Social network Orkut recently announced about a complete redesign . The new site is faster. You will find the activity stream front and center. Orkut has reduced the number of pages by clubbing the most popular actions in the home stream. For example, you will find in-line commenting for status updates, photos, and videos. The homepage now also hosts the various notifications (such as friend requests, testimonials, community requests or birthday announcements etc.).

Orkut now offers video chat, in addition to regular text IM. You can access other Google properties (Gmail, maps, and search) from the top of the homepage. Photo uploads are now faster than before and the profile pages are more customizable.

The redesign was inevitable as Orkut was facing tremendous pressure and major encroachments by Facebook in its strongest markets of India and Brazil.

Recent figures show the need to worry. In September, Orkut got 51 million unique visitors across the world, which is lower than 54.5 million in July (comScore). Facebook is about six times larger than Orkut worldwide and recently Twitter surpassed Orkut with 58.4 million global visitors.

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