Social networking websites have sprung up dime a dozen all over the Indian web, and most of them are undifferentiated, having similar functions & features. Corners & Sumitr are a couple of additions to that ever growing list, but they must be complimented for trying to think differently from the pack. Both these sites have their own twist to the generic SNS concept.
Corners is conceptualised as a content centric social network; what this means is that unlike other social networks like Orkut, Myspace, Facebook etc, the focus is not on the users profiles or friendship. ‘Corners’ are a common meeting point for people having shared interests- these could be movies, sports, celebrities, places etc. The socialising happens around this interest and the social objects e.g. photos, videos, blogs etc are the means of achieving the socialising. What binds the people in a ‘corner’ together is their common interest. Check out the corner for Rajnikant in the screen shot below. Or this one about Saurav Ganguly. Corners comes from a company called Melamesa. They plan to have an ecommerce & advertising based revenue model that will dovetail into their site’s basic character. Compared to a generic social network, the socialising in Corners will happen around a context, and hence there are interesting business opportunities for sponsorship, promotion, e-commerce, and advertising. e.g.- while navigating the “kodaikanal” corner, a user can make travel-planning / hotel-reservations.
One small feedback- the current content on the website (sports, bollywood, movies) does not look user generated to me at all.
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Just as a note, this concept of a object oriented social network is not new. With SlideShare, we’ve tried to do something which is somewhat similar. The social theory of online networking runs along a time based continuum. Social networks can broadly be classified as the following
First Generation Social Networks (circa 2003-05): Friendster, Myspace etc – here the focus was on direct online friendship and the socialising is the end/targeted result.
Second Generation Social Networks (circa 2006-07): Flickr, YouTube, Slideshare – the focus is on the object; this could be photos, videos, slides, podcasts etc and the socialising is contextual to the object. Here (in contrast to first generation networks) the socialising is not an end in itself, it is a means of achieving the ends.
3 Dimensional Social Networks (circa 2007-08) – these are the virtual world networks like SecondLife, or communities built around MMPOG/MMPORPG (Massive Multiplayer Online Games/Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game)
The Social Graph Phenomenon (circa 2007-08): This is the new twist in the social networking sweepstakes and has started with Facebook’s stupendously successful platform launch; Facebook provides the social graph (it’s millions of users) and the others get their objects to tap into the existing graph, without trying to build it themselves.
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Sumitr is a platform to manage your family’s social life online. It is a closed door network (password protected) that you can create for your family or friends. What’s unique about Sumitr is that it tries to extend the concept of online networking to the family (it has concepts like core family consisting of your spouse + kids). You can create your own genealogy based family tree with Indian relationships and family details. The family members can share photos & music, write blogs, make bets (wow!), share news items etc. The revenue model is based on subscription as well as advertising. The site has chosen to have a decidedly Indian flavour with its different sections having titles like Yaadein, Baazi, Bindaas Baatein, Taaza Khabar, Mitr, Parichay, Parivaar etc. Screenshot below.
they’re (corners) pulling photos directly from flickr !
and the videos from youtube. ingenious 😛
just remove the “All rights reserved” next to all that content atleast.
Animeesh, who does not get photos and videos from Flickr? It is not the content but the discussion around the content I am assuming what Corners is trying to do. In that case one cannot talk or discuss about movie stars also, because the sites don’t own them 🙂 chill buddy
yeah…pull and leverage as much as possible.someday some indian co. wud surpass one of them.
Anonymous and Nagu – you are absolutely right. I am one of the co-founders of Corners and really excited to see being blogged about (thank you Amit). We share your view that it is not just about the content but it is the community that shares the interest around the content that is going to make it interesting for everyone. Besides, why re-invent the wheel when there is plenty of content available on the web on any givent topic – we chose to make it easy for users by pulling it in rather than forcing them to upload at yet another site. We are constantly improving our technology and bring content from several sources when you consider news, photos, videos etc. Keep the comments coming – we are always looking to improve the site and your open and honest comments will go a long way in making the site useful for all the fans out there. What are you a fan of? check out the new IPL Cricket corner – http://www.corners.in/corners/indianpremiereleague
Thank you
Sanjeev
Corners seems to be an interesting concept…
yeah i guess that’s right. but I was somehwhat bit peeved from a photographers point of view.. i’d not be pleased if i see my photos somewhere else without attribution. Would like to know how you take care of that.. could be a concern for many people.
Good point. In terms of photos, for example we are pulling in pictures with open Creative Commons license; in terms of attribution, our goal is to show any information that we get from the source. We will fix the bug on our photos page which is only displaying partial info at this time.
Also we are implementing a feature where community can flag any piece of content as abuse or inappropriate and it will be removed from the system.
Sanjeev, Animesh,
The IP issue is important but if the media being pulled in is creative commons, then its fine …thats the basic characer of web 2.0; once you put something on the web for mass consumption, you have implicitly made a decision to allow its syndcation…I don’t think that is the real point.
The strategy for getting content this way is just not scalable, and it is also not involving for the users from a behavioral perspective. This can be a short term tactic but cannot be a long term strategy.
Amit – thanks for the insightful comment. Agreed on the scalability side – the tools help jumpstart the content but our goal is that ultimately community picks it up from there and participates in making it their own – via discussions, news, blogs, comments, ratings, sharing and including uploading their own collection of photos and videos. The site offers features for both possibilities and we do not consider it mutually exclusive by any means.
Amit, an attribution is still required I believe, unless you have the author’s consent. For example.. following is one of the commonly used licenses on flickr –
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
Correct me if I’m wrong (or my interpretation is wrong). But I think thats why we have creative commons in place – to protect the content creators.
Also.. not all photos on flickr fall under creative commons. The author can choose to have “all rights reserved”.
And just to support the fact that corners.in is infact not paying attention to the kind of license whatsoever.. here’s an example –
http://corners.in/corners/hyderabad/photos/3404
http://www.flickr.com/photos/blacknwhite/2245161836/
The author has “all rights reserved” as you can see on his flickr page.
So guys please get this straight. I’m myself a part of a few amateur photography groups and I do strongly mind. It is unacceptable.
Not intentional – a bug in the system is probably causing it. We will investigate and fix it. Thanks for bringing it to our attention.
Thanks for responding Sanjeev. Do drop in a line once you fix that.
Cheers
Its like fanpop.com Isn’t it?
The logo looks oh-so web 2.0-ish! It may be a better idea to place the ‘beta’ tag above the logo, or else people will start reading it as ‘Corners Beta’ (Beta as in son, in hindi)
🙂
‘Beta Corners’ also suffers from the same issue (Son Corners).
Animesh, Amit,
The Attribution part if fixed now.
fyi
Sanjeev
corners.in ia a very interesting concept, not very sure about submitr.