET.  That one surprised me.

It has many security and privacy issues just as other social networking services have.  For example, one can send a message to thousands of members with only a few clicks.  There could be some XSS (cross-site scripting) problems as well.  But, overall, I have yet to see anything that can be resolved over time given sufficient technical and financial interests.

Invitation-only aspect of Orkut blew me away in terms of its effect and its meaning.  Since you can't just register without an invitation from someone within, it creates a sense of value that drives people to signup.

As to the meaning, what invitation-only means is that everyone who is a member of Orkut knows Orkut himself through a string of friends.  It means you have joined a six-degree of separation experiment where the starting end is Orkut Buyukkokten.  I'll bet that was why it was named Orkut.

I am not yet convinced that there exists a workable revenue model behind Orkut but then I have similar opinions about Rovers in Mars.  Entertaining thoughts about what might lie beyond the horizon with a bunch of geeky friends is a reward enough for now.  To this end, I created an Orkut Community titled “Orkut Design” to examine Orkut in detail.

Orkut Death

Orkut Death 03/06/2004 02:09 AM
Huy Zing: My Orkut.com death was a slow painful one that lasted 1.5 hours starting at 20:44 on Monday, February 23, 2004. [via Danah Boyd]

Orkut Bay Area Map

Orkut Bay Area Map 02/18/2004 10:49 PM

I know that Orkut is a tired topic already, but here is a map from DataWhoreHouse showing distribution of Orkut members who exposed their general location on Orkut (via Scoble and Liz at Many2Many).  Hmm, no, I didn't have to pay to get layed.

Mostly what I expected except Silicon Valley looks like Death Valley for some reason.  A bug?

Orkut Goes Dark, At Least For A Bit

Orkut Goes Dark, At Least For A Bit 01/25/2004 08:34 PM

The edge of Orkut

The edge of Orkut 12/19/2004 03:06 PM

I just got the following message on Orkut.

Limit reached for number of friends

You have 1024 friends. You can only have up to 1000 friends. Before you can add more friends, you need to remove friends.

Partially because I was getting sick of social networks systems, partially because they were trying to be "exclusive" with invite only and partially because it was easy, I took the policy of saying yes to every friend request that didn't look like a fakester. Now I've found the edge of Orkut. According to Orkut, you can only have 1000 friends. I guess that's OK compared to the 150 or so for AIM. This error message reminds me a bit of real life. I know need to forget someone every time I meet someone I want to remember because I'm having a buffer overflow on my people recognition memory.

Now the question is... What do I do with my Orkut network now that I'm "done"?

Comment - TrackBack

Warren Ellis on Orkut

Warren Ellis on Orkut 01/26/2004 02:57 PM
Orkut, the recently-launched, Google-affiliated FOAF (Cory critiques them -- and the bigger FOAF picture -- here), is offline for a while. Before the temporary beta outage, Warren Ellis logged on, sniffed around, then said:

Right now, it looks pretty much like an iteration of the Tribe.net system, with an eye on Friendster's apparent main function as a dating system. (Which means, oddly, it requests your business profile at the same time as it's asking you where you like to be fingered.) (...) It's faster than Fuckster and Tribe, but it shows that all these friend-of-a-friend things have really hit a wall. I mean, what can you actually do aside from invite all your friends and piss about on a couple of small message boards? Message boards that, unlike Tribe, allow anonymous postings and therefore devalue the message board experience? What happens after that? After you've gotten all your friends in -- whom you send email to or IM regularly in any case, presumably. That's it. All done. Until, I guess, yet another social network system opens and you start all over again.

These things want to be a hub for your Internet community experience, but they're just not necessary enough. Tribe gets closest, but it's nothing you're going to leave as an open window on your desktop all day. The first new social network system that builds an IM program into its structure may have a shot. The Delphiforums message boards have Jabber tacked on to them, which would have been brilliant when Delphi was at its height, but has gone pretty much unnoticed in the wake of their self-mutilating half-smart attempts to monetise. The idea was and is sound. The minute you make these things the easiest and most direct way to communicate with the personal network the system's let you build or collate, there's going to be a reason to keep the site on your desktop. And that has to be their goal. I mean, who builds a social network system that doesn't want people to use it all the time?

Link

Should sites like Orkut own your profile

Should sites like Orkut own your profile 01/25/2004 12:45 AM
orkut - terms of service: "By submitting, posting or displaying any Materials on or through the orkut.com service, you automatically...

Google's Orkut cuts out

Google's Orkut cuts out 01/27/2004 09:51 PM
The social network site, an experimental project of search giant Google, goes offline just days after thousands of Silicon Valley execs and techies are invited to join.

Orkut Back in Orbit

Orkut Back in Orbit 01/29/2004 02:49 AM

Like the title say, it's online again.

Get out of Orkut Jail - for free

Get out of Orkut Jail - for free 02/10/2004 02:47 AM

Thanks Seb!  I can use this - that's for sure.

Let's see - I think I'll go add 30 more friends and get put back into jail - again.

BTW Orkut is having his birthday party Friday night.....

*************************************************

orkut.com Launch Party

Friday, Feb. 6th

8:30 - 10:00PM Private

10:00 - 4:00AM General

21+ ID and orkut.com profile print-out required

FREE COVER & TWO DRINKS to the first 500 people!

suite one8one

181 Eddy St.

San Francisco, CA 94109

www.suite181.com

*************************************************

The folks at Tribe think it'll be cool to show up with a Tribe T-Shirt. For info on getting that Tribe T-Shirt, contact Harriet Kaizer for details.

==========================

Communit y Chest. I've decorated an earlier post with this card. Let's see if it comes on the picTuner...

[Seb's Open Research]

Language Tempest At Orkut

Language Tempest At Orkut 07/17/2004 11:15 PM

Orkut Newsletter Spam?

Orkut Newsletter Spam? 05/25/2004 02:21 AM
Well, it seems that Orkut is now sending out a newsletter to members. Mine looks something like this: Hey Jeremy, You have 162 friends: - 145 friends - 5 acquaintances - 12 haven't met New members in your network since May 16th: - 2 new friends - 33 new friends of friends - 2490 new friends of friends of friends Friends of friends you might be interested in meeting: - Joi Ito http://www.orkut.com/Profile.aspx?uid=1405190888294923508 - Ask Bjørn Hansen http://www.orkut.com/Profile.aspx?uid=5207100656550035736 - Mitchell...

Orkut, Google and Privacy

Orkut, Google and Privacy 02/14/2004 05:25 PM
If I understand this correctly, Google can now link my name and personal information to all of the Google Web searches I do (or may have done, as long as the cookie on my computer has been there, prior to signing up). This is totally outrageous. A company PR person said she'd look into it. I'll let you know what she says.

Salon discusses Orkut

Salon discusses Orkut 06/16/2004 03:59 AM
You are who you know

salon.com/tech/feature/2004/06/15/social_software_one/index.htm l
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Orkut Personal Network GeoMapper

Orkut Personal Network GeoMapper 04/26/2004 08:11 PM

datawhorehouse.com/orkut/mapme.php
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a first stab at mapping Orkut networks

a first stab at mapping Orkut networks 04/26/2004 01:14 PM
it looks cool, but i gotta reluctantly point out this has no use to me

Brazilians outnumber Yanquis on Orkut
2-1

Brazilians outnumber Yanquis on Orkut
2-1 07/18/2004 08:45 AM
Orkut, Google's social networking tool, is only open to people who've been invited to join the service. This means that once a well-connected Burning Man attendee shows up in Orkut, lots of burners follow.

Which is how it is that suddenly, Portuguese speakers (presumably mostly Brazilian, given Brazil's kick-ass connectivity and widespread adoption of moblogging, blogging and other viral, social tools) outnumber Yankees on the service nearly two-to-one. There's now a vicious fight raging between USAns and Portuguese-speakers, as the former group is displaced, for nearly the first time, by another linguistic group.

(I'm reminded of a story that a product manager for Hotmail once told me -- "Our growth curve was pretty steady, then one day someone sent an email to someone in India with 'Get a free email account at hotmail.com' in the footer and the next day we singed up half a million users").

Tammy Soldaat, a Canadian, got a sample of Brazilian wrath recently when she posted a message asking whether her community site on body piercing should be exclusive to people who speak English.

Brazilian Orkut users quickly labeled her a "nazi" and "xenophobe."

"After that I understood why everyone is complaining about these people, why they're being called the 'plague of Orkut,"' she said in a site called "Crazy Brazilian Invasion."

Link (<>i>via /.)

Orkut OD: TOS hack, and craziest
community yet

Orkut OD: TOS hack, and craziest
community yet 02/16/2004 08:08 PM
BoingBoing reader Larry sends an interesting "loophole" for Orkut's much-bemoaned TOS:

I noticed that people have been making a stink about Orkut.com's TOS lately, saying that it reserves the right to do pretty much anything with content posted to Orkut.com. I was actually a little more disturbed by another item from the TOS. Orkut.com forbids "directing any user (for example, by linking) to any Materials of any third party without such third party's prior written consent." That runs counter to the ethics of practically everyone on the Web, right on up to Tim Berners-Lee himself. So I made a PHP hack so Orkut users can strictly comply with the letter of the law in the TOS, but still point to any site they want on the Web without guilt. The URL I give here is just an example of how it works; as you can see, it refers to bOING bOING. There are no specific instructions on my site yet for using my hack, but I may remedy that if needed. In the meantime, anyone on Orkut has my permission to use it. Link

... while Jason Schultz sends us a link to something that wins my vote for zaniest/most paranoid Orkut community ever:

"PONZI: For those who believe orkut is a Ponzi scheme, fans of Ponzi schemes, or those who think Ponzi was on Happy Days. It's all about the Ponzi is all we're sayin." Link
Grok Description matches for Orkut don't care about you
GrokA matches for Orkut don't care about you

Orkut don't care about you

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