Dear Google, We Need Orkut Categories For Orkut Apps!

Now that the search engine king's favorite social network has gained well over 1,000 Orkut apps (1306 as of this post), I think it's time for Google to seriously consider adding categories to make it easier to find new Orkut apps to add to our profiles.

Although you can always find new apps from your friends (or by searching), this seems to be a rather inefficient way to discover new apps (as you may not always want to add apps based on your friends tastes and needs).

Google already does this with several other services that they own (such as YouTube, Google Books and even for Orkut communities), so they might want to consider doing the same thing for Orkut apps in order to make finding them a little easier.

------------------Example------------------

Lets say an Orkut user is interested in playing games at work (note: I would not recommend doing this unless you want to lose your job!).

Instead of simply doing a search for games over on the Orkut app directory, they could simply click on the Games category and see apps like:

• Counterstrike
  
• Sonic the Hedgehog
  
• Pacman
  
• Chess
  
• Zelda
  
• Checkers
  
• McDonalds (note: Not made by McDonalds)
  

Other users interested in music could click on the Music category and see apps like:

• Profile Tunes
  
• iLike
  
• My Music (note: there are two other Orkut apps with the same name)
  
• Phulki
  
• Tempo Trax
  
• Music Mazaa
  
• Sunoh.fm (note: see review)
  

I could list other similar Orkut apps but I think you would get the idea. :-)

Whether or not Google should create the categories or allow developers to simply apply labels to their apps I will leave to Orkut to decide.

But either way, we need a better way to organize these apps, as the last thing users need to do is sift through 10,000 Orkut apps in the future (which could easily happen at the rate these apps are being submitted and approved).