Google More Confident

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Google has kept Beta tag for its products like Gmail, Blog Search for years, but it has removed the beta tag for Chrome browser with in 100 days of its first release. This is change is Google's strategy. People may like to use browser which is more secure (may not prefer beta products as browser). Google has made some 14 silent updates to the chrome over last 100 days. Google claims over 10 million users (probably downloads) since first beta release. Google very well may also be tracking active users as well, they may have way wherein they may be sending some update to Google servers via the browser. Start using the latest chrome browser and let us know, which is the best IE, Firefox or Chrome ?

Firefox doesn't allow accessing the parent frame url whereas

Firefox doesn't allow accessing the parent frame url whereas Google Chrome allows in case of cross domain

As you know that codeinspections is now malliks and also as you can see any user opening codeinspection gets automatically redirected to malliks.mazic.in, I am making this posting to explain the technical details about how we did that.

Basically in malliks we have created an index page which has an header and iframe which has the source as the codeinspections.blogspot.com and this works as expected. But I wanted to go a step ahead and let anyone coming to codeinspections automatically get redirected to malliks. I did that by adding a javascript code to the blog and the code looks like below:

This code works in firefox and IE, because these browsers doesn't all you to access the parent frame url if both the parent and child are in different domain. In the above code if user come to site as codeinspections flag will be zero and hence gets redirected to malliks, and when the user is on malliks, javascript code tries to access parent url and gets an exception, therby flag is set to one and hence user is not redirected. I tested this on IE and firefox and it worked fine.

But one of blog reader reported that blog was not opening in the chrome browser and even I tried in browser and it didn't work, it was infinitely getting redirected to malliks, i,e a frame inside a frame and so on infinite frames gets opened. This is because chrome was not giving any exception and it was allowing to freely access the parent frame url. I then added code below to make it work on chrome.

With increasing number of browsers(IE6,IE7,firfox 2,firfox 3,chrome IE8), it challenge for developers to write a code which works perfectly on all these browsers. Whats your take on this?
source: http://codeinspections.blogspot.com/

Carol Bartz is New Yahoo CEO!! Whats in Store?

Carol Bartz is named as new Yahoo CEO. Carol is ex-CEO of Autodesk. She was with autodesk for 14 years. AutoDesk is a traditional software company building CAD related software and selling it to customers. Yahoo is free online web business with ads as revenue model. So, both the businesses are not similar. It interesting to see how Carol handles this.

Micrsoft is a great software product company, which builds the operating system and sells it (Autodesk type), but its struggling to make a mark in online business (Yahoo type). Lets see whats in store for Yahoo?
All the best Carol Bratz

SMS Apps From Mazic Using SMSGupShup Platform

SMS GupShup (Webaroo company) has released its platform for developers to build their SMS applications. The platform is very easy to use. SMS Application is an application that can be used to provide services by communicating through SMS. It can be built using any programming language like Java, C, C++, Perl, PHP, Python etc. You need to register, a Keyword and Appurl with Sms GupShup. When any user send an SMS Keyword Query, the app url will be getting the user phone number and Query as the Query parameters. The response from the app url should be in form of XML or JSON which contains the phone number and content to be posted to the phone number. App cannot send infinite outgoing responses. The outgoing responses from the an app can be upto 5 times the incoming messeges.

Mazic India has built couple of SMS apps using this platform, SMS Dictionary and SMS News.
SMS Dictionary:

SMS DICT pasta and sends it to 56767888 to get meaning of Pasta as response. Usage: DICT Query

SMS News:
SMS Khabar Satyam to 56767888 to get latest news related to satyam. Usage: KHABAR Query

Let us know what kind of services you would like to access via SMS.

Stop Writing in Toilets and Start Testing

After few recent incidents, I feel that all the Google testers are busy writing on the toilets (Read about Testing on the Toilet) and forgot testing the software. I would request them to please concentrate on testing software and not to just claim themselves as best testing/QA team of the world. Google definitely have some of best testers who helped build world class web applications, but quality soon seems to be deteriorating.

First, it was the security loop holes in Google's Chrome browser which surprised me. Just an hour back Google Search started showing all the results as malware sites,which may harm you computer. This lasted for about 15 minutes. On lighter side, Google may be trying to show all non-sponsored results as malware so users will end up with no option but to click on sponsored ads.

One more issue on orkut, I was trying to submit an orkut app from couple of days with no success using this url. I am constantly getting message as:
Bad, bad server. No donut for you.
Unfortunately, the orkut.com server has acted out in an unexpected way. Hopefully, it will return to its helpful self if you try again in a few minutes.
There was no response from them even for an email. Lets see how long this will remain.

What do you guys feel? Is Google slowly losing on the Quality front?
source: http://codeinspections.blogspot.com/

Google's Explaination on Flagging all the Sites as Malware sites

Google gave official explanation about yesterday's bug where Google flagged all the search results as malware. It wasn't a code push that actually caused the issue, but its a data push. Google maintains all the URL which are considered malware in a file. The URLs in this file are updated both manually and in automated way.

Yesterday the new version of this file was pushed to servers and the file contained '/' as one URL which is like * in the regular expression and so all the sites were listed as malware. Great that team was able to identify this issue soon and revert back the URLs file.

But the question remains is how did '/' get into the URLs list. It can be either manual error or bug in automated malware URL detecting code. Google claims it as a manual error and for that matter any tech company in such a scenario would not admit it as bug in the code. But how can a human whose daily job is to update these URL be unaware that entering '/' would mean all the URLs or is he some disgruntled employee who got pink slip recently?

Now will ecommerce sites like e-bay or amazon sue Google as they may have definitely made losses during this 55 minutes where there site have been shown as malware sites? source: http://codeinspections.blogspot.com/

Google Promotes Youtube Video Downloads!!

Piracy has always been associated with Youtube. Media majors have filed lawsuits against Google for their copyrighted content being hosted on Youtube. Some of recent judgments have been in favor of video sites where the video hosting sites pleaded its defense under the “safe harbor” provisions of DMCA copyright law, which meant it could be safe as long as it removed the infringing video when alerted by the copyright holder.

But what if a video hosted on youtube is downloaded by some user even before an alert by copyrighed holder? Many sites like this exists all over the internet which allows users to download Youtube videos. Google cant control those sites so its ok but Google went ahead and accepted an application named Youtube Video Downloader for its Orkut social network. At the first point this application doesn't have any social feature, one of our app was rejected few months back stating it didnt have any social features. Most important being how can Google accept such application which is allowing download of videos from one of their sites. If Google thinks there is no problem with this then why dont they just give download link on the youtube video page itself.

Is "Be Evil" Google's new mantra? What will be copyrighted content holders take on this?
Will Orkut remove this Application? source: http://codeinspections.blogspot.com/

How to post invisible scraps in orkut?

Recently I found this interesting feature (or bug) in orkut.

I could send a scrap to my friend which is invisible to my friend and me.

You could ask me then what's the use of that?
The receiver gets a popup saying that vivek had scrapped you "nothing", and when the user checks his scrapbook he finds nothing there (no scrap from vivek).

What I had done was I had posted a scrap with html content with image embedded. I have picked the html content from a social image bookmarking app Picso
Looks like orkut thought it might be spam and deleted my scrap with out intimating me :(.

What could have happened?
1. When I scrapped my friend orkut accepted my scrap with a small captcha.
2. Trigged by this event popup notifier created a noticiation event.
3. After an hour the spam prevention engine of orkut had woke up and saw my scrap, as it is not intilleginet enough, it thought my scrap as a spam and deleted that from my friends scrapbook :(.


Now I am using this to send invisible scraps to my friends. Its fun try it out yourself.

Google works on monetising Orkut in 2009

Google’s social networking platform, Orkut is in discussions with the Indian Premier League (IPL) cricket to create brand positioning campaigns and even an IPL profile page for Orkut users. Mahesh Narayanan, senior industry manager, Google says around 10 entities, including FMCG, telecom and movie producers, will be the big-ticket advertisers for Orkut in 2009. The Indian advertising industry in 2008 drove an estimated 45 million internet subscribers advertising market to Rs 240 crore which is around US 55,713,382. The Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry feels that by 2011 Indian would have touched Rs 2,500 crore which is around US 497,446,231. This explains the effort undertaken by social networks to monetise their user base.

Source Business Standard

Read Any Orkut Scrapbook as RSS Feeds

These days orkut popularity is on its peak with its wide usage. In india itself it is becoming more popular day by day as lots of orkut users (some friends of mine) are more curious to know after every minute if they receive any new scrap from their friends.

So today i would like to dedicate this post for all those who want to know every second about any new scrap and this too with out being required to login to orkut.

Nothing tedious , the only thing you have to do..

1. Login to your orkut account and go to your profile by clicking the profile by at the left navigation panel.

2. Copy the uid number from the address bar and append it to the url below.

http://www.indian-tv.com/orkut.php?uid=enter your orkut uid here.

4. Final url will be of form http://www.indian-tv.com/orkut.php?uid=xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

As it is for my orkut profile so i can read my scraps simply by entering the above url in the address bar in my mobile phone browser or on my computer browser.

Note: But you can’t reply to any scrap as it requires login to orkut but don’t worry as that feature may be implemented soon . source: http://techol.blogspot.com

Send Musical Scraps to your Orkut Friends with Dhingana

WeekendApps, that recently happened at the Google office in Mountain View, was a weekend long hackathon where developers had to create functional OpenSocial applications in one weekend - the coding process would start on Friday night and deployment by Sunday.

Dhingana, a last.fm like site but for Indian music, won the first prize at WeekendApps for developing "Bollywood Music" - an Open Social application that lets you send music to your friends via Orkut scraps.

It works like this - you add the Bollywood Music application to your Orkut profile, search for music tracks and then use the embed code to add that song into the profile of another Orkut user.

You may also use the Bollywood Music application to listen to any song from Orkut though the player would open in another window on the main Dhingana website.

Existing users can link their Dhingana and Google Accounts and that would give them access to even songs that you may listened outside Orkut. Going forward, the application will use this musical data from all orkut users to display the most popular songs and music playlists on the Orkut page.

Update: If you have trouble embedding songs in Orkut via Dhingana, simply strip out the portions outside the EMBED tag. This happens when the embed code is longer than 1024 characters. source: http://www.labnol.org/internet/send-music-scraps-in-orkut/7603/

Social Media Madnes

By Erik Qualman, Search Engine Watch, Feb 23, 2009

'Tis the season of college basketball. In less than a month, corporate America will suffer a $4 billion dollar loss in productivity as a consequence of workers ardently filling out basketball brackets for the office March Madness pool, according to a study by Challenger, Gray & Christmas, a job counseling firm in Chicago.

I felt it only appropriate to put together a Social Media Madness bracket in the hopes of answering: Who is, or will become, the king of social media? Is it Facebook? Twitter? Or is it a "Cinderella story" like Livemocha?

I've broken it down into four regions. Rather than start with 64 teams (companies), I've taken the liberty of narrowing it down to the Sweet 16. I'll list each company's key wins (strengths) and key losses (weaknesses) and point out how your company or brand can leverage these social media offerings.

details here: http://searchenginewatch.com/3632888

English Now Irrelevant for Net Surfers

A new Internet technology utilizes keyboard shortcuts to access popular Internet sites. According to the developers, knowledge of English is no longer a prerequisite for surfing.
Sites such as Google, Orkut, Yahoo, Microsoft, etc. can be accessed via simple, pre-defined keyboard shortcuts. For e.g., to visit Google, a user will have to type the following three consecutive letters in the keyboard gghhjj.com . To visit Orkut, they will have to just type ookkmm.com.

The technology has been developed by a team of eight young Indians and has been named as the 'Angle Theory of Atoall.com.' It does not require any software installation. The developers say their intention is to make the Internet and websites on the Internet accessible to all, including illiterate people. They insist they have not violated any rules and regulations of the Internet.
They believe that this new Internet technology for search engines will not only make the online surfing experience easy for English-speaking users, but even non-English speaking and illiterate people can access websites of their interest.

Sanjeev Singla, MD of Atoall.com said, "One has to type three letters twice on the computer keyboard, which are in a straight line, 'C' or inverted 'C' or 'V' or inverted 'V' twice, followed by .com or ctrl+enter (it's for www .com) . The shortcut keys are together on the keyboard, for e.g., rrddcc.com, ccddrr.com, mmjjnn.com, nnjjmm.com, etc.

Online advertisers can especially benefit if this technology works as promised. Just imagine the exponential increase in Internet surfers if even non-English speaking users start using the Internet. We can earn $36 billion annually from this invention because illiterate people can also use the Internet by Atoall.com's Angle Theory. So, non-English speaking persons can get benefits of Internet technology."

Source: CXOtoday.com

Express Yourself, Face Prosecution? Bloggers Speak

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In recent times, blogging has become the most common way to exercise one's freedom of expression. However, we are not sure if it will remain thus henceforth.
I say this because a criminal case has been filed against a Kerala-based 19-year-old IT student for starting a community on Orkut against a political party. "You should not have indulged in such activity. You are a student of IT. You are doing something on Internet and you should know about it," the Supreme Court Bench said, refusing his lawyer's plea.

Members of the blogging community have a lot to say about this. Some of them are for such a verdict while the others are totally against it.

A recent blog entry on DesiPundit.com by Patrix says, "We are seeking suggestions to address these concerns, especially from a legal perspective. Moving beyond rants against the SC ruling, we would appreciate it if you could offer any suggestions to tackle efforts at controlling our blogging rights. This ruling not only affects bloggers but all netizens who comment on forums and Facebook/Orkut communities."

Popular blogger Praveen Dalal, who is by profession an advocate practicing in the Delhi High Court and the Supreme Court, on his blog post says, "It is not the blogging that is bad or illegal per se, but the 'Illegal Contents' that it generates. With constitutional protection on the side of bloggers, there must be very strong reasons to book a person for defamation or disturbing religious harmony. The Government of India can make things better by formulating a good cyber law that clearly demarcates between legal and illegal opinion sharing."

Annie Zaidi, journalist and owner of the blog Known Turf, reveals another side of the issue. She says, "I blog about various subjects, but I do not often call people or parties names, and usually exercise restraint even when I am very angry, which is what I would do even in print, or on television. The 'blogging culture' needs to grow up and recognize that the laws of the land apply to them as well. If they want to campaign against the laws of the land, that is a separate issue."

Zaidi also points out that bloggers or moderators of web forums should not be held responsible for libel if the said material is in the form of a comment. "Responsibility needs to be placed where it is due," she adds.

Writer, photographer, and blogger Ajay Jain said, "Blogging is a form of media just like any other: newspapers, internet, radio, and television. The laws and rules of conduct that apply to the latter should apply likewise to blogging. Bloggers and other citizen journalists should realize that power and freedom does not come without responsibility. Blogs and social media are public platforms like any other, and what they say on these affects society and the nation. Just like journalists do, all information and opinion should be based on verified facts and not hearsay, with full attribution being given to sources."

Jain is an active blogger who talks about a diverse range of topics on his blog ranging from Politics to Travel and Social Issues to Technology.

Jain also says, "We must appreciate that blogging gives the power and freedom to citizens to exercise their opinion, and it should not be curtailed in any form. However, what may be a matter of concern is the ability to beat down bloggers because they are individuals without any support system. Political parties, courts, and other legal authorities may find it easy to intimidate them through force and the threat of legal action. As a society, we should not allow this to happen."
Poonam in her blog Visceral Observations questions the grounds on which SC has made this decision. She also goes ahead to state the "reasonable restrictions" stated in Clause (2) of Article 19 of the Indian Constitution. These reasonable restrictions are:

• Security of the State
• Friendly relations with foreign States
• Public order
• Decency and morality
• Contempt of court
• Defamation
• Incitement to an offence
• Sovereignty and integrity of India

She says that it is not clear to her which clause this particular act falls into.

Another post on Mutiny.in says, "Blogs have always been about opinion, and in terms of reportage, blogs are now quickly gaining more readership and attention. With increased exposure to the aam internet-savvy junta, I do believe that bloggers must also show some restraint with criticism and inject it with more constructiveness. Mere rants serve little purpose except for satisfying one's itch and/or ego to make themselves heard, and when this tends to hurt public sentiment, the law is forced to step in. If the court says it will take action against bloggers who go online and make hate-posts against a particular individual, and if this hurts public sentiment, then I am with the court."

We have a lot of diverse views and opinions from the members of the blogging community. However, according to SC's verdict it is not just about blogging, but is related to anything being published on the internet, and if someone files a criminal case on the basis of the content, then you are subject to prosecution.

We want to know what you guys feel about this. Are you for or against this verdict, or do you have an opinion to give. Let us know your thoughts. Techtree.com

WebPage VoiceMail Inbox Gadget Now Available On Orkut

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February 22, 2009 - MeterNet's WebPage VoiceMail (WPVM) is taking the social networking community by storm as it unveils its OpenSocial inbox gadget on Orkut couple of weeks after its release on Friendster and Ning. These platforms are among the biggest social networking sites in the world.

Orkut, owned by Google, claims 50 million worldwide users of its Social Network, with dominating positions in Brazil and top tier positions in India, US, and other international markets.

With the Inbox Gadget, WPVM subscribers on Orkut can easily receive voice messages on their profile while protecting their privacy. This is because WPVM is an online voicemail system that allows subscribers to receive free message calls from anyone, anywhere, thru any Internet browser on PC or Mac computers without revealing their email or contact numbers.

WPVM subscribers also enjoy automated 24x7 email notification and online retrieval of their voicemail messages anytime thru the WPVM Inbox Gadget. With low flat-rate pricing for the WPVM service, subscribers also enjoy freedom from any per-minute charges or advertisement clutter.

To add the Webpage Voicemail Inbox Gadget into your Orkut page, please follow these simple steps:

1. Subscribe to WPVM (http://www.webpagevoicemail.com) via Paypal, selecting either the Annual or Quarterly Plan.

2. Log-in to your Orkut account.

3. Go to Orkut's Application Directory and look for "Meternet" using the search box.

4. Click Add Application.

Besides Orkut, WPVM subscribers can also use their Internet voicemail accounts on Friendster, Ning and other social networks, blogs, emails and company website.

About Orkut
orkut is an online community designed to make your social life more active and stimulating. orkut's social network can help you maintain existing relationships with pictures and messages, and establish new ones by reaching out to people you've never met before. orkut makes it easy to find people who share your hobbies and interests, look for romantic connections or establish new business contacts. You can also create and join a wide variety of online communities to discuss current events, reconnect with old school mates or even exchange your favorite recipes. Who you interact with is entirely up to you. Before getting to know an orkut member, you can read their profile and even see how they're connected to you through the friends network. For more information, visit: http://orkut.com.

About MeterNet
Formed in 1996, privately held MeterNet integrates and markets Web Programs & Tailored Services. MeterNet delivers solutions to help do business with "late adopter" customers more effectively. Over its thirteen-year history, MeterNet has met demands of worldwide clients including Ziff-Davis, America Online, Alta Vista, Shopping.com & IBM. The company launched its new VM1 Internet VoiceMail Network and WebPage VoiceMail service in 2008. For more information, visit http://meternet.com and http://internetvoicemailnetwork.com.

About OpenSocial
OpenSocial defines common programming for social applications across multiple websites. OpenSocial is currently being developed by a broad set of members of the web community. The ultimate goal is for any social website to be able to implement the programming and host 3rd party social applications. For more Info, got to http://code.google.com/apis/opensocial
source: http://www.1888pressrelease.com

Bloggers can be nailed for views

NEW DELHI: A 19-year-old blogger's case could forever change the ground rules of blogging. Bloggers may no longer express their uninhibited views
on everything under the sun, for the Supreme Court said they may face libel and even prosecution for the blog content.

It will no longer be safe to start a blog and invite others to register their raunchy, caustic and even abusive comments on an issue while seeking protection behind the disclaimer — views expressed on the blog are that of the writers.

This chilling warning emerged as a Bench comprising Chief Justice K G Balakrishnan and Justice P Sathasivam refused to protect a 19-year-old Kerala boy, who had started a community on Orkut against Shiv Sena, from protection against summons received from a Maharashtra court on a criminal case filed against him.

Petitioner Ajith D had started a community on Orkut against Shiv Sena. In this community, there were several posts and discussions by anonymous persons who alleged that Shiv Sena was trying to divide the country on region and caste basis.

Reacting to these posts, the Shiv Sena youth wing's state secretary registered a criminal complaint at Thane police station in August 2008 based on which FIR was registered against Ajith under Sections 506 and 295A pertaining to hurting public sentiment.

After getting anticipatory bail from Kerala HC, Ajith moved the Supreme Court through counsel Jogy Scaria seeking quashing of the criminal complaint on the ground that the blog contents were restricted to communication within the community and did not have defamation value. He also pleaded that there was threat to his life if he appeared in a Maharashtra court.

A computer science student, Ajith pleaded that the comments made on the blog were mere exercise of their fundamental right to freedom of expression and speech and could not be treated as an offence by police.

Unimpressed, the Bench said, "We cannot quash criminal proceedings. You are a computer student and you know how many people access internet portals. Hence, if someone files a criminal action on the basis of the content, then you will have to face the case. You have to go before the court and explain your conduct." source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/

Court refuses to go easy on hate site

New Delhi, Feb. 24: The Supreme Court has refused to quash criminal proceedings against a computer student who created a hate community on networking website Orkut.

A member of the “I hate Shiv Sena” community, which is over 500-strong, posted a death threat against Sena chief Bal Thackeray.

D. Ajith, the 20-year-old student from Kerala, denied posting the threat. “He only created the anti-Shiv Sena site. He has not posted any harmful things,” Ajith’s lawyer Jogy Scaria said.

The criminal proceedings against Ajith had been initiated by the cyber crime cell of Mumbai police.

A bench yesterday turned down Ajith’s plea to quash the case. Chief Justice K.G. Balakrishnan said: “We will not do that. Anything that is posted on the Internet goes to the public. The Internet is open to the world.”

Ajith, who was 19 when he created the community, is studying computer science at a private college in Cherthala, Kerala.

His community lambasted the Sena chief and his party for illiberal policies. The site featured writings accusing the Sena chief of dividing the country on religious, caste and regional lines.

The police had registered a case against Ajith on the charge of posting a death threat to Thackeray on the Orkut site. The student faces charges of criminal intimidation and hurting religious sentiments.

The police had monitored Ajith’s Gmail account and postings on Orkut for a week before zeroing in on his residence near a government ayurveda college in Mararikulam.

They questioned Ajith’s father and confiscated the hard disk of his computer.

The police had been monitoring the website ever since the Sena staged a series of violent protests against Orkut for carrying anti-party comments. Cybercafés across Mumbai were vandalised.

Mumbai police then wrote to the Centre seeking guidelines to tackle such websites.

The Sena also threatened cybercafé owners to prohibit access to Orkut or face closure.

Google, which runs the networking site, has since tied up with police in five Indian cities to monitor objectionable material on Orkut. It has also advised users on how to report abuse and prevent sharing of private information.

India has the third highest number of Orkut users, according to data on its website. Around 53.25 per cent of Orkut users are from Brazil, 18.85 per cent from the US and 16.02 per cent from India.

A petition has also been submitted before the Aurangabad bench of Bombay High Court against Orkut and other social networking sites.

Lawyer Yugant R. Marlapalle has urged the bench to issue a directive to all network service providers operating in India to ensure their sites are not used to promote content that is inimical to the country or promotes hate and violence. source: http://www.telegraphindia.com

The Social Networking Landscape in India and Europe

By Chris Crum
comScore released a couple of interesting reports today. The first involves the social networking landscape in Europe. According to comScore, France in particular had a big year when it comes to social networking, growing by 45% with Facebook as the leading network.

"2008 was a significant year for social networking in France," said Mike Read, SVP and Managing Director of comScore, Europe. "Not only was it a year that saw significant growth, but it was also a period in which Facebook took the category by storm after translating its interface into French early in the year. It will be interesting to see what happens in 2009 as Facebook and native social network, Skyrock, battle for the top position in the French market. source:http://www.webpronews.com

Arsenal Community On Orkut

Vacas Areph is 25 years old and is a banker in Lahore, Pakistan and has been supporting Premier League club Arsenal for almost a decade. He owns an Arsenal community on Orkut and now explains his love and dedication towards his club and his community…..

Goal.com: Tell us something about yourself.

Vacas: My name is Vacas Areph and I’m from Lahore, Pakistan. I’m employed in a bank. I’ve been supporting Arsenal for almost 10 years. For most people it’s the players or the clubs’ history that attracts them but for me it was different. My first introduction to club football was through FIFA 99. I started taking interest in club football after that. But when I started watching club football, I had no knowledge about clubs. It was Arsenal’s attractive style of play that inspired me to follow them. Since then I’ve been a Gooner through and through.

Goal.com: When and how did the community start?

Vacas: This community was originally created by Jud on January 31, 2004. Incidentally it was the same year I joined Orkut. This commnuity had seen five owners already…..it sounds like managerial changes at Chelsea, doesn’t it? But it is different. Whenever the owner felt that he or she could no longer dedicate time towards the community due to priorities in personal life, he or she passed on the community to the deserving member. I started as a member and was then appointed a moderator by the owner. Eventually I was passed on the ownership.

Goal.com: How did the community develop?

Vacas: When I joined this community, it had very few members. But with the passage of time the number has risen up to 85,000 members. The growth rate has been staggering. Interestingly, the discussion level in the community has also improved with more members joining in.

Goal.com: What is the aim of your community?

Vacas: The aim of our community is to discuss every matter related to the club we love, interact with fellow Gooners in a healthy environment, increase our knowledge of the club and help one another become a better person in the world of internet as well as in actual life.We have also started an Arsenal blog with the name 'The Gooner World'. The money received from the Blog clicks goes to Charity.

Goal.com: Has your community fulfilled that aim?

Vacas: We have established Community Etiquettes and Rules for the betterment of the community. The members are very cooperative and humble and along with the moderators and previous owners, they have helped the community gain popularity and touch new heights.

Goal.com: What type of discussions do you hold here?

Vacas: Every topic related to Arsenal is discussed in our community. From matchday events to live scores to financial aspects, transfer rumours, strategies, history…..every topic under the sun even remotely related to the club! Oh, we have also created a separate thread for members where they can interact with one another and talk all things other than football.

Goal.com: From which nations do your members come from?

Vacas: We have members from India, Pakistan, Brazil, France, Iran, USA, UK and Germany. Our community member Felipe goes to every Arsenal match and gives us match reports and news.

Goal.com: Is it tough to maintain your community?

Vacas: I wouldn’t call it tough because I love my community. But managing every community (on Orkut) requires a certain level of dedication and we’re lucky to have excellent moderators to look after our Arsenal FC community. Heated debates and disagreements are a part of discussions but the members are educated and are aware of the significance of Community Etiquettes and Rules.

And here is what the members, who are obviously Arsenal fans, have to say about the community as well as about the club that they support.

Chinmay Tadwalkar from Aurangabad: This community has played a vital role in shaping me as a proud Gooner. The members are more than just my fellow members.

Vinay from India: Arsenal Football Club is my life. This community is the way I can express my feelings and my passion towards my beloved club.

Vijay Saibola from Dortmund, Germany: Since coming to Germany for my education, watching the Premier League has not been easy. Only the Bundesliga matches are shown in pubs and I cannot yet afford myself a TV with Premier Cable package for Premier League matches. The only solution is livestream on the internet. Even while watching the match, I never miss out on the 'live-text' thread in the community. It’s really nice to get the the views and be in tune with the emotions of hundreds of other Arsenal fans while the game is on.

Paul, India: Hostile arguments happen all the time. But at the end of the day, most members listen to reason and are generally not afraid to admit it when they are wrong.

Moiz from Karachi, Pakistan: This community provides a very good opportunity to know people who share the same passion.

Eric from Mumbai, India: I have been an ardent Arsenal fan since 2001 and the television and newspapers were the only source of football related stuff. It was ‘all take and no give’. I wanted to express my opinions about Arsenal and this community surely has taken care of that desire. This is more like a “soccer family”. Thank you Arsenal FC Community (Codename 4553).

Akshay Jha from Guwahati, India: The only reason that I am still on orkut is because of this community and the club.

Mamoon Ghaffar from Peshawar,Pakistan: I don't remember when I started supporting Arsenal; it seems to me that I was born an Arsenal fan! Long live Arsenal! Love live the sacred " 4553 " and its beloved members.

Felipe Hassin, from London: Since moving to London when I was only a 16-year-old boy, I found Orkut to be a bridge that linked me with my friends and family in Brazil. Two years after joining Orkut I finally joined my very first community (Arsenal community). Since then I have never spent a single week away from here.

Asjad from Lahore,Pakistan: I have an Orkut account only because of this community.

Sumanth Anchan from Thane, India: Usually we have had healthy debates. Everyone is allowed to make a point. Yes, sometimes the situation does go out of hand, but since each member is so passionate about Arsenal, that is understandable.

Sandeep from India: My Love for Arsenal will remain till the very last breath of my life. Proud to be a Gooner, Gooner till I die. And one more thing: "Be a Gooner, Be a giver."

Amoy Ghoshal and Subhankar Mondal

Orkut Users Targeted in Malware Campaign

Orkut is a Google-owned social networking service with most users located in Brazil and India. It recently ranked 21st in Compete.com’s top 25 social networking sites, with more than 5 million monthly visits in January of 2009.

Now, much like the other social networking sites in the said list, Orkut is now also being used by cyber criminals to carry a malware that can compromise a victim’s computer.

Spoofed emails which claim to be from Orkut inform the recipient that their account has been found fake and is doing illegal activities such as sending out spam to other Orkut members. SOURCE: http://blog.trendmicro.com

Orkut users targeted in scam

Over the weekend, users of Google owned social-networking service Orkut were singled out in a scam offering up Malware that would compromise the user’s computer. The Malware kills off anti-Malware applications, thus allowing additional software to be loaded onto the system.

Orkut is used mostly in Brazil and India, according to TrendLabs, which reported the new scam. As of January, the site sees about five million hits monthly on average. The user base, and the fact that social networks are popular targets for criminals, are just two of the reasons Orkut has been targeted.

The scam is relatively simple: An Orkut member receives an e-mail alerting them to suspicious activity on their account. The e-mails warns that the user’s account has been flagged for containing illegal information. To address the issue, they are offered a link to download software, which is said to contain more information on their account. Naturally, the software is malicious.

An alternate scam starts in a similar fashion: The user gets an e-mail reporting their account as being fake or of sending spam. To correct this problem and confirm their account, a link is offered. The link redirects to a malicious site, where the Malware is waiting for download.

In both cases, TrendLabs advises users to ignore the incoming e-mails.

Orkut users were targeted last December by a Worm that compromised over 400,000 users. The Worm was triggered by viewing a malicious scrapbook entry, which led to infection and propagation to everyone listed as a contact on the infected profile. The Worm started because of a malicious SWFObject. source: http://www.thetechherald.com/article.php/200908/2961/Orkut-users-targeted-in-scam

Social networking site users grow as Orkut emerges leader

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Social networking site users grow 51% in Dec; Orkut emerges leader

Orkut received the maximum number of users among social networking sites as about 12.8 million people visited the website in December 2008

New Delhi: The Internet user traffic to social networking websites in the country grew by 51% in December 2008, with more than 19 million users visiting popular sites such as Orkut, Facebook and Hi5, according to marketing research firm comScore.

Orkut received the maximum number of users among social networking sites as about 12.8 million people visited the website in December 2008, an increase of 81% over the same month last year, comScore said in the report.

“Social networking continued to grow strongly in India this past year, with several of the top global brands carving out a more prominent position,” comScore executive vice- president Will Hodgman said.

Facebook came second with 4.04 million visitors, while Indian site Bharatstudent.com managed to capture the third spot with 3.26 million visitors.

However, it was Hi5 which witnessed the strongest growth of 182% garnering 2.01 million visitors compared to 714,000 visitors in December 2007, it added.

The number of visitors to sites like ibibo, PerfSpot, BIGAdda, and Fropper dropped by 50%, 79%, 25% and 3% respectively. PTI

Orkut User Loses in Indian Supreme Court

The Supreme Court of India has denied legal protection to a 19 year old computer science student facing a lawsuit for comments left on a group page he created on the Google owned social network Orkut, according to The Times of India. Local press has identified the young man by the name Ajith D (a common name) and report that his alleged offense was creating a group page where other visitors left "libelous" comments critical of militant right-wing political party Shiv Sena.

Indians around the internet are condemning the ruling as a blow against freedom of speech and democracy. It certainly appears to be a dangerous misunderstanding of the nature of the internet on the part of the court and a bad precedent in the most populous democracy in the world.

The Times of India quotes the court as having offered the following statement to the young man. "You are a computer student and you know how many people access internet portals. Hence, if someone files a criminal action on the basis of the content, then you will have to face the case. You have to go before the court and explain your conduct."

We're not sure what the number of potential readers has to do with anything and we find it pretty frightening that a court that would say "you're a computer student so you know how many people use the internet" had any say at all in such matters.

According to reports the comments in question were left by anonymous users and the group's owner claimed they were legitimate exercises of free speech. The youth arm of the political party facing criticism apparently filed suit under a law pertaining to "hurting public sentiment."

There are more than 1,000 groups on Orkut that show up in a search for "Shiv Sena," some for and some very much against the party. We're writing based on relatively light local reporting, so it's possible that the group started by Ajith D was particularly heinous. On principle, though, we presume that the young man should not face legal charges for anonymous comments left by others - no matter what those comments were. source: http://www.readwriteweb.com

oogle looks to earn money from IPL through Orkut

By siliconindia news bureau
Mumbai: Google is betting big on upcoming Indian Premier League (IPL) as they are all set to make its social networking site Orkut open for advertisers. The internet giant is in discussion with IPL officials to create brand positioning campaigns and even an IPL profile page for Orkut users, reported Business Standard.


According to Google India Managing Director Shailesh Rao, the company last year built a stronger base of marketers and invested in internet advertising. In 2009, Google should make revenues from its own social media platform.

Moreover, Google seeks to convert its vast network of Adwords advertisers to Orkut where they can place targeted and contextual advisements on various social communities and user profiles, reaching individual customers directly. "This would be through minimum intrusion, as we will only allow advertising at the lower half of the user's profile page, that too at an infrequent rate," said Mahesh Narayanan, Senior Industry Manager, Google.

Google expect that companies from segments such as FMCG, telecom and movie producers would be the big -ticket advertisers for Orkut on 2009. "You will see Google helping airlines sell tickets and packages on Orkut, financial services and products to users, and insurance and brokerage firms to offer services to targeted users," Rao pointed out.

Google sites ranked as the top property in India, with nearly 20 million visitors, as per a comScore data in 2008. Besides, Orkut registered nearly 10 million visitors with a growth of 39 percent. Apart from that, Orkut Apps, the blog that helps for software developers to market their social applications, has also emerged as a new revenue source for Google.

Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (Ficci) estimates that online advertising market which is presently stood at Rs 240 crore in 2008, will grow to touch Rs 2,500 crore by 2011. Meanwhile, a bad economy outlook and fall in online advertising is forcing the networks to focus more on making money from existing subscribers than on adding new users.

However, research firm IDC claims that the use of social networking sites will continue to grow, but advertising will not necessarily expand along with it. "The fact that people use social networking services for communication puts them in a mindset that is less receptive to advertising than when they are using web sites like Yahoo or Google," opined IDC analysts.

Cashing in on IPL fever Google works on monetising Orkut

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Part of a wider trend of social networking sites leveraging their user base.

With the Indian Premier League (IPL) cricket season round the corner, Google’s social networking platform, Orkut, is hoping to turn itself into a hot-bed for advertisers.

In discussion with IPL to create brand positioning campaigns and even an IPL profile page for Orkut users, Google is serious about monetising its social media portal. “Last year, we built a stronger base of marketers and invested in internet advertising. In 2009, we should make revenues from our social media platform,” says Google India Managing Director Shailesh Rao.

Google is banking on converting its vast network of Adwords advertisers to Orkut, where they can place targeted and contextual advisements on various social communities and user profiles, reaching individual customers directly. “This would be through minimum intrusion, as we will (only) allow advertising at the lower half of the user’s profile page, that too at an infrequent rate,” adds Mahesh Narayanan, senior industry manager, Google. Online display adverts are a $70-million market today and Google is gunning for a bulk share.

Around 10 entities, including FMCG, telecom and movie producers, says Narayanan, will be the big-ticket advertisers for Orkut in 2009. “You will see Google helping airlines sell tickets and packages on Orkut, financial services and products to users, and insurance and brokerage firms to offer services to targeted users,” says Rao. According to comScore data, in 2008, Google sites ranked as the top property in India, with nearly 20 million visitors. Orkut registered nearly 10 million visitors, marking a growth of 39 per cent. Orkut Apps, the blog that has become popular for software developers to market their social applications, has also opened new revenue streams for Google.

An estimated 45 million internet subscribers drove the online advertising market to Rs 240 crore in 2008, and according to Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (Ficci) estimates, it could touch Rs 2,500 crore by 2011. But a harsher financial outlook in 2009, combined with an expected fall in online advertising, is forcing the networks to focus more on making money from existing subscribers than on adding new users.

But market research firm, IDC, in its report claims that the use of social networking sites will continue to grow, but advertising will not necessarily expand along with it. Their analysts say: “The fact that people use social networking services for communication puts them in a mindset that is less receptive to advertising than when they are using web sites like Yahoo or Google.”

This explains the effort undertaken by social networks to monetise their user base. In an earlier interview, BigAdda had also confessed to the need to engage its users to churn value for advertisers on its networking portal.

Shivanandan Pare, its chief operations officer, told Business Standard: “Pricing for generic banner advertising on social networking sites is relatively low as compared to other sites, because marketers believe users are logging in for communication rather than commerce.”

BigAdda is campaigning with brands like Intel, Nokia and Lenovo, where these interact with users via special promotions, free multimedia download and through brand polls. source: http://www.business-standard.com

Dr Kalam's Orkut community targeted by Pakistani hackers

Dr Kalam's Orkut community targeted by Pak hackers

The former president respected Orkut community till date has 207,249 registered members and this attack has seriously compromised the security of the community and its members

NEW DELHI, INDIA: Pakistani hackers have targeted the Orkut community of Dr Abdul Kalam.

Prelimanary reports suggest that the hackers whose registration has been traced to Pakistan had renamed Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam community and were now using it launching pad to distribute malicious and objectionable content.

The former president respected Orkut community till date has 207,249 registered members and this attack has seriously compromised the security of the community and its members.

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."

The message clearly points out new moderators whose origins can be traced to Pakistan.

How Social Networking Sites Are Helping In The Growth Of Football

Goal.com's Subhankar Mondal discusses how social networking sites such as Orkut and Facebook are adding to the popularity of football in India and elsewhere.... are adding to the popularity of football in India and elsewhere....

Like the runaway express train screaming through the tunnel, the lad goes on hitting hard his keyboard. Night is subsiding into morning but like the child who goes on reading Enid Blyton long into the night, he carries on fiercely tabbing on the keyboard.

His parents in the next room wake up and come rushing to his room, understandably annoyed at their son's impertinence to stay up so late. The mother fears that he might have resumed his long torn apart relationship with his now Spain-residing Italian boyfriend-possessing hardly studying good-for-nothing ex-girlfriend while the dad thinks he might be surfing the net for some ‘cheap entertainment’ (you know what that means, right?).

Out come the words and the thunder. And the slap. And the cane. And the newly bought Mac topples down onto the floor. The father picks it up and looks at the screen and instead of finding any picture of sensuous women doing their nutter, he discerns the unmistakable Orkut screen with football-related stuff written all over it, including the far ranging comments that have recently flocked in after Real Madrid's 1-0 win over Deportivo la Coruna.

Like a dreamy eyed romantic getting addicted to Shakespeare or a frenzied Holy Grail seeker voraciously going through each and every document containing the terms holy and grail, this lad has been hooked onto Orkut seemingly forever.

And there are hundreds, thousands and millions like him who through the social networking sites such as Orkut, Myspace and Facebook connect themselves to fellow football fanatics from around the world.

Football in India might not enjoy the mass popularity that cricket does but it is gathering momentum and doing so rapidly. Social communities such as Orkut are playing the role of a catalyst in this and football supporters from India and from around the world are coming to a single place to discuss and debate all things football.

Take for example our very own Goal.com India community on Orkut. It is a community that was started in October last year and has quickly become quite popular among football fans, who range from the regular Manchester United follower to the Gunner for Life to the Chelsea mental to the cheeky lad who says that he supports a certain club in Madrid but actually fosters affection for a certain club in Verona.

The discussions range form the intellectually refined to the regular fan-rant, the words at times soaked in Shakespearean theatrics and at times picked out of the mouth of a ruffian (well, sort of).

The Goal.com India community is not unique in this matter. There are several hundreds of communities devoted to clubs, national teams, players and managers. And even rivalries.

Salman Ahmed is the owner of one such popular community in Orkut. He lives in Bahrain and supports Spanish and European powerhouse Real Madrid.

Ahmed's community focuses on Real Madrid and he explains, "We are a united community and have many football fans and Real Madrid supporters. We keep our community updated with the latest news, comments and articles related to the club.

"Every member has different views about different players, coaches, clubs and the like but in our community we put all the differences aside and join to cheer the biggest club in the world.

"Not only do we have active members but we have intelligent participants who understand and read the game very well. People join communities that are active and in which they are welcomed any time. Our community has these features. I think our community has helped football fans from around the world come together."

The internet has apparently condensed the world and brought people closer. These football communities provide a platform for the average and the slightly above average (whatever that may mean) football fans to connect to one another, allow the Man United supporter in India to have a go at the Liverpool fanatic in Singapore or the Barcelona follower in Australia to fight against the Real Madrid fan in Toronto.

These social networking sites are hugely aiding in the growth of football in India as well as in places where football is still a secondary sport. In certain places, football might be big, maybe even huge, but is not really a (sporting) culture in the same way that it is a culture in Europe (or at least in most European nations) and in South America.

But the social networking sites, especially Orkut, Myspace and Facebook, are contributing to the alteration of the social contour and are trying to make football a vital component of the culture.

Source: http://www.goal.com/

Orkut : Voter awareness campaign at Lucknow University

LUCKNOW: Post a scrap on Orkut and invite a friend to vote. Log on to a social networking site and replicate the message across a community. It
is something that even students can do.

The voter awareness campaign that was started at the Lucknow University
(LU) with the aforementioned message, on Thursday, had hordes of students flocking to it to get the details. The girls outnumbered boys proving they are better aware on issues that concern the governance of nation.

The session witnessed students learning a simpler way to get themselves registered as voters. The group had both the first time voters and also those who had used the right to vote earlier.

"Can we cast our vote from Lucknow,'' was a common query of outstation students. And, they were told they can. As a citizen of India and above 18 years of age anyone can cast a vote from anywhere provided he has been living at his current address for at least six months.

Some of the students also wanted to know how can they vote when they do not have a voter ID card. Their doubts were dispelled by volunteers who highlighted that a person who has his name on the electoral rolls can vote. "Voter ID card is simply the proof of identity,'' said Manu Singh, a volunteer.

The volunteers are targeting colleges and universities to reach out to the youth and to exhort them to exercise their right to vote and to bring others to the fold. "Registering for a vote can be as simple as logging on to the campaign website,'' said Singh.

The concept is driven by results of Bihar municipal elections of 2007. At least 50 per cent of candidates who won the elections were less than 30 years of age. It prompted a non-profit organisation to start a nationwide endeavour to dispel the belief that registering oneself to vote is a cumbersome process.

"You can encourage others to register for voting,'' said Manu Singh, a volunteer who interacted with the students. If the person has his name in the electoral votes he can vote. Students wishing to register for voting need not have a address proof document with their name on it. They can use documents with the name of their parents, relatives and friends.

The students can themselves turn a campus crusader by encouraging as many students as possible to get registered for voting. The campaign had recently been conducted in few other colleges also including the new campus of LU.
source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com

Orkut: BJP’s portal pangs put Congress on alert

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BJP’s portal pangs put Congress on alert
Anita Katyal
Our Political Correspondent

New Delhi, February 12
With reports coming in that the much-publicised digital campaign launched by the BJP’s PM-in-waiting is popping up on adult sites, the Congress is treading very carefully in using the Internet and networking sites for projecting its leaders and publicising party programmes in the run-up to the upcoming Lok Sabha elections.

Well aware that the technology is a double-edged weapon, Congress publicity managers are striving hard to design a digital campaign, which will not be tampered with or misused as in the case of veteran BJP leader Advani.

In his effort to connect with India’ tech-savvy youth, Advani (81) had launched his blog with great fanfare over two months ago. A special website has also been launched, social networking sites such as Facebook and Orkut are being used to popularise Advani while the popular site www.youtube.com is also being used for the same purpose.

“We don’t want to make the same mistakes as the BJP,” said a senior Congress functionary involved with the party’s poll campaign, adding that they will use effective filters to ensure that their campaign is not similarly misused. “We will also be particular about the search words we use for our campaign,” he added.

In fact, this matter was discussed at length at a recent meeting of the party’s publicity committee, which was also attended by AICC general secretary Rahul Gandhi, who is known to be extremely tech-savvy like his late father Rajiv.

Since 40 per cent of India’s population consists of people who are below 30 years, the Congress recognises it has no choice but to use technology, like the Internet and SMS, to reach out to the e-generation.

The full campaign and the party’s new slogan will be unveiled after the Election Commission issues the notification for the Lok Sabha poll, but the first phase of the campaign has already been launched.

Huge hoardings with a focus on “unity, development and promise of a better future” have been strategically placed in all cities. Like the 2004 elections, the Congress will continue to stand by the “aam admi” who will feature prominently in the party’s manifesto and the campaign this time as well. The UPA government’s achievements and the future pledges will also be a recurring theme in this party’s campaign. source: http://www.tribuneindia.com

Talha used emails, Orkut extensively

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Talha used emails, Orkut extensively
23 Dec 2008, 0257 hrs IST, Soumittra S Bose, TNN

NAGPUR: Sleuths have retrieved around eight email IDs and several log-ins of various social networking sites of the net-savvy terror suspect Aamir Talha arrested on Sunday.
They believe that Talha may have around 20 IDs of different email services and social networking sites. They will help establish not just Talha’s links with other accused and suspects but also how the terror module communicated.
Some of these IDs are yourstalha@gmail.com, obstinatesam@gmail.com, osama.aamir@gmail.com (his brother’s account), talhaaam@aol.com, talha.aamir@wipro.com and talha.aamir@ubs.com, They are learnt to have provided ample evidence of his linkages to others in the alleged module of Delhi-based Indian Mujahideen (IM) being held reponsible for blasts in Delhi, Bangalore, Jaipur, and Ahmedabad as also for Surat bombs that did not go off. Talha’s address books in these accounts had the names of Atif Ameen, Shadab Baig, Mohammed Shakil, Saquib Nisar, Zia ur Rehman, Saif, Asadullah Akhtar and others. Most of these names, according to sources, came up during interrogation of the arrested terrorists held after Batla House encounter.
The email contents suggest influence of radical Islamic thoughts on Talha. “True meaning of Jihad” is one of the most circulated topic of Talha. He had also circulated gory images of Mumbai train blasts among his contacts. The e-mails suggest Talha was telling his friends not to let anyone know of his association with Masood Ras, Khalid Nisar Ansari and others.
Cops came across the name ‘Azhar Siddiqui’ in the emails sent and received by Talha. Talha seemed in regular touch with Siddiqui and appeared to be receiving regular guidance from him. Cops think Siddiqui may be one of the seniors in the module.
Talha appeared active on social networking sites. His Gmail accounts have been used on Orkut as well. On his Orkut account, scraps of Atif Ameen, Shadab Baig, Arif khan alias Junaid, Asadullah Akhtar, Adnan Alam and others were found. Talha was in touch with every one of his group regularly and kept communicating vital details. Talha has commented on the images of Saquib Nisar and Adnan Alam. These people used Jaxtr.com as well to communicate among each other.
Apart from his contacts, sleuths have also come to know of Talha’s insurance policies, travel plans (he had booked and cancelled an e-ticket through IRTC) and his other professional details.

source: time sof india

Dr Kalam's Orkut community targeted by Pak hackers

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Dr Kalam's Orkut community targeted by Pak hackers

The former president respected Orkut community till date has 207,249 registered members and this attack has seriously compromised the security of the community and its members

NEW DELHI, INDIA: Pakistani hackers have targeted the Orkut community of Dr Abdul Kalam. Prelimanary reports suggest that the hackers whose registration has been traced to Pakistan had renamed Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam community and were now using it launching pad to distribute malicious and objectionable content.
The former president respected Orkut community till date has 207,249 registered members and this attack has seriously compromised the security of the community and its members.
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."
The message clearly points out new moderators whose origins can be traced to Pakistan.

Programmers in India prefer Google's Orkut

Google's Orkut social network isn't just big in Brazil. It's also popular in India, especially among software developers, according to a new survey.

Despite Facebook's efforts to promote that social network as the platform of choice for third-party application developers, Orkut is used by twice as many software programmers in India than either Facebook or MySpace, according to an Evans Data survey of more than 300 developers in India. Software programmers in that country are heavy users of social networks in general.

Seventy-three percent of those surveyed said they had used Orkut, compared with 35 percent for Facebook and 32 percent for MySpace.

"Capturing mindshare with developers in fast-growing emerging development markets like India and Brazil gives them (Google) a strategic advantage going forward in further cultivating this very important community," Evans Data Chief Executive John Andrews said in a statement.
Google has released new domains specific to India and Brazil as a result of the popularity in those countries.

The independent survey was conducted in late May and early June.

Beware Net’s baddies

Special Correspondent

Bangalore: The so-called social networking sites on the Internet — Orkut, MySpace, YouTube, etc, — where lay users share their likes, dislikes, hobbies and habits with thousands of likeminded people, many of them unknown, have a downside: the Net’s baddies now seem to have made such sites the focus of their attacks, using techniques like phishing, a type of email fraud which aims at stealing a person’s confidential information, even his total identity.

The latest Internet Security Threat Report, released by security management specialist Symantec, holds out a special warning for India-based fans of social networking on the Net, who number between 5 and 6 million and spend anything from 15 to 75 per cent of all spare time in this activity. Such sites are easy to spoof, leading trusting lay users to share personal information with bogus operators, the report says. In effect, cyber criminals have moved subtly from targeting your computers with worms and viruses, to targeting YOU.

“Attackers look for the weakest link — and right now that is social networking,” says Prabhat Singh, Symantec’s Director, Security Response in India.

Source: http://www.hindu.com/2008/04/27/stories/2008042755951200.htm

Be careful when posting on the internet, you are an Indian.

Posting anything derogatory on the internet, no matter even if you are trying to be funny could land you in jail if you are in India. Your service provider, your favorite internet website and even your neighborhood cyber cafe owner will hand you over to the police if need be.

Try to find out the exact laws because who knows your arrest could be the first instance that specific law that will applied to the internet. So whatever is illegal in real world will apply to the internet. If you post a hate message, it is ok, at least as far as the the Mumbai Police is concerned. “hating (someone) is his/her personal opinion and having a personal opinion about someone, anyone, is not an offence as per the law”. But posting an offensive message is. And especially if it related to a political leader or an influential person.

Well, this week two such news items got a lot of attention. Firstly Rahul Krishnakumar Vaid was arrested and faces upto 5 years of imprisonment for posting a hate message (obscene message if news reports are to be believed) on orkut. A report-abuse link on orkut could have handled this issue but things went out of control for Google and they gave out the ip address of the person who posted the message. So next time you are emailing something to a dear friend or posting on a community website, remember that your message could be read by thousands and if anyone reports it to the police and it is found against the law, you could be the next Vaid.

One more celebrity who was blogging from his vacation home was Aamir Khan, the Bollywood star. His caretaker has a dog named after Shahrukh Khan. Aamir could not hold back in using this information on his blog and composed a blog post with this as the highlight. I watched this movie, and am sitting next to a river etc etc and by the way, Shahrukh is licking my feat. Shahrukh wants attention, blah blah blah. Well Shahrukh is my dog. Well, Aamir could not hold back and we doubt he realized what he was saying. After all, he was just typing on his informal blog. His fans did not like this not did others. People took exception to this kind of irresponsible and childish blogpost. Aamir Khan later apologized for his post.

As you write or post on the web, think twice before you click on the Submit button. Does not matter if you are a celebrity big shot or some unknown guy.

Source: http://www.newsline365.com/20081062/be-careful-when-posting-on-the-internet-you-are-an-indian/

Noida murder mystery still unsolved

New Delhi, Wed, 21 May 2008 NI Wire

Five days after the killing of a teenaged school girl- Arushi Talwar- and her house servant Hemraj, the Noida police are yet to come on to any conclusion and have been clueless so far of the intension and connection in the double murder case. The girl was found stabbed to death in her room.

The manner in which Uttar Pradesh police carried out the investigation so far is raising many questions about their investigation procedure.

First the police after recovering the body of 14-year-old Arushi from her home didn’t bother to check the terrace, where the Hemraj’s body was lying and noticed a day later.

Police had brought Hemraj in prime suspect list, but after finding him too as victim, they are now searching for more clues and are questioning several people including Arushi’s parents. The cell-phone records of the murder of the girl are also to be examined.

Police in its investigation termed behavioural changes in Arushi contrary to what her friends or school mates who revealed her friendly nature and as normal as any other school girl. It is not understandable what the police led to make such public statements, when the investigation is not over.

Noida police in another ignorance searched Talwar’s garage five days after the murder that to when some television reporters pointed it out. To common sense and basics of investigation it is essential to bring everything in to scanner that comes in close contact with the victim but the police have failed so far.

As per latest report officers are now questioning a PCO owner in Noida from where a call was made to Hemraj’s mobile. The calls' details and Arushi’s relatives and family friends seem to be the last hope that can edge the case further.

After the earlier Nithari murder case it is apt to mention here that the Noida police have learnt little from the serial murder case. Senior officials are holding their lips tight due to the lack of any concrete plot which can angle the direction. Initial investigation has already ruled out sexual assault after medical examination of the deceased.

Police are also trying to find absconder, who used to talk on Orkut, a social networking site, with Arushi Talwar and on the eve of her murder, she had got the message “the next day will be vital for you”. After which he deleted all his accounts from the Orkut.

Now, police are trying to find out any link of the 'message' with the 'murder'. However, to all the investigation skills of Noida police is not up to the mark with their carelessness.

Source: http://www.newstrackindia.com/newsdetails/3511

Obscene Sonia post on Orkut lands techie in jail

New Delhi, May 21: A young techie working for a BPO company was sent to jail for posting obscene and derogatory massage regarding Sonia Gandhi on Orkut. The techie, a 20 something young man from Gurgaon who worked in this New Delhi satellite town had posted deorgatory and obscene remarks regarding Congress president and United Progressive Alliance chairman Sonia Gandhi.

The case that had come to the notice of authorities last year was solved after Google, the leading internet search and online advertising company complied with the request of Indian authorities to supply the IP address of the person who posted the massage on Orkut. Google owns Orkut a leading social networking site.

The youth who posted the obscene massage about Sonia has been disclosed to be Rahul Krishnakumar Vaid, a man in his early twenties who works for a BPO firm in Gurgaon, a satellite town of Delhi and part of National Capital Region (NCR).

The obscene massage that came to the notice of the police in Pune, Maharashtra last year was solved largely with the assistance of Google when it supplied the IP address of the person who posted the massage to the police. The massage was posted on an Orkut community called “I hate Soniya Gandhi”

A police official says that Vaid, who was working with PC solutions, an IT company in Gurgaon, had loaded the derogatory and obscene massage while working in his office in Gurgaon.
The accused was arrested by police from his residence two days ago and has been remanded to custody till 21 May.

He has charged under Section 67 of the Information Technology Act 2000.

Source: http://www.khabrein.info/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=14412&Itemid=88

Google hands over user information in India

Written by Iain Thomson, vnunet.com, 20 May 2008


An Indian man is facing five years in jail for making an "offensive" comment after Google handed his personal data to local police.

Rahul Krishnakumar Vaid, a 22 year-old IT consultant, was arrested after posting derogatory comments on Google's Orkut social networking site.

Vaid was posting in a forum called 'I hate Soniya Gandhi' and was identified after the police asked Google to hand over his email address.

Vaid was arrested after a police raid on his house on Friday and has been charged with breaking section 292 of the Indian Penal Code and section 67 of the Information Technology Act.

If found guilty he faces a possible five years in prison as well as a fine.

The case highlights a curious facet of Indian law. The creator of the forum cannot be punished, since an individual's dislike is covered under personal freedom of choice. However, the information Vaid posted is classed as "vulgar", thus the arrest.

Source: http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2217063/google-handing-user-information
Vaid's arrest also highlights Google's increasingly tarnished reputation, despite its unofficial motto of 'Do no evil'.

The motto gained the company much kudos in the IT industry but, after Google's activities in China, many are now questioning its stance on human rights.

One held for posting obscene Orkut message on Sonia

One held for posting obscene Orkut message on Sonia
18 May 2008, 0325 hrs IST,TNN

PUNE: Orkut, the popular social networking site, is in the news again. The cyber cell of the city police crime branch has arrested Rahul Krishnakumar Vaid (22), an IT professional of Gurgaon, Haryana, for allegedly uploading obscene and derogatory text about Congress party chief Sonia Gandhi on Orkut. Congress activist Amol Bhokare (28) of Pune, who saw the message, lodged a complaint at the Deccan Gymkhana police in December, 2007. Vaid was found guilty under section 67 of the IT Act. According to assistant commissioner of police (cell) Netaji Shinde, Vaid, who was working with PC solutions, an IT company in Gurgaon, had added the derogatory text in a community named'I hate Soniya Gandhi' on Orkut, last year. He uploaded the text while working at office. Shinde said that the police had first asked Google to provide the IP address of the person who posted the message. They learnt that the accused was connected to the net through Bharati Airtel and Sify Internet in Chennai. It was also learnt that the message was circulated through the email address'rahulvaidindia@gmail.com'. The police then sought information about the user of this email address from the internet service provider and learnt that it was the address of Rahul Vaid, a resident of Chakarpur in Gurgaon. The police nabbed Vaid at his residence on Friday. He admitted to having posted the message. The accused was produced before the Shivajinagar court on Saturday and remanded to custody till May 21. Interestingly, the person who formed the community'I hate Soniya Gandhi' is not guilty as per the law. ACP N. Shinde said hating Sonia Gandhi is the personal opinion of the person who formed the community. Having a personal opinion about someone is not an offence as per the law. Source: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/Pune/One_held_for_posting_obscene_Orkut_message_on_Sonia/articleshow/3049971.cms

Google Networking

SAN FRANCISCO (AFP) - Google has set out to enable all websites, free of charge, to be imbued with common social networking features as the Internet evolves toward becoming a giant community along the lines of MySpace or Facebook.

Google Friend Connect was previewed at a Campfire One gathering of software developers at the company's "Googleplex" campus in Mountain View, California on Monday.

The unveiling of the plan comes just days after top social networking websites MySpace and Facebook broke down walls of their online communities to let members share profile information at other websites.

"Social is going mainstream," Google director of engineering David Glazer told reporters. "What used to be hard and proprietary is becoming easy and open. It's the evolution of social networking."

Glazer described the MySpace and Facebook announcements as "big steps forward in giving users control over their data" and said Friend Connect is intended to advance the movement.
"We see the web moving toward an end state where people can use any application on any website with any of their friends," Glazer said.

"Social activity on the web has been bottled up in a handful of sites. As things mature on the web they become more open and more interoperable."

Friend Connect lets website owner's add social-networking features such as registration, member galleries, message boards, and fun or useful third-party applications called "widgets" by simply adding snippets of free computer code.

People visiting websites using Friend Connect will be able to interact with contacts they know from online communities such as Facebook, Google Talk, orkut, Plaxo or hi5.
To demonstrate, an iLike application was incorporated into an official website of musician Ingrid Michaelson so that visitors don't have to leave to connect with friends at their social networking profiles.

All website operators using Friend Connect see are user nicknames and images, if any, posted along with them.
Concerns about protecting people's profile data prompted Google to decide to work individually with website operators interested in Friend Connect, according to Glazer.
Website owners are invited to put their names on a "white list" online at www/google.com/friendconnect.

Google wants to be at the heart of the Internet trend of people building online identities that play, share, and conduct business in virtual environments, according to Silicon Valley analyst Rob Enderle.

"Much like Google kind of controls the overall online advertising experience I think this is Google trying to figure out how to own the virtual representation of a person on the web," Enderle told AFP.

"Monetizing the virtual person on the web is where the money is and they are trying to figure out how to do that. If you want to have the door into my wallet you want to be as close to my information as you can get." Google plans to phase in more websites and social networks in the months to come, with the Open Social software platform as a basis for interoperability. Google launched Open Social last year to promote common protocols so developers can make applications that work on any social networking website involved in the effort.

Facebook cuts off Google’s Friend Connect

MySpace, then Facebook and then Google all recently launched services for third parties to access their users’ data through other sites.
Google, though, uses Facebook’s developer platform to distribute Facebook user data through its own service, Google Friend Connect. Now, Facebook has cut off that access.

When Google announced Friend Connect on Monday, I asked the company for clarification on its relationship with Facebook — strangely, Google didn’t offer MySpace data even though those two companies are partners on Open Social. A main point of the announcement, after all, was that Open Social applications could run on other sites, with better access to social networks’ data.

Instead, Google announced that third party developers would be able to access data from Orkut, smaller Open Social member network hi5 and Linked — and Facebook. Google, it seems, wanted to see just how open Facebook’ social network rival was.

For Google’s response to my question, check out this audio clip. As the company tells me in the clip, it has no business relationship with Facebook.

From the Facebook company blog, today:
In the past, when we found applications passing user data to another party (for instance, to ad networks for the purpose of targeting), we suspended those applications and worked with those developers to ensure they respect user privacy. Now that Google has launched Friend Connect, we’ve had a chance to evaluate the technology. We’ve found that it redistributes user information from Facebook to other developers without users’ knowledge, which doesn’t respect the privacy standards our users have come to expect and is a violation of our Terms of Service. Just as we’ve been forced to do for other applications that redistribute data in a way users might not expect or understand, we’ve had to suspend Friend Connect’s access to Facebook user information until it comes into compliance. We’ve reached out to Google several times about this issue, and hope to work with them to enable users to share their data exactly when and where they choose.

Facebook?s Friends Data Has Already Left the Barn

SchonfeldTechCrunch.com Sunday, May 18, 2008; 1:09 AM

How much are your friends worth? That is the question behind the big debate going on around social networks and data portability. In the last ten days, Facebook, Google, and MySpace have all announced ways to let people access their data (including friends lists) from other sites, except that what they are really trying to do is erect new walled gardens by positioning themselves as the primary repository of that personal and social data. This is valuable data and none of the big players want to cede any more of it than is necessary, which is why Facebook banned Google from tapping into its members' social data.

But here's a little secret. All of this data is already leaking out in ways that Facebook and other social networks can hardly control. Startups are finding ways around their official APIs to get the data consumers want into their own systems. For instance, Zude, a personalized Webpage service, recently launched a feature called SocialMix that lets people import friends lists, photos, profile information, status updates, comments, and other data from Facebook, MySpace, Bebo, Orkut, and hi5. (See the screen shot below, which shows my Facebook friends on Zude). "What we are doing is taking the information and normalizing it and making it available in any manner you want," claims Zude CTO Steve Repetti. He was tired of waiting around for true data portability to arrive, so he figured out a hack to offer it on his own (and it doesn't involve screen scraping).

Taking a different approach, Minggl has found a way to access your social data through a browser plug-in. And Media6° is placing cookies through the ads themselves on Facebook to collect social data for advertisers. If you click on an ad with one of its cookies, then the same ad will be shown to all of your friends, who supposedly are two to ten times more likely to click on the ad than other people. Media6° also should be able to target Facebook members as they wander across the Web (as long as a cookie has been placed in their browsers and they come across an ad with the Media6° Javascript code embedded in it).

I've come across other startups who claim to be able to pull profile and friend data from Facebook. Facebook can go after them and shut them down, but it is rightly more concerned about Google gaining free and unfettered access to that data. Google is the bigger competitor and the bigger threat. But in the meantime, all of these little startups are finding ways to get at the same social data being so ferociously guarded by Facebook. In fact, they already have it, and Facebook is going to have a hell of a time trying to put it back in the barn.
(Photo by Larry Wilder).

Ask an outside consultant

Q What are some of the less known but effective marketing strategies available for cash-strapped companies?
KOFI BOSQUE-HAMILTON
WWW.ADSURFARI.COM
A Whether a marketing strategy succeeds or not depends on how precisely the marketer has identified the target segment and whether the product or service being marketed offers a compelling benefit to those potential customers. Since I do not know the nature of your business, I will highlight some variants of the "word-of-mouth" techniques that are inexpensive.
You may think about creating advertising material for your products and putting it on a website such as YouTube. Some leading brands have successfully launched innovative online advertising campaigns and achieved increased awareness and greater buzz for their brands.

You may also try some of the popular social networking sites such as MySpace or Orkut and put up your product or service demos and messages for people to see. These avenues are free and they offer a potential for increased word of mouth. If your marketing message is creative, it's likely that the person seeing it may feel motivated to forward it to friends, thereby generating greater awareness for your brand.

In addition, you may make use of the professional networking site Linkedin. This site has been used effectively by professional consultants to advertise their services; it offers the opportunity to provide a link to your company on your personal page. The name of the game is to tap into a network of professionals who may be interested in your products or services.
Any of these approaches may be successful, but only if the right audience happens to get exposed to them.
AVINASH MALSHE,
ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF MARKETING,
UNIVERSITY OF ST. THOMAS
OPUS COLLEGE OF BUSINESS
Source: http://www.startribune.com/business/18997749.html?location_refer=Business

Hit Pause On The Evil Button: Google Assists In Arrest Of Indian Man

Michael ArringtonTechCrunch.com Sunday, May 18, 2008; 7:09 AM
These stories are becoming more common as Internet companies operate under the laws of many counties.

In February A Moroccan man was arrested for pretending to be the Moroccan king?s younger brother, Prince Moulay Rachid, on Facebook. Facebook complied with Morrocca information requests about the man, leading to his arrest. The man was granted a royal pardon after his sentencing, and was out of jail by mid March.

Today we're hearing of another arrest, this time in India. 22-year-old IT professional Rahul Krishnakumar Vaid. His crime was writing in an orkut community named ?I hate Sonia Gandhi.? Sonia Gandhi is a prominent politician in India.

Vaid was charged under section 292 of Indian Penal Code and section 67 of the Information TVechnology Act because he created a profile and then posted content in vulgar language about Sonia Gandhi in the community.

During investigations, the cyber crime cell of Pune police communicated with Google (which owns Orkut) seeking details about the who formed this forum and circulated the obscene content. It was known that the vulgar message about Sonia Gandhi was circulated through an email address ? Rahulvaidindia@gmail.com . The owner of the email id Rahul Vaid was traced, using information supplied by Google, to Chakarpur in Gurgaon city of Haryana.

He was thn charged under section 292 of Indian Penal Code and section 67 of the Information Technology Act because he created a profile and then posted content in vulgar language about Sonia Gandhi in the community. If he's convicted, he can be imprisoned for up to five years and may have to pay a fine up to Rs one lakh.

This is an issue that needs to be addressed everywhere, but the hot spots right now are areas where extreme laws make what would be legitimate actions in the US or Europe into fairly serious crimes in their jurisdictions. Our companies have to decide if they'll defy the law and take the consequences. On the upside, users will flock to them knowing their data is secure.