September 2008
Yahoo! India has launched a social network only for the Indian market called SpotM.
SpotM plans to target users in the 16-24 age bracket. Don't ask how they will enforce the age bracket rule because the site is currently in a closed beta, and I don't have an invite yet.
As per blog coverage of the announcement, the touted differentiators are strong privacy features like anonymous friends and chat as well as mobile integration like SMS alerts, etc.
Privacy features may be the first of its kind, but most of the popular Indian social networks are already on mobile through SMS, WAP and Apps. Check out the mobile websites of Orkut, Facebook and BigAdda.
Social networking in India is dominated by Orkut, with Facebook fast catching up and BigAdda doing big promotional activity through TV advertising etc. Among notable others, MySpace launched its India site in April this year, while India's top portal Rediff has Connexions. Wild card entries in this competition include Web18's portal in.com, Chinese QQ.com's group company iBiBo and HT Media's Desimartini.
It remains to be seen if Yahoo! can become a social networking leader through product innovation or by building upon its sizeable Yahoo! Groups and Messenger user-base in India. But its track record is not a good indicator, with both Mash and 360 shutting down earlier this year.
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