PC4Media: Exclusivity of a Network

April 25, 2004

Exclusivity of a Network - Free Orkut Invite

Update 2/15/2005: [removed] has rescinded her offer. Apparently, she had Bill-Clintoned the memory of saying "sure" in response to my question: "would you like to volunteer to send invitations from people that find my blog?" So, I will ONLY send invitations to people if they agree to let me post their email address so that people can ask them for an invitation. Isn't that fair?

Update 2/14/2005: [removed] has offered to send out invitations to orkut. Her email address is [removed]. If you'd like to send out invitations, I can add your email address here.

Update 2/12/2004: I am no longer sending out invitations to Orkut. I receive a minimum of 10 requests per week and it is a pain in the ass. Given all of my responsibilities I have decided that this is not a wise use of my time. I suggest you find some bloggers that work for google and ask them. Then, maybe they'll eliminate this stupid invite-only policy.

Update 9/12/04: If you would like an orkut invitation, use this to contact me.

So, I finally received an invitation to orkut. Thanks Merrick. It was actually the 3rd one. The first two from Dan Keldsen and Mitko Gerensky-Greene bounced because my hotmail service is always at about 95%. I know I should clean it out, but its low on the priority list since I only use that for friend's and networking online, not any urgent business, which I transfer over to my WhizSpark account. And I have a gmail account too now, since I was previously a heavy blogger user.

I initially was pissed that I had to beg people to send me an invite. I had a few people that I talk with online, pretty much ignore me. Which is no big deal. I am used to the blog rejection. However, It still doesn't sit well with me that it is an invite only network. I think this is going to be a trend that we see, especially from google that: you have to qualify to try out their services when they are new.

From a marketing perspective it is pretty smart. Everyone wants to be one of the "lucky ones" to try it first. The people that try it first want to tell the whole world about it
because then they'll get the glory. At the same time they are telling the world about it, they have to be thorough in their review, so they are in effect, giving google all the feedback they could ever hope for for free from the early adopters. Therefore, it is pretty damn smart from a product design and improvement perspective too. It is also good from a scalability issue. Having launched a social networking site (on MS technology), we have the thorny issue of how many servers to buy and when. Although, google doesn't have the same issue because of their massive scalable infrastructure (that they may be using for orkut, which is built on ms's asp.net) , they can control the flow of users a lot easier.

However, I don't like that someone has to deem me worthy to be invited into the network. I know that eventually, that'll cover everyone cause we are all only separated by a few steps, but It isn't very democratic. Growing up, I think we've all encountered groups that weren't very inclusive. I think the web has a chance to change that - breaking down barriers - destroying cliques - being friendly - letting people control their own destiny. I may be getting a little philosophical here and the powers that be at google may have not even thought of this issue. But they may have, and instead, weighed the marketing and technical benefits over the benefits of being democratic.

So, If anyone wants an invite, I am glad to send you one, whether I know you or not.

I thought of also creating a gmail account and publishing the id and pwd so that anyone could play around with it, but it was after I chose the handle that I wanted. And I don't want to risk losing that one. Unfortunately, I can't create another gmail account from my blogger invitation.

Posted at 09:53 AM | Permalink

Comments

Hi
Can you send me an orkut invitation?
thanks

kasra.kh {at} gmail {dot} com

Posted by: kasra | June 09, 2004 at 08:17 AM

Hey, im looking for an orkut invitation, i know you have received many requests for this, but hey it's a damn fever. I'm already a gmail participant and i have given my invitations to whoever asks for them. Dont be a meanie :P

Posted by: Lukar | June 10, 2004 at 02:47 PM

can you send me an invitation to orkut? if you can i will be pleased. thanks. mail: halilbayrakci@yahoo.com

Posted by: halil bayrakci | June 10, 2004 at 04:15 PM

Please send me an invite to orkut. a_mal3@yahoo.com

Thanks

Posted by: Steve | June 11, 2004 at 03:42 AM

if it's not too much trouble, could you please send me an orkut invite. inertia@punkass.com

thanks =)

Posted by: adam | June 11, 2004 at 12:43 PM

ok for all you guys wanting orkut go to: tyedyedtrucks.blogspot.com
for gmail is a lot more difficult, try gmailswap.com, or if your desperate go to ebay where the idiots are selling the free invites.
orkut is easy to get

Posted by: briaguya | June 11, 2004 at 02:05 PM