Here comes Indian Social Networking initiative – In Web 2.0ish way

I came across this website last night while looking out for latest Web 2.0 launches. First thing which attracted me towards it was its name – SixerTV. And the description said something like this –

A place for cricket fans…dot.

So it is a Cricket website, I thought. Then I searched my memory for, how many cricket websites have I seen in Web 2.0 category…Perhaps none. So it is going to be the first of its kind. The next thought which flashed in my mind, I am not sure about the cause, was that probable it should be by some Indian. After all, it is the country of cricket maniacs. Next, I stepped on the website by Ctrl + clicking the link and opening it in another Firefox tab. But why sixer.tv…why not sixer.com or sixer.net when these domain names are available and when it is all about social networking??? Don’t ask me. I have no idea and can’t even make a wild guess. The front page consisted a nice interface which included the some typical social-networking website links plus couple of Top cricket stories aggregated from different RSS feed of different cricket websites being displayed in a box. I was impressed by unique UI scheme. More than 90% of news were about Indian cricket and therefore, my belief turned stronger. There were links to view Top Stories of Today, Week or Month. Different runs were assigned to each story (must be some complex algo :roll:).

online platform to connect global cricket fans.

Next thing that I did was to sign up for this Cricket based Social Networking website (afterall I also belong to same manic community :MD). I got instant activation mail in my Gmail account but what is this…it wasn’t properly formatted. The HTML code appeared before me and I had to search for activation link in that code (first gotcha) but that was expected – I should had looked at BETA tag with the website. I promptly sent a reply to activation mail about it. After activation, it takes few seconds to activate and then Let us you log-in. Once you log-in (there is Remember Me option), you are asked to update your profile which includes your personal info, Interests (hobbies, favorite batsman, bowler, website), Cricket life, Team, Photo and Background. There were only 4 languages to choose as your regional languages (all popular Indian Regional languages) but excluding the most popular Indian regional language – Punjabi – do they not like Punjabi otherwise how can they just ignore it (you have to choose 1 of four listed languages although I didn’t know any of them!)? It was fun filling the information which I was never asked before and I got remembered my feat of taking 3 wickets in one over! I found that the City which I mentioned in my Profile was being shown as my Hometown on my Background page (does City means where are you living or home city?) There were different networking links placed in arranged manner on My Page. There were options to invite friends, Join a club (player clubs), Submit News, Add Videos/Pictures etc. I noted that there was a personalized link to my page – http://www.sixer.tv/members/net but when I clicked to open it, it displayed error 403. I couldn’t understand, why I wasn’t allowed to see my own page (gotcha no. 2). Today I noticed their early morning reply in my inbox, so I thought of writing my experience about Sixer. As I had guessed, it is happened to be Hyderabad, India based firm. They are strongly backed by San Francisco based LINUS Capital investment group. I decided to navigate through the website. Joined Sachin’s club. Then I accessed the members of different groups. They are boasting of having 500 members within 2 days of its launch but I could find many users as testers. There was one age bug which showed age of a person as 106 years who is a medium pace bowler!

 On accessing the page of person, it returned error 404.

 

You are given runs for reading/viewing different news over this website – it is innovative. You can upload your pictures and videos – I found that most of the testers had uploaded video of DON – seems to be their favorite :P! On Social Networking aspect, one can expect this website to create a big bang in Indian Online Community. It provides means to connect with other people based on interests based on teams, players, technology, location, movies and what not for cricket lovers. And the way connectivity has been established between different kind of interests is appreciable. I also received a link to the recent interview of the man behind this initiative- Raj with indiablogwatch.com. Sixer has also been covered in BW also. Here goes few words by Raj about sixer –

Sixer is going after cricket fans that love to connect with other fans. The game (cricket) is becoming bigger everyday with new countries joining ICC and the number of games being played by each team.

Although it is a bit buggy but then it is in beta. So still a long way to go for this website. After a long time, an Indian entrance has been observed in online-space which is sailing with very bright prospects. Perhaps, it can act as a major catalyst for turning BIG Indian Web 2.0 Dreams in to reality. Best wishes for this Great Indian Startup! Update (October 11, 2006): I have been mentioned on the sixer.tv blog. Thanks guys.

Almost every bug mentioned in this post has been fixed and now, I am able to see more regional languages including Punjabi and Sanskrit. My personal page link is also working!

Great work, sixer team. Keep it up.

 

Update (October 12, 2006): Afrter some regular conversations with sixer.tv for my following statement, I would like to mention that this assumtion is made by me because of successful trails of other Web 2.0 startups.

They are boasting of having 500 members within 2 days of its launch but I could find many users as testers.

No doubt that Traffic Figures on Alexa.com about sixer.tv are impressive but there were no proof posted by sixer.tv on their blog beside mentioning this statistic.

One thought on “Here comes Indian Social Networking initiative – In Web 2.0ish way”

  1. http://www.bechums.com
    What is this Bechums???Bechums is a Social Cause Networking Website.Social Cause Networking means we use Social Networking for a good cause.The Concept here is very simple,It is a known fact that websites make money by hosting advertisements.More members a website has…more money they earn.What have you done is made the firm dance to the bank.What if this money earned by the site is used for feeding a Poor child,Spreading Aids awareness and helping Aids affected patients???That is exactly what Bechums does.We will give out 70% money earned from advertisements in our website to organizations working on these missions.Now what is your contribution here?We are not asking any money from you….All we need you to do is keep this website alive by spreading this website and asking your friends to join this website,as more the members…more will be the advertisement deals.What about the remaining 30% of the money earned from the advertisements? We will use the same for paying out our Hosting bills.So what are you waiting for…..Have Fun with a meaning…..Remember your Single blog article or scrap could feed a Hungry soul somewhere in the world…..
    Press Release:http://www.prlog.org/10014750-asia-first-social-cause-networking-website.html

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