“Desi Facebook” - Imitation is the best form of flattery
I stumbled upon DesiMartini.com today. It is a desi social networking site. Hmmmm. The site bears a striking resemblance with Facebook. I’m sorry, I really meant to say that the site is a complete ripoff of Facebook. The screenshot does not do full justice to this mimicry, I encourage you to visit the site. Mr. Pahwa ripped not only the basic concept of a social network but went the extra mile and ripped the stylesheet off Facebook too.
On researching them, I stumbled upon an online Q&A with the CEO at Businessworld. My favorite excerpt from the article is the CEO talking about “everything Indian”.
Our marketing strategy is to strongly associate DesiMartini with everything Indian since ‘Being Indian is in’ and this is the concept we are selling – Indian space, Indian people, ‘Your’ space, not some space run by an international company or by Indians from America – but by Indians and for Indians. Why should India’s most popular social network be run by an international company? It’s that simple.”
Being an Indian myself, I whole heartedly agree with Mr. Pahwa’s sentiment. Sure, take pride in your heritage. But why ripoff your entire website from an international company? How hard is it to create an original design? I mean, REALLY. At least have the creativity to throw in a new font or color. And don’t play the Indian card when you are blatantly dishing out a desi version of Facebook.
Take some tips from IndyaRocks and Sirfdosti for starters and change your name from DesiMartini to DesiLassi. That would be a true original step.
Sphere: Related Content
VERY INTERESTING POINT OF VIEW. HOWEVER, I DO NOT SEE A FACEBOOK AD. I USE DESIMARTINI TO KEEP IN TOUCH WITH ALL MY FRIENDS. I THINK FACEBOOK HAS COPIED DESIMARTINI.COM
↓ Quote | Posted May 24, 2007, 11:11 amHi all,
↓ Quote | Posted July 18, 2007, 6:25 amI just came across this webiste http://www.desidirectory.com/desi-indian-poems/ and thought about sharing this information with you too.
It says :
This site have valuable information about world across Indian people Connecting Indian people, Desi Blogs India Travel Designation , India Travel guide, Local city event, Indian festival information and much more included - http://www.desidirectory.com.
[…] had written about it when it first came out back in May here. I was a little peeved how the CEO was waving the Indian originality flag in all his press […]
↓ Quote | Posted November 30, 2007, 8:06 pm