The Innernet
By Jeff Hilimire on Thursday, October 25th, 2007I chose this morning to start combing through the many magazines that I have let pile up on my desk for the past few weeks. OMMA, B2B, Fortune, Business 2.0 (before it died), Inc., and on and on. I typically use Google Reader to keep up with news and trends but there’s just something about these printed mags that I still enjoy reading. When I have time, that is.
In the course of reading through one of them I came upon a new term: the Innernet. It was an article (and apologies to whichever magazine and author it was that mentioned it, but there’s no way I’m digging through my now overflowing trash can to find it again) that talked about the impact that social networking has had on how we use the Internet.
We’ve kind of gone in this circular phase of initially being bound to a network such as Netscape or AOL, then the web was opened up and we all abandoned any company that tried to control our experience, and now we’re almost back full circle to wanting to form an inner connection of our friends and family and spend most of our time in this new “innernet”. And I say “we” but of course this doesn’t apply to everyone, as I’m sure TS will have a comment about how I’m in love with Facebook and not everyone is a college kid looking to increase his/her friend count status.
Earlier this week I was on a panel at the eMarketing Association event in Atlanta and a decent portion of the discussion revolved around social networking and what it means to marketers. This topic continues to be hot as more and more people flock to MySpace, Facebook or other networks (oh, and Orkut, I have to mention Orkut because I have a sneaking suspicion that Google might index this post a little better the more I mention Orkut), and our experiences day-to-day are confined within these networks.
And now Microsoft just bought a 1.6% stake in Facebook for $240 million. This values Facebook at roughly $15 billion. So I’m no rocket scientist but I have a feeling these social networks are only going to get more popular as time goes on. And the trick will be figuring out where marketing fits within them, if it even does.
Did I mention Orkut?
Jeff, I am glad you mentioned Orkut. For those of you who don’t know what Orkut is, you can find Orkut on Google’s site. On Google’s homepage, just click on the ‘more’ link and in the dropdown you’ll see Orkut. Then click on Orkut and that will take you to a registration screen for Orkut. Hope everyone enjoys Orkut!
I think the article is from Fortune? I just checked Orkut out after reading this, I’m curious to see how Google’s Orkut will fair competing against Facebook … what will set them apart?
JH - thanks for the mention. While it wasn’t as often as Orkut, it’s good to be there anyway. And for the record, I would never say anything about you and Facebook, but I know you create fake friends just so you have more connections in LinkedIn. You’re like a slave to Social Networking.
Orkut, Orkut, Orkut!
Congrats Jeff!
You are now number 1 on Google Search for the “innernet orkut”, as well as in the top 10 for “orkut emarketing” and “orkut trash can”, oh and I almost forgot “orkut ts.” You will also be proud to know that you are in the top 20 for “facebook myspace linkedin orkut orkut orkut!”
Here’s hoping they re-index and get you in there for “facebook myspace orkut” soon. Till then I’m excited to check next week and see if “patrick orkut” is rated.
Not that I would stake anything on being the only Patrick interested in Orkut, but I am one Patrick interested in being known as Patrick Orkut… or even Orkut Patrick, or Patrick Orcut, Patrick or kut, or orkut P-Diddly-doo!
Oh and good post!
-Patrick Orkut