There was a time when the world had Orkut fever, as it was something that narrowed down long distances between loved ones around the world. People used to spend so much time on chatting and using Scrapbook on Orkut but now it seems to be a thing of ancient past. A change came that wrecked Orkut’s existence completely. And this change was the introduction of yet another social networking site that we all are well acquainted with – Facebook.
Mark Zuckerberg, the founder of Facebook introduced this social networking site after a month of Orkut’s introduction in January 2004. A cutthroat competition started between the two and as we all know, in few years Facebook outnumbered Orkut. Now a stage has come where Orkut is left with few living days. Off lately Google has announced that by September this year it will shut down Orkut forever.
Orkut’s closure reminds us of disastrous history of Google’s social networking business ventures. Here are some, which fell from grace soon after their introduction.
iTunes Ping
This attempt by Steve Jobs’s Apple turned out to be a big failure, as it never really kicked off in the first place. Ping was designed to serve as a place where music fans could connect with their favorite artists through Apple’s iTunes platform. However, the plan substantially failed, as it could not grab the attention of users because they found the platform quite cumbersome and awkward.
Gowalla
Gowalla was a location-based social network that enabled users to check spots in their local area. It gained popularity but not for long, as a rival named Foursquare ate up Gowalla’s user base and emerged as a winner of location-based platforms. However, Gowalla did not have to face shut down because the mighty Facebook acquired it in December 2011.
Diaspora
In the initial stages of its introduction, Diaspora was seen as a strong rival of Facebook. A simple to use platform that allowed its users to control their personal data, enabled users to connect twitter, Tumblr, and Facebook accounts. Diaspora shared its launching time with that of Google+ and both had more or less same features. Diaspora struggled hard to win the competition but some additional features of Google+ plus ultimately overshadowed Diaspora.
MySpace
Initially MySpace attracted massive user base owing to its feature that enabled users to customize their profile in every possible way, but after some time it fell from grace because users started finding it monotonous.
