Google Orkut, a social network that has had virtually no impact outside of Brazil and India in years, is shutting down a decade after its launch.
The network, which has been overtaken in every respect by Google+, has been close to death for some time, leaving almost no one surprised that the axe has finally fallen.
“Over the past decade, YouTube, Blogger, and Google+ have taken off, with communities springing up in every corner of the world,” Google Engineering Director Paulo Golgher wrote on the Orkut blog. “Because the growth of these communities has outpaced Orkut’s growth, we’ve decided to bid Orkut farewell (or, tchau). We’ll be focusing our energy and resources on making these other social platforms as amazing as possible for everyone who uses them.”
The Orkut blog, by the way, hadn’t been updated since 2012. Again, this shutdown is no shock.
Google+, simultaneously one of the most maligned and underrated social networks on the Web, is said to be “growing tremendously,” despite justified public perception that Google has constantly tried to force users into the service.
New users are already unable to create Orkut accounts. The final plug will be pulled on Sept. 30, 2014.
Illustration by Jason Reed
