SAO PAULO (Reuters) – Orkut, popular among Brazilians in the mid-2000s, had its website reactivated on Wednesday and generated speculation about the social network’s possible return.
Created by software engineer Orkut Büyükkökten in 2004, the network belonged to Google, from Alphabet, and relied on viewing in communities and conversations, instead of organizing content in feeds, as is the case with Twitter, Facebook and Instagram, from Goal.
On the homepage, there is a message from the founder reflecting on current social networks and a register where internet users can sign up to receive news about the project.
“They [redes sociais] should protect our data, not sell it. They should give us hope, not fear and anxiety,” Orkut wrote.
The social network, which reached 300 million users, was mostly composed of Brazilians, representing about 50.6% of the total in 2011.
Orkut was shut down in 2014 by Google, which said at the time that its focus was on the YouTube video platform.
Orkut’s possible comeback comes two days after Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk bought Twitter for $44 billion.
(By Beatriz Garcia)
