Your conversations with your boss, relatives and friends are different. So, it’s time to join a network that “layers” conversations. Enter, vebbler.com

Started by: Sahil Bhagat, 24. His first venture (when he was 18) was Frogster.com and then came a 360-degree digital solutions firm called Doodle Works which provided solutions in web design and development, social media marketing, SEO and Internet advertising to reputed clients in India and abroad. At present he is pursuing a correspondence degree in business and management from the London School of Economics. He graduated in advertising and mass media from KC College, Mumbai.

Based in: Mumbai.

Launch: November 12, 2013.

Average profile: Subscribers are usually in the 16-35 age group.

The idea: To make the experience of connecting and sharing online similar to how our real-world relationships work. The core of the platform is the crowd-layering model that enables people to connect with different types of relationships, like friends, parents, teachers, colleagues and even bosses on one network through different layers, so that one aspect of a person’s life does not spill into another.

“Before Vebbler, I was working on another social network called Frogster.com, which was a platform that brought together like-minded people, passionate about causes that plague the world today. During the period of remodelling Frogster into Vebbler, we saw two big shifts in the social networking space. First, there were many different types of relationships that were beginning to use social media. Second, privacy and user data were becoming an increasing concern with networks, which were in the process of trying to make platforms more ‘open’. People today are afraid to expose their entire social graph and unfortunately platforms do not do a very good job at segregating different relationships. This brought up a big question: ‘If our digital lives are an extension of our real lives, then why are our online relationships not similar to our real-world relationships?’”

Different from Facebook: There are three ways in which Vebbler differentiates itself from its competition. Besides being built on a crowd layering model, Vebbler is a personal network and not a social network. Third, Vebbler is privacy-centric. “The Dunbar Theory states that an average person cannot have more than 150 real-world connections in a given lifetime. The important term here is real-world. Yet, on social media, we can connect with 5,000 people! The repercussions on clutter and privacy are enormous. Vebbler is designed on the personal networking model (think Path, Avocado, NextDoor, SnapChat...) which provides a space for close and valued relationships, unlike Facebook and Google+ where one connects with a larger set of people, including acquaintances, distant relations and people you may not even know. And in order to keep the quality of relationships high, a person can connect with a maximum of 500.”

Milestones: “We are launching new features and initiatives every few weeks, including the Campus Connect Program, Promoted Bloggers Initiative, chat and private messaging features as well as custom stickers. Next on the list is the Recommend button and LifePath, a new kind of profile page.”

Reaction: “The platform has crossed 45,000 users from 80 countries and 713 cities across the world. We see an average of 45 per cent of people returning every day from countries like the USA, the UK, Singapore, Dubai, Saudi Arabia and Australia. This makes Vebbler a more global product than any of its homegrown competitors.”

Rate and review movies, make lists, scan an ever-growing movie database (170,000+ movies), get movie recommendations, explore films by language/genre and more, find out what your friends are watching or meet other film buffs who share your taste in movies. You can do all this and more on Rinema.com, created by a bunch of cinephiles and geeks. After all, the inspiration behind the word Rinema is rendezvous with cinema!

Started by: Grishma Udani, 32. The IIT Kanpur graduate also co-founded and ran another start-up called Whirlybird Electronics which made Inertial Navigation Systems for clients like Indian Navy, ISRO, Honeywell, etc.

Based in: Mumbai.

Launch: September 2013.

Average profile: 20-40 age group; 25 per cent probability of users being based in India, 25 per cent in the US and 50 per cent based elsewhere.

The idea: “I have been a Goodreads user since its early days... 2007 I think... and every time I logged on, I couldn’t help but wish there was a movie version of the site. And, after years of searching, I finally decided to build one myself.”

Milestones: “The most notable one in my opinion would be July-end/August 2013 when we started noticing that over 35 per cent of new sign-ups add over 100 films to their accounts. That’s when we knew we were ready to launch, as in open the service to all.”

Reaction: “Users both in India and abroad love it. In fact, we have users from 160-plus countries who have added about 300,000-plus movies to their profiles. To quote one of our users: ‘I’m on it (Rinema) like a monkey on a cupcake!’”

Revenue model: “Revenues are not a top priority right now. But eventually we intend to build tools for indie filmmakers to be able to sell/promote their movies via Rinema.”

Challenges: “We rely mostly on word-of-mouth marketing so, it’s all about keeping our users happy.”

Mobile app: “It’s very important but we are still working on it. It will be out in a few months. We do have a mobile-optimised site though at m.rinema.com.”

Future plans: “We also have a bunch of other ‘fun’ features planned, like quizzes, YouTube integration and stuff but I would rather talk about that when it’s ready.”

You have family members across India and outside. And you are thinking of ways to keep your conversations on the social network restricted to them. Imlee does just that. It helps you bond with family members only.

Started by: Aatish Dedhia. Imlee is a project by Pebstone Infotech Private Limited (founded by Aatish). And he is also the CEO of Zycus (established in 1998). Prior to Zycus, the former IIT-Mumbai and Cornell University student worked with Intel Corporation in USA and was part of the core design team for the Pentium-II processor.

Based in: Mumbai.

Launch: February 2012.

The idea: It began when Aatish was invited to a family function and presented with a family tree that visually represented all his relations. “This simple gesture inspired me to create a family-networking site, wherein all relatives can connect with each other, share family information and discover new relatives by collaboratively building a family tree,” says Aatish.

Different from FB: “You feel a little weird adding your parents and relatives as ‘friends’ on Facebook. The generation gap makes it problematic to truly connect with one’s family online. Although Facebook has privacy settings that allow you to filter content and fix interaction levels with family members, it is far from ideal. Thus, a standalone social network for your family makes sense. With such a site you don’t need to worry about data being viewed outside your family.”

Milestones: “We have more than 60,000 users and over 8 lakh profiles that have been created by registered users.”

Revenue model: “Our marketing efforts are more aligned towards branding concept acceptability in the market. In the long run we do have ideas for revenue generation through affiliate marketing, family centric e-commerce, and surely through ads.”

Mobile app: “We will soon launch a mobile app that will help families connect on the go.”

Future plans: “We intend to pump in resources to reach the one million-user mark.”

And there’s more...

Wooplr.com: If you are tired of reading about fashion, food and shopping trends in the West, this is just the site for you. Discover the things you can buy at local stores or shopping trends among friends spread across India. And if you want to start a lifestyle-oriented business, this is a treasure trove of information. Sadly, Calcutta’s presence needs a boost.

Wishberg.com: You have your wish list or bucket list and it’s time to put it online. Even if your wish is out of the box, fellow users won’t laugh at it!

Touchtalent.com: Aspiring artists can upload their work on this social network and who knows, there is somebody out there to appreciate it... or perhaps seek information about it.

Mathures Paul
Which online social networks do you spend most time on? Tell t2@abp.in