<<Today we're announcing our latest improvement to the site: an updated look! Just as you change your profile picture to keep with the times, we're updating the look of orkut. The change isn't live yet, but starting soon, we will start rolling-out the new look. To start, we will roll it out to a small group of users randomly selected, and will continue to do so until everyone is on the new site. We'll tell you a little more each day, so come back to the blog to get a few sneak peeks.>>
http://en.blog.orkut.com/2007/08/coming-soon-new-look.html

Socialstream??!! A new look might revive Orkut's popularity in the U.S.

excellent!

FINALLY! This better be awesome lol

If anyone gets the new look before us post a screenshot

I havent got it hear yet (never personally use the site).

Will be interesting to see what it looks like. Facebook has taken over the social network space...

I agree with Sam. Facebook > Orkut (in every aspect).

Let's pray that it's not going to be like MySpace (allow users to overly customize their profile pages).

It's not the extent to which the user can customize their pages, it's the way that myspace has them do it. Facebook has done an outstanding job-- i would love to see orkut do better.

BTW, have you guys noticed that you don't need the additional login for Orkut anymore?

Yeah i picked up on that recently too :)

Screenshots! http://www.info-mundo.net/2007/08/23/orkut-tera-nova-interface/

Here too: http://www.flickr.com/photos/kyzy/1216686773/

Finally I don't know if all this screenshots are true or if users have used an extension :
http://orkutplus.blogspot.com/2007/08/get-beautiful-and-stunning-orkut-themes.html

I've already talked about that, but I can't access Orkut. I've tried with various browser, I've erased cache,cookies...
No sucess.
I'm also experiencing problems on random videos on YouTube (the video doesn't load and it stays black forever)
Has anyone been experiencing the same things ?

Maybe the video has been removed?

Nope. On videos that have been linked as working from tiny sites (no overload effect)

But that's the orkut thing that is the weirdest. The Favicon loads in Konqueror (doesn't in Firefox), but in both cases I get a page not found thingy.

Kind of annoying.

If you ask me, they should have completely rebranded Orkut as "Google Friends" or "Google Network" or something and focused more on its features.

The new design is better but completely underwhelming.

Colors excepted, where is the SocialStream touch in this new look ?

I expect more radical changes. They only did a few CSS retouches

Tony Ruscoe
In case of renaming. Why not...
Picasa to Google Photo
YouTube to Google TV
Blogger to Google Blogs
Dodgeball to Google Social Mobile

I think this can be good for Google as brand but it would increase the possibilities of being judged by monopoly as Google brand turn omnipresent like Micro$oft

Google doesn't need such a brand image. There's more chance of products catching on if they have a distinctive name... surely. I can't imagine there been such a buzz about YouTube if it was called Google TV?

Anyway, I think this orkut "redesign" is more of just a facelift, with the old reflection here and there.

Ok problem fixed. It seems to be a Fon.com problem (connecting using la Fonera). Dunno how to iron it out, but using good old Ethernet for now

<<I think this can be good for Google as brand but it would increase the possibilities of being judged by monopoly as Google brand turn omnipresent like Micro$oft>>

I don't think monopoly status would have anything to do with the branding.

It would be nice if they would make it easier to find people... I've had the thing for 3 years and I still can't have it search my Gmail address book to find people who may already have an account...

They plan on releasing new features after the new look is rolled out to everyone. They'll be releasing them over time so they can catch bugs easier. Also, everyone should expect to have the new look within the next couple days :)

They need to put a button called "This is not a person" or "This person is spam". I'm tired of being invited by sexy brazilians with long email addresses, and comments like "visit my website, check out my photos!" ¬¬
Anyway, I don't have any connection there and I don't use it...

Haha they have that-- most social netowking site do

The main problem I have with orkut is spam, which is why until last night I hadn't bothered to use it. I spent a whole 2 minutes and managed to find at least 100 spam accounts which were active.

Yeah, Orkut has a unbelievable spam problem. It's as bad as MySpace if not worse.

Screenshot in PNG from Google:
http://bp0.blogger.com/_eXrfCIRgeCA/Rs78Y4ZZv4I/AAAAAAAAFho/9uhuTh4V9Rg/s1600-h/new-homepage-en.png

Meu perfil correndo o mundo lol

I still don't have it! Ughh :(lol

...i'm so impatiant :D

Here's another official post where the screenschot from Haochi was taken from http://en.blog.orkut.com/2007/08/redesign-preview-true-blue-simplicity.html

I like this screenshot better:
http://internetducttape.com/2007/08/24/google-orkut-new-look/

:)

heh...they could've done a better job

engtech, obvious photoshop job.

Well, it's nice that the most popular Latin American social networking service has gotten a face-lift. Good for them Latinos. :-)

But seriously, what good is any of this if I can't even find a single orkut community that isn't filled with Portuguese and Spanish posts? Not that I'm racist or an English elitist or anything (I'm a Filipino, so English isn't even my primary language), but why can't they consider the people who don't understand their language and simply use a more universal one (English)? Now, it'd be less irksome if this was only isolated to American communities (i.e. both North and South America), but Portuguese posts in purely Philippine communities?! WTF?

This would change after more users join-- it's just a language barrier that has to be broken with more users

Okay that was worded badly. when more users of a given language, say english, join, then users of other languages will go to groups where there are more people who speak that language and leave the english groups alone.

During this period of switching over new accounts do any of the users who can see the new look see any links to the orkut homepage from within orkut or on their google accounts page that are odd and may let other users see the new orkut?

it's not likely but i'm trying to think of ways to get it sooner. anybody got any better ideas? yes, i know-- i'm VERY impatient sometimes

Hey guys, go to the Help Center. :)
http://help.orkut.com/support/

nice! :)

I found more pictures of new Orkut at here:
http://www.googlediscovery.com/2007/08/24/orkut-estreia-nova-e-elegante-interface/

Looks nice!

Thanks-- i think we have enough screenshots now

This is a much needed visual overhaul to orkut. The sky blue color scheme has become really boring after all these time. The new design, although not really radically different from the old one, breaths some fresh air to the google social network application. One can hope that this will mean that Google is putting in more efforts and resources to the web application. I know it's pretty popular in some countries, but I have yet to see a more innovative and ground-breaking Orkut.

It's is the 7th most popular site in the world. And they have been working on orkut-- only they haven't been making the changes because they were waiting for this new look to come out.

Too bad thy did not bring over SocialStream features. Dont know why Google is not incorporating it soon enough.

Read some of my thoughts on this:

http://abhishek.tiwari.com/2007/08/25/orkut-refreshed-but-where-is-socialstream/

Because it's not close to being ready...

Socialstream isn't owned by Google, its simply sponsored. Whether or not Google buys the source to the project/hires the students and implements it into Orkut is a complete unknown, although highly likely IMHO.

http://www.hcii.cs.cmu.edu/M-HCI/2006/SocialstreamProject/index.php

<<Directed to *help improve the online community orkut*, the project's scope was not to simply redesign the interface.>>

Must have missed that (apparently, I'm blind).

haochi

Yeah you are right, thank god now! no need of additional login!

tony ruscore

Well i don't want orkut re branding or does google! Since most of the Brazilians and Indians love calling them orkut and have them in heart.

And also it wouldn't be nice if you hear google everywhere google tv, google bathroom, google earth. etc etc

I disagree-- i want a Google Bathroom ;)

Google Feaces Analitycs ;-)

"we'll reveal a little more each day, so stay tuned" What else is there to reveal and why did you say that and then only do 1 follow-up post, Orkut Bloggers?

A little more each day? They missed Saturday (yesterday)...

Maybe they are reveling it through Orkut-- not just the blog? I have no idea

I still get nothing new here. I'm really wondering how they chose the users who get the new look. Randomly? By country? Language? Any idea?

I was informed that they release it to a group of people at a time using a "sampling model" so that they can make it adjust it to some percentage of users. They sometime use a whitelist but for orkut they are relying only on this algorithm which selects random users (exept google employees?). With this sampling model they can release it to say 0.2% of users and see if they like it by looking over the data.

Ok

I got it on first day!!! :)

I see the new design.

Lucky man! (in all languages?)

> I disagree-- i want a Google Bathroom

Hmm...
http://blogoscoped.com/archive/2004_12_19_index.html

Talking about the Orkut brand... I brought home this flyer from Zurich (where Google has one of their development centers):
http://blogoscoped.com/files/orkut-party-zurich.jpg

i too have the design now, seem like its live for everyone

>> seem like its live for everyone
Not just yet. I'm still not seeing it.

Here neither.

I'm wondering how many people have now the new look of orkut. If they release their new look to 10'000 new users each days, I will discover it in 18 years...

Maybe 10000 in the first 7 days and then everyone.

I have got the new one

You should have it by tomorrow ;)

http://img207.imageshack.us/img207/2125/orkutbrokenbuttongb3.png
Got it here as well, but the buttons are kinda broken though.

DPic, do you work at GOOG :)?

Haha, no but that would be awesome
I just turned 16 last a little over a month ago :)

The new design is now available http://en.blog.orkut.com/2007/08/redesign-preview-its-little-things.html

Philip, Orjut is too popular in India too :)