Creation of the social network Orkut and challenges
Posted: Sun Jan 19, 2025 9:43 am
On the morning of Tuesday (December 13), PM3 attended the talk by Orkut Buyukkokten – founder of orkut.com) on the stage of Product Camp 2022. Creator of one of the most beloved social networks by Brazilians and which had thousands of users around the world, Orkut spoke about his professional trajectory and the influences that were part of the creation of a product remembered with such affection here. He also shared some technical aspects of the creation of the platform and the challenges faced in this process.
Check out some insights from the talk here!
Personal influences
Orkut began by saying that several factors and decisions were decisive in getting him to where he is today. Since his childhood, contact with people has been very important in his life, especially as he is a Turkish boy with German experience.
In parallel, his interest in technology emerged at the same time, when his fascination with a ZX Spectrum – a European microcomputer from the 1980s – led him to begin his journey into finland mobile phone number the world of programming. As a teenager, he points out that the bullying he suffered at school made him focus even more on this new hobby , which led to a very important next step: a scholarship to study Information Science at Bilkent University in Ankara. There he became even more involved and immersed himself in the field, participating in the college's first Computer Club and giving lectures and classes on computers and programming, as well as offering classes on these topics to underprivileged children.
Club Nexus at Stanford University
After college, Orkut went to Stanford, where he earned a master's and doctorate in computer science. His research focused on web search and optimizing the power browser for personal digital assistants , which were nothing more than old palmtops .
In keeping with his goal of uniting his interest in technology and relationships between people, in 2001 he launched Club Nexus, a social network for university students that already included some of the many features of today's social networks, detailing the interests and hobbies of its users, as well as a list of friends. The project arose from observing the networking he himself had with other students in that environment.
This was a very important first experiment . Focusing on the richness of details, the analysis of data about users considered each person’s personality through self-assessment. Then, the goal was to find a correlation between male and female students’ preferences, obtaining more insights that would help answer questions such as:
“Why do people try to get close to others?”
“ Data analysis needs to be meaningful, accurate and have a good sample size”
– Orkut Shopping Cart
After finishing his research at Stanford, he says he had the choice of going to Google or Microsoft. When he chose to join Google, he says the opportunity to impact so many people was something that stood out to him. He didn't just want to make a difference for students, but for people everywhere.
“When working with large products, every small change has an impact on many people.”
– Orkut Shopping Cart
By dedicating himself entirely to the social network that ended up bearing his name, he highlights some challenges he faced in seeking a better experience for orkut.com users.
Related Communities
The first of these is directly linked to communities, a strong feature of the platform that has been very successful here in Brazil. The suggestion of related communities was a feature that sought to help users connect more and more with people with similar interests, even if they were not exactly the same. With so many options, it was important to develop an algorithm that would help members of the social network in this search.
To do this, he created a system that analyzed several factors to generate a score that allowed communities to be associated, as well as a system for interpreting user actions , which generated an overall click rate.
Check out some insights from the talk here!
Personal influences
Orkut began by saying that several factors and decisions were decisive in getting him to where he is today. Since his childhood, contact with people has been very important in his life, especially as he is a Turkish boy with German experience.
In parallel, his interest in technology emerged at the same time, when his fascination with a ZX Spectrum – a European microcomputer from the 1980s – led him to begin his journey into finland mobile phone number the world of programming. As a teenager, he points out that the bullying he suffered at school made him focus even more on this new hobby , which led to a very important next step: a scholarship to study Information Science at Bilkent University in Ankara. There he became even more involved and immersed himself in the field, participating in the college's first Computer Club and giving lectures and classes on computers and programming, as well as offering classes on these topics to underprivileged children.
Club Nexus at Stanford University
After college, Orkut went to Stanford, where he earned a master's and doctorate in computer science. His research focused on web search and optimizing the power browser for personal digital assistants , which were nothing more than old palmtops .
In keeping with his goal of uniting his interest in technology and relationships between people, in 2001 he launched Club Nexus, a social network for university students that already included some of the many features of today's social networks, detailing the interests and hobbies of its users, as well as a list of friends. The project arose from observing the networking he himself had with other students in that environment.
This was a very important first experiment . Focusing on the richness of details, the analysis of data about users considered each person’s personality through self-assessment. Then, the goal was to find a correlation between male and female students’ preferences, obtaining more insights that would help answer questions such as:
“Why do people try to get close to others?”
“ Data analysis needs to be meaningful, accurate and have a good sample size”
– Orkut Shopping Cart
After finishing his research at Stanford, he says he had the choice of going to Google or Microsoft. When he chose to join Google, he says the opportunity to impact so many people was something that stood out to him. He didn't just want to make a difference for students, but for people everywhere.
“When working with large products, every small change has an impact on many people.”
– Orkut Shopping Cart
By dedicating himself entirely to the social network that ended up bearing his name, he highlights some challenges he faced in seeking a better experience for orkut.com users.
Related Communities
The first of these is directly linked to communities, a strong feature of the platform that has been very successful here in Brazil. The suggestion of related communities was a feature that sought to help users connect more and more with people with similar interests, even if they were not exactly the same. With so many options, it was important to develop an algorithm that would help members of the social network in this search.
To do this, he created a system that analyzed several factors to generate a score that allowed communities to be associated, as well as a system for interpreting user actions , which generated an overall click rate.