Orkut Help Migrating Away From Google Groups?

It looks like the Google lords have had their fill of Google Groups, and are planning on migrating away from Google usernet forum towards something a little bit more professional.

Vandini Ravindran, an Orkut Guide breaks the news over in the Official Orkut Help Group.

(Orkut Help Forum) Hi everyone,
We're in the process of moving the orkut Help Group from Google Groups
to a new platform that offers a number of features our users have
requested. The Forum in Google Groups will be closed to posting once
we've made the switch, but will still be available as an archive of
all the great information you've shared.

Some of the features the new forum will provide:

- Question & answer format to help you find answers quickly
- Better spam detection and prevention
- Public recognition of Top Contributors and frequent posters

I'll make sure to post another announcement as soon as the new forum
launches, but wanted to give you all a heads up so that the change
doesn't take you completely by surprise :)

Thanks in advance for your patience as we work to build a community in
the new orkut Help Forum. We hope you'll come check it out!

Cheers,
Vandini

While this news will not make the Google Groups department happy (as the AdSense help team left earlier), this will hopefully make the forum much more useful (as spammers and flamers seem to be targeting Google groups nowadays).

No word on when the new help group will be launched, although hopefully it will be by the end of next month.

Happy Birthday Orkut!! (Glad You Still Exist)

(Hat Tip: Orkut Sharing and Orkut Plus)

Five years ago, a Googler from the great nation of Turkey created Google's first official social network.

Since his last name Büyükkökten was fairly hard to pronounce (at least to the average American), Google decided to name their new social network after his first name, Orkut instead (at least according to the rumors).

Despite the fact that it failed to succeed in the US (MySpace and Facebook dominate here), Orkut somehow later on took off in both Brazil and India--and was even given "Google love" on the homepage for a short season.

Although Orkut has gone through many changes ranging from a (desperately needed) site redesign, to Orkut apps to launching Orkut mobile for smart phones (including the iPhone), the site has kept its simple yet functional design, making the site very enjoyable to use.

While I can only guess what 2009 holds for Orkut's future, I am glad that Google gave Orkut a chance early on as it is one of the few sites that allows me to actively interact with people from half way around the world (mostly from India and Brazil, but also Pakistan, Israel, England, and those crazy--yet lovable Iranians).

Happy Birthday Orkut! And thanks to all of the Googlers (especially the founder) who spend time improving the site, and for putting up with our constant whining (at least mine).

Update (1/25): The Official Orkut Blog not only celebrates its 5th anniversary, but hints towards even greater surprises for 2009.

Will Google Shut Down Orkut?

(Hat Tip: TechCrunch and Search Engine Land)

Unless you have been living a geek free life, you have probably heard about Google closing down Dodgeball, Mashup Editor, Jaiku (which will live on in the open source wilderness), as well as choking uploads to Google Video and removing support for Google Notebooks.

This wave of shutdowns surprised many people, causing some to wonder if Google will close down other popular (yet expensive) services--Orkut included.

While it is impossible to know which services Google may shut down (unless one is a Googler themselves), here are a few reasons why I think the search engine giant may decide to keep Orkut alive instead of killing it off in order to survive the upcoming recession.

• Orkut has influence: Despite failing in America, Orkut is very popular in both Brazil and India. If one were to look at global trends, Orkut comes in 9th place (according to comScore) when it comes to unique visitors.
  
  If Google ever did shut down Orkut, there would probably be a lot of outrage in South America and the Indian subcontinent (which would hurt the Google brand over seas).
• Potential for profit: With Orkut now running Google Adsense throughout forums, searches and (unfortunately) profiles, Orkut may just be creating a little wealth for Google (if not paying for most of the costs to keep the servers alive).
  
  Orkut may also be able to generate some extra cash by entering the VoIP arena (with some help from Google Talk and GrandCentral).
  
  Note: Orkut also has a third option, but I'll save that for another post. ;-)
• Developers, Developers, Developers, Developers!: Orkut is one of the few non search Google services that has a large following of third party companies or (as Steve Baller of Microsoft likes to call them) developers, developers, developers, developers!
  
  Thus far Orkut has almost 2,000 Orkut apps created by third party companies or hackers, not to mention countless GreaseMonkey scripts and Firefox extensions (with hacks for Google Chrome hopefully along the way).
  
  Unless Google desired to inspire frustration among its geek community (at least overseas), they probably would not kill off Orkut unless the companies financial existence was seriously threatened with extinction.

Even though Google may decide to cut even more services in the future (like Google Knol which is Google's version of Wikipedia) I do not see the search engine giant killing off Orkut--at least in the near future.

Have The Orkut Wars Begun? (India Verses Pakistan)

Personally I am not too thrilled about seeing this on Orkut, but here is the general gist of the story (from what I can gather from various emails, a few orkut scraps, etc.).

Last month, there were reports that a group calling themselves HMG (note: what does HMG stand for?) had successfully hacked the Islamic Republic of Pakistan orkut forum (or IRP for short), which may have been a response to the Mumbai attacks that shocked India (and the world) two months ago.

When I first heard about the Orkut hack, I was hoping that Google would be able to restore access to the original owners of the forum (as Google has done previously when Orkut forums were hacked en mass).

Unfortunately it seems as if the original owner of the Orkut forum, Arzoo (whose profile is no longer working) was deleted, allowing for any member of the forum to "simply inherit" the rights to the IRP community.

Many former members of IRP have since created two other Orkut forums (although both communities are not as large as the original forum).

Later on it was reported that Pakistani hackers were able to briefly take over the Dr. APJ Abdul kalam's Fan Club forum (note: the original owners were able to recover it back).

(CIOL.com) Pakistani hackers have targeted the Orkut community of Dr Abdul Kalam. [...]

The orkut page of Dr Kalam currently reads "We, the people of India, apologizes to our Pakistani brothers and ISI for barbaric acts of terrorism like Mumbai and Gujarat and many more which were originated and carried out by few citizens of India and supported by government of India. We condemn such acts to fullest."

I am hearing more reports of various forums hacked by either side, although thus far these are the only two that I can confirm at the moment (as Google may have restored the others to their original owners).

While I do understand why everyone's emotions are running high (as America experienced something similar after September 11th), I do not see the point in these forum hijackings as it only helps divide Indians and Pakistani's (which is probably the goal of the terrorists).

(Image via Anil Kalhan, original photographer unknown)

Fortunately there are a few Orkut forums out there trying to bring both sides together (note: and they have even started a unity petition).

Hopefully both sides can find more ways of working together--especially the hackers who would probably benefit everyone by creating more Orkut Apps--or even mobile apps for Orkut (which is definitely needed for Google Android phones as well as the iPhone).

So instead of trying to tear Orkut apart, why not instead try to build it up into something great together? (and perhaps makes some money on the side).