The Hindu Business Line : Towards safe networking

You haven’t been hearing the best about social networking (SN) sites, have you? Reports of youngsters being lured and murdered have had people protesting against such sites.

Orkut appears to be listening. It has brought in new safety features to help users feel reassured that fun is also safe.

“What started as an invite-only community has indeed grown fast, encouraged by the positive response and feedback from users the world over.

Acting on this feedback, we’ve added even more features around communities, photos, and videos. To help users manage the content posted on the site, we recently launched some new privacy controls that help restrict who gets to see your photos, testimonials, and scraps,” says Vinay Goel, Head of Products, Google India, the parent company of Orkut.

Here is what is on offer.

Testimonial privacy: Shy of sharing those mushy words, so fondly written by your friends, with strangers?

You can now restrict access to your friend list and ensure that only your friends get to view them.

Album and video privacy: You want to share those fun moments with your friends but are not comfortable with everyone on Orkut having a look. You can do this, by choosing the album and video privacy feature.

Scrapbook privacy: Tired of receiving random ‘frandship’ scraps? With the Scrapbook Privacy feature, you can make sure whatever is written to you is by a friend or by a ‘friend of your friends.’

These privacy controls can be activated by visiting the privacy tab here: http://www.orkut.com/PrivacySettings.aspx

Desi experience

With the recently launched OpenSocial applications available on the Orkut online community, users can expect a more fun and powerful experience.

These applications, created by third party developers, let you interact with friends and customise your profile by adding games, music and more.

With over a dozen applications to choose from and more on the way, you can share your favourite ideas with other enthusiasts and even play games.

These applications are integrated into user profiles such as regular Orkut features.

Since Indian developers contributed a number of applications, Orkut will also allow for a more ‘desi’ experience. ‘Hangout’ is one such application that enables users to schedule events and invite friends.

“With so much user interest and enthusiasm around Orkut and other interactive Web sites, it is safe to say that the Web is better when it’s social.

“We’ve also uploaded a video to provide you with an easy tutorial at http://youtube.com/watch?v=orhGjGOEG_4.

These applications will make the Internet more enjoyable for users,” says Goel.

So go on, be social — and as private as you wish!

paromita@thehindu.co.in