Google to shut down Orkut end September

Google today said it was shutting down Orkut, its ''first foray into social networking,'' as it looked to focus on YouTube, Blogger, and Google+ services that had proven more popular.

The internet company said it would pull the plug on 10-year-old Orkut at the end of September.

''Over the past decade, YouTube, Blogger and Google+ have taken off,'' Google engineering director Paul Golgher said in a blog post.

''Because the growth of these communities has outpaced Orkut's growth, we've decided to bid Orkut farewell.''

Orkut grew out of the company's ''20 per cent project'' in which Google workers were encouraged to spend a fifth of their time on ideas not necessarily related to their job responsibilities.

Orkut gained wide popularity especially in Brazil, where two years ago it was eclipsed by social networking powerhouse Facebook.

The company's next social network initiative was launched in 2011, which is being increasingly integrated into other services.

The company has not revealed the number of Orkut users.

Orkut's launch came in early 2004, the same year that saw the founding of Facebook, now the world's No 1 social network with 1.28 billion users, Reuters reported.

The shutdown of the service comes as Google's social networking plans remain uncertain following the departure in April of Vic Gundotra, the head of Google's social networking services.

Gundotra is credited with launch of Google+, which counted 300 million users visits every month.

The social network is apparently trying to position Google+ more as a means of establishing a unified ''user identity'' system to improve the company's web properties rather than a competitor to Facebook.

As a step in the direction, Google started requiring users of its YouTube site to sign in with their Google+ identity before posting comments about videos.

According to the company, it would preserve an archive of all Orkut "communities" that would be available from 30 September.

Google said if users did not want their posts or name to be in included in the community archive they could remove Orkut permanently from their Google account.