The New York Times discusses Orkut’s phenomenal success in Brazil. [Orkut is Google’s social networking site.]
About 11 million of Orkut’s more than 15 million users are registered as living in Brazil a remarkable figure given that studies have estimated that only about 12 million Brazilians use the Internet from home.
…
No one quite knows why Orkut caught on among Brazilians and not Americans, although the fact that it is an invitation-only network might explain why it exploded in Brazil. In a 2005 interview with the newspaper Folha de So Paulo, Mr. Buyukkokten said it might be because Brazilians were “a friendly people,” and perhaps because some of his own friends, among the first to join the network, had Brazilian friends.
