Does the fairly new social website have the firepower to dethrone Facebook from its top position?
The creators of Ello claim to have a long list of new features, including mobile apps and more privacy settings
Hyderabad: During the peak of Orkut’s popularity, Facebook slowly but steadily crept in and managed to dethrone it as the world’s largest social networking website. From then till now, Facebook has managed to fight competition from other upcoming social websites to remain number one. But now, it looks like it might just meet its hardest contender yet!
Although too early to claim something like this with conviction, a lot has been spoken about Ello all of the last week. So, what is Ello? It’s an ad free, invite only independent social network, which has surprisingly gained a lot of followers of late, and is being nicknamed ‘anti-Facebook’.
Ello was launched way back in March, so the reason behind the sudden influx of users and its surge in popularity raised many eyebrows. Several reports, however, have linked the rise of Ello to the recent firestorm caused by Facebook’s so-called real name policy (which requires all users to go by their legal name on the social network). Though the policy per se isn’t new, it came under fire earlier this month as several LGBT activists spoke out after being locked out of their accounts for not using their legal names.
Facebook, after a brief discussion with a few San Francisco city officials, agreed to temporarily give individuals affected by the policy back their accounts, but did nothing. This angered some in the LGBT community to migrate to Ello, which has more relaxed naming policies. The creators claim to have a long list of new features, including mobile apps and more privacy settings that they are working on.
The sudden popularity has also fueled massive interest in the fledgling social network, with various reports claiming Ello is receiving anywhere from 4,000 to more than 30,000 requests an hour. That sudden interest also temporarily limited users’ abilities to send invites.
It’s too early to say whether Ello is the next big thing or just another passing fad, but it has definitely caught the Internet’s attention. Is it time to say Ello to a new social website? Only time will tell!
( Source : dc correspondent )
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