Orkut Applications launched !

A random refresh at about 11.30 P.M.(IST) on my Orkut Profile revealed this new image.At first it appeared as a security tip, but one more look told me that Orkut had finally graduated to the next level, and had come up with much awaited third party applications.


The application directory currently has the following applications:

Music iLike

By iLike, Inc.

Add music and videos to your profile, list your favorite artists, and test your skill in the Music Challenge! Join 23 million iLike users to share and discover music.

Emote!

By RockYou!

Bored, Happy, Glum? We've got an ever growing list of emoticons to show off how you feel.

PhotoAttack

By ActOnME, Inc.

Attack photos of your friends with cool animations! Slap them silly, send them a kiss, splash them with color balloons. No matter what your emotions are we have an animation that can help you to express yourself. Let the game begin. Attack Now !!

Horoscopes

By RockYou!

Are the stars aligning for you? Find out with a RockYou horoscope and get regular updates for your sign.

TypeRacer

By Alex Epshteyn

Typing meets racing in this first-ever competitive typing game. Compete against your friends and the whole world in the new sport of keyboarding!

Top Friends by Slide.com.

Who are your Top Friends? Keep track of your best friends right on your profile with Top Friends by Slide.com!

SlideTV by Slide.com.

Add custom pics, graffiti, videos and more to your profile with SlideTV by Slide.com!

myHangman
By C2w.com
Play the classic word game of Hangman or create one of your own on your favourite movies, music, TV shows and more. Guess the missing letters of the alphabet to fill in the blanks and get the right answer.

By ugenie
iRead is a social book discovery application. With iRead you can organize your favorite books in bookshelves, rate and review them. You can browse what other iReaders and friends are reading. iRead learns from your book reading tastes and recommends books you will like and also users who read like you. Add application and join the social book discovery revolution!

Flixster Movies

By Flixster, Inc.

Share movie ratings and compare your movie taste with friends. Create and challenge friends to movie quizzes. Meet other movie fans with similar taste.

Chakpak Movies
By chakpak.com

Chakpak Movies is a social movies application that lets you rate/review movies and related photos/videos and share your ratings and reviews with your friends. It also lets you organize movies by classifying them into ones you have seen, you own, your favorite movies and other similar categories. Among other fun things, you can also create movie quizzes and challenge your friends.

ReadingSocial

By Hungry Machine

Organize your reading history! Build up your bookshelf to keep track of what you've read, want to read, and are currently reading. See what your friends are reading. Show others what's on your real bookshelf. See others reading the same book (a good icebreaker). Read and create reviews. Recommend books on your bookshelf to your friends. Get recommendations from your friends.

Bible Verses

By Barry Welch

Play the Bible Verses quiz and challenge your friends. Post a prayer and share it with your Orkut friends. Post your favorite bible passages to your profile and scrapbook.

India Dekha!

India Dekha has been developed by Zoomtra.com in an effort to connect Indian Travel enthusiasts with one another. How much of India Have you traveled or plan to travel to in the future? Make your India Dekha! Map and share it with your friends.

Teen Patti

By minglebox.com

Teen Patti - Indian version of 3 card poker; also known as flash. A multi-player game that you won't be able to stop playing - once you start. A must play before and on Diwali for most Indian families, even losing in this game is supposed to bring you good luck. Get together with friends and have fun!

Hangout

By Auciti Info Technologies

Upcoming music concert or a quick meet at a coffee shop down the street. Casual outing or a special event. Schedule it and invite friends. Hangout enables you to schedule, coordinate and have fun with your Orkut friends outside your online world. Hangout now!!

BuboMe

By BuboMe.com

Pimp yours or your friends photos by adding themes and bubbles, be the celebrity or superhero you always wanted to be, there are hundreds of themes to choose from, and built in 4 languages: English, Portuguese, Chinese and Vietnamese, come create some fun photos!

Music n Movies

By Minglebox

Vaat Lag Gayi Maamu! New, fun way to interact with friends! Let your friends know what you think of them and how you are feeling! Go back in time with classic dialogues from Sholay and Don or enjoy dialogues from recent hits like Om Shanti Om and Jab We Met. Enjoy personalised music stations. Add your favourite channels and share fun memories and trivia around songs! Listen to Bollywood Hits, Indipop, Punjabi Hits, International Hits and more... Share your movie tastes with friends, add favourites, rate and review movies. Check out what's hot and happening in Latest Movies.

These applications had been testing in the Google Sandbox for quite some time now and were also open for reviews.The initial line up looks good, with some apps from Indian sites like minglebox, and zoomtra and others from sites like slide, ilike etc. basically focusing on books, movies and travel.

This is the start of the exciting new phase for orkut, the online social networking hub in India.Like Facebook, we will soon see the entire web bandwagon designing apps for orkut, which I'm sure will be lapped up by the Orkut hooked Indian audience which has been relentless thus far and has shown no signs of the so called Social networking fatigue!

It also comes in at a time when Google is looking to monetize Orkut big time after achieving the kind of user base and page views.The applications feature is a winner, and is sure to escalate the real estate prices at Orkut !!!