14 DAY TRIAL // Alexandre Dumas' Three Musketeers' catchphrase is, I think, the one that best describes where Google is going to. The Mountain View based company is trying to unite its users under one single profile that will link from there to all the services it graces us with. This is coming in, one step at a time, and the first one is here. Google decided to let Gmail and orkut become friends and play together in the sandbox.
Orkut is trying to become a serious alternative for Facebook and to extend its success further than Brazil and India, where it is the fourth link in the navigational bar. It has already included news feeds, third party apps via OpenSocial (not yet live), additional privacy controls and, now, orkut allows its users to find their Gmail contacts on orkut for adding them as friends on the social network.
"Your Gmail address is already filled in, and since you've already logged into orkut, we don't have to ask for your Gmail password once again. We'll show you the contacts who are already on orkut, and let you choose which ones to add as friends. For contacts who aren't on orkut yet, we make it easy to choose the ones you want to invite to orkut. You can even add a personal message to send with the invite. Soon, we'll be adding support to import your contacts from other email accounts", promises Jude Britto from orkut.
It would definitely be interesting to see what people choose to display on their social networking profiles; I read a study a while ago that said that if they were to be employed based on the content of their profiles, most of the youth would fail the test. Be careful what pictures you upload, your mom might see them and ruin her image of you for good. No more morning hangover pictures, mind you!
