This will be interesting

Finally! In response to those pesky getamac ads Microsoft will soon respond. From the news at WSJ, Microsoft will be hiring Jerry Seinfeld for the campaign. The campaign - a closely guarded secret until now and with a $300 million budget, will have Seinfeld and Gates appearing in the ads..Despite what realdan(formerly fakesteve) says on his blog about hiring a 54 year old semi-retired comedian,I think it is a great idea.True Seinfeld fans will notice that Jerry's room had a computer - presumably a Mac. Apple also released a one time "Think different" ad with a small tribute to Seinfeld.Clearly if Seinfeld were to endorse a brand it seems like it should be Apple. How then did Microsoft decide to hire Jerry Seinfeld?What seems to be a blunder according to many may be a brilliant move. I can see ads like this similar to the PC guy - mac guy ads like this

Gates : How are you Jerry? I see you are working on your computer.Busy eh?
Seinfeld : Busy ?Me?Haven't worked since 1998 :-) Well I am not actually working, just editing a movie
Gates: (sigh) On a mac?Guess I must really get going
Seinfeld:No, actually I switched to Vista after I just ran out of options to get new hardware on the Mac and guess what I can now use the Windows Movie Maker on Vista to make movies.
Gates:That must have been tough, for someone using a Mac for .. 20 years?
Seinfeld: hmm, actually no, contrary to what others said - come over, let me show you..Even a 54 old guy like me can get it to work easily

.....


I can see how this can get really interesting if done right..Can't wait to see the ads

Is the begining of the end of Orkut in India?

Can someone explain the precipitous fall in the Alexa statistic for Orkut here? And compare that with rise in Facebook usage.Now I agree Alexa is far from perfect, but I still think it is interesting.
I think there may be a lesson here for all those sites that want to get around the cold-start or chicken-and-egg problem associated with platforms with high network effects.The graph is a worldwide usage graph but given that India has a significant (18% and second highest) share of Orkut users,this may be attributed in some ways to change in Indian users' behavior patterns as well.

A few months ago,I was reluctantly introduced to Facebook when a small but significant and growing percentage of my friends dumped Orkut for Facebook. I initially rejected the idea with a yawn - Indians are already hooked on to Orkut, Do need another social network? A lot of also-rans came and died ( yaari, WAYN, and few others which now reside in my spam mail folder) and I wondered if another 'me too' social network would ever work. I was wrong.

I increasingly find myself more on Facebook and less on Orkut and I think in a few months I may have to invoke the "forgot password" option on my Orkut account.

I think the initial reason for the migration was due to the Facebook apps.There was a lot more to do than just see photos and updates from friends,and I think its an important reason why people come back to the site. Orkut was and is a lot more static and by early 2008 Indian users of Orkut had got past the initial novelty factor and were beginning to get bored of logging in again to see the same page with just a re arranged grid of friends.Thats when I Facebook provided something that was missed - a more dynamic page with more updates from friends.Facebook apps-although many apps are not very useful - are a clever way to increase the number of friend updates and help maintain a more dynamic page.Users will login more often to see what changed. And that is again a self feeding cycle with network effects - the less often users login the less number of updates friends will see and even fewer people will login. Network effects in reverse direction!

I think the graph explains very well what happened. Facebook is gaining a foothold in India and Google better do something about maintaining Orkut's popularity in India. The OpenSocial Apps and friend updates strategy doesn't seem to have worked too well. The UI needs a big face lift and probably a better way to show updates must be worked out. Still, if things stay the way they are , I think it is beginning of the decline of Orkut in India.