I just found a new tab called "olx" at the top of my Tribe home page. Clicking it takes me to a website that looks like a poor-man's Craigslist. Is there a business connection between olx and Tribe? Is this tab really new, or did I just take a long time to notice it?
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SF Bay Area
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Re: olx?
Wed, April 16, 2008 - 11:01 AMI think it's new. There's one at the top of the tribe page too. Where you see topics, an photos and events tabs. -
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Re: olx?
Wed, April 16, 2008 - 12:59 PMNews to me. Anyone do a 'where's waldo' search for posts (official or otherwise?) about it yet? -
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Re: olx?
Wed, April 16, 2008 - 1:20 PMWell, I just tried a search using "OLX" via the "search" feature for tribe and came up with bupkiss.
Widened my search to the net as a whole and found this:
www.fabricegrinda.com/
Search on the page for tribe.net and the fellow (who I gather is a developer of OLX) mentions offering putting an OLX badge or some such on your social networking site as a way to expand itself to existing social networks. Its from 2006. Looks like Darren opted us in to the end result of that development.
As a side note, the next search result came up with a blog about Darren's adverstisement e-mail, and it mentions an OLX link in the e-mail, so maybe its not as new as all that. That wa sfrom last month.
blog.otherinbox.com/2008/03/...-eve.html
This search result also turned up the following article on Friendster partnering with OLX, believed to be a revenue sharing deal.
www.news.com/Friendster%...6182755.html
So I would surmise that whenever it came about it was done to do something similar, provide revenue sharing. Also as a possible replacement for the regularly ignored listings feature Tribe offers? I could see both as possible desirable outcomes for tribe.net (less maintenance, same as when google search replaced tribe search maybe?). When you click on the olx link, it does indicate via the URL that your click came from tribe.
Most other search results beyond that surfaced the 'olx' tab title itself, and thus were unrelated. Thus ends this reporters investigation.
Oh, and Waldo is in France, under the Eiffel Tower, right next to the small brown dog with the baguette in its mouth. -
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Re: olx?
Thu, April 17, 2008 - 10:11 AMHaving it included in with the other tribe tabs seems odd, since it apparently has nothing to do with the tribe you're viewing. If I understand correctly, it has nothing to do with Tribe at all... why would we have a tab that automatically opens up another site? Isn't that called an advertisement? If it's a revenue generating function it seems deceptive to have it masqueraded as a Tribe function tab. It makes me only a little uncomfortable being brought to a site that is actively connected to all the other social networking sites in any way. -
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Re: olx?
Thu, April 17, 2008 - 10:20 PM>>Having it included in with the other tribe tabs seems odd, since it apparently has nothing to do with the tribe you're viewing.
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I agree. It seems like access to olx is in the wrong place. Why should it have a tab in each tribe? It does seem like a sneaky form of advertising. Maybe it should be only on our home pages. Maybe the premium members should have an option to turn it off altogether. -
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Re: olx?
Fri, April 18, 2008 - 12:31 AMYou guys are always so negative.
Do you have the same feelings about ebay?
I have some computer hardware I'd like to sell. Tribe? sure. CL? better excposure. OLX? Hey, maybe. I donno.
I like options. I know OLX is an opensource API, similar to the idea of iCAL for standardizing want ads. It's brilliant. It's something that's been needed for a long time.
Do we need MORE places with classified? How many places do you have to manually spam if you want to place an ad? Wouldn't it be better to have something that you write once, check off appropriate boxes and the information is distributed to where it needs to go?
What if you are looking for something? How long do you want to surf for it? How many sites? We have Tribe, Myspace classified, Craigslist, Ebay, Half dot com, Amazon auctions, etc etc etc. They're everywhere, and nothing is linked. Might as well be brick and mortar at this point.
We're on the internet. The idea is to network things, tie information together, not further fragment it.
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Re: olx?
Fri, April 18, 2008 - 7:31 AM"You guys are always so negative. "
Because we have opinions? Look, this is a tribe for gold star members to share opinions, right? I don't think it's appropriate to tell someone they're being negative when they express an opinion about a new feature. It's a valid opinion, you don't have to agree with it.
My opinion is a positive one... I love Tribe. I don't want to see Tribe become infected, dilluted, polluted and barraged with crap from all over the internet. I like Tribe as it is. I like it to be different than all the other sites, not the same. I don't want it linked to other sites or look like other sites. I don't want to use it to sell stuff, or be sold or marketed to. I want it for community discussion and the people. How is that negative? Because I'd like to see Tribe remain special? -
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Re: olx?
Fri, April 18, 2008 - 2:35 PMOpinions are fine, it's just that every time anything is potentially implemented on tribe everyone starts freaking about about privacy, who's looking at their account and personal information.
Now, the bug people are talking about, system hangs and such are all cause from people who are trying to reinvent the wheel.
I love tribe as well, so don't get me wrong, and I liek the way things are, but we all know that it's broke. I mean, couldn't the PM system have been adapted to use mailman or Qmail behind the scenes? No. They wrote a whole PM system from the ground up. The same goes for a standardized event and listing system. There wasn't one so yes, you HAD to write one from the ground up.
Now people are trying to change that idea. Instead of writing one from the ground up, you plug in an API module. Does tribe HAVE to use the OLX default system? Most likely not. The nice thing with an API is you can tell it "Local Database Only" and it will operate just like it does now. It could even work with the existing interface we know and love. The key word here is WORK.
Secondary, it would give options. I like options and choices. I like the idea of, if this works, either making a listing for my local area, ALL of tribe, maybe local area on and off tribe (net access) or maybe just a global listing.
I trust Darren enough to know that he's not going to farm everything out to 3rd parties. Quite the opposite actually. how a little faith in a guy who's just as paranoid about personal information as everyone else around here.
(and no, I'm not picking on you Dusty, I'm talking to everyone)
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This is the maximum depth. Additional responses will not be threaded.
Re: olx?
Fri, April 18, 2008 - 2:48 PMI know you're not picking on me. And I'm not picking back. It's not that I don't trust Darren. It's not personal. It's that I don't trust the direction of the entire 'social networking' scene... this desire to glom everyone and link everything together. There are privacy exposures that are well outside of Darren's control, and for all I know, his awareness. And as much as I do trust him, and believe his intentions to be the best for us, I also want to make sure that this concern is kept at the top of the pile so it doesn't get lost in the mix while he's trying to keep tribe growing and afloat. That's all.
So, every time I see a feature that make me raise an eyebrow about privacy and makes me feel too close for comfort to Myspace or Facebook or Friendster and the like... yes, I'm going to voice my concern. I trust Darren is listening.
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This is the maximum depth. Additional responses will not be threaded.
Re: olx?
Fri, April 18, 2008 - 5:17 PMIt's ok, I guess, the olx feature. It's a tab I can opt to never click on, which is my choice. It seems too impersonal. If I wanted to look at classifieds, I'd go to CL. And you asked about EBay. I don't go there either.
If I were on Tribe to try and sell things, I'd like the new feature. I guess it beats trying to use listings that don't always work.
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Re: olx?
Wed, April 16, 2008 - 3:14 PMI never noticed it either. It has a weird CL format with a bad color scheme. Maybe Jan and Co. went there? -
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Re: olx?
Thu, April 17, 2008 - 6:40 AMIt also has a limited number of cities at the moment. :( -
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Re: olx?
Thu, April 17, 2008 - 7:55 AMAnd hardly any action, so if people aren't using it are we supposed to all flock there and give them a kick-start? I have some issues with CL and if I could find a Viable alternative I'd use it.
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Re: olx?
Thu, April 17, 2008 - 5:28 PM
OLX means free local classifieds on a global level. OLX allows you to meet others, express yourself, trade products, find jobs, apartments, and much more!
We built OLX to improve on traditional classified sites, which are functional but missing key features to really deliver a proper public service to communities everywhere.
On OLX you can:
Easily design rich HTML listings
Control your selling, buying, and community activity in My OLX
Send or accept PayPal payments
Be assured of a spam-free experience
Promote your listings on other websites, like MySpace, Xanga, and Blogspot
Discuss listings with other interested users
Enjoy a website that has world-class speed
Search for items near you, wherever you live
Access our site from your mobile phone
View our site in your local language
OLX has a presence on six continents. The company was founded in March 2006 and is privately held.
I think its wise of Tribenet to do away with the events and listings or give an alternative that wont crash... yeah no donuts!! -
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Re: olx?
Thu, April 17, 2008 - 6:22 PMWill anything I post on OLX be visible to other social networking sites?
If so, it needs to be made EXTREMELY CLEAR to the Tribe user that this link/site is not Tribe and that something you post might be visible on other sites.
Personally, I don't want ANYTHING I do relative to Tribe to ever be visible anywhere except Tribe. I know that's unrealistic, but that's what I want. If something I post is going to be promoted outside of Tribe, it should be made very clear. -
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Re: olx?
Thu, April 17, 2008 - 9:03 PMYa, but if you're selling something, you want maximum exposure.
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Re: olx?
Thu, April 17, 2008 - 9:13 PMTrue... but at what cost? I'd be curious to know what percentage of Tribe users come here to sell stuff. My guess would be very very few. I suspect more users care about privacy and not being connected to other social networking sites.
Myself... when I come to Tribe I want privacy (within the tribe community). I do not want exposure.
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Re: olx?
Thu, April 17, 2008 - 9:55 PM"Ya, but if you're selling something, you want maximum exposure. "
...unless you don't.
I'm with Dusty. It should be C R Y S T A L clear, regardless of how naive any expectation of privacy is. -
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Re: olx?
Fri, April 18, 2008 - 2:54 PMIf I want maximum exposure, I'll go someplace that has it already, like CL or eBay or Amazon. Or all 3. OLX is in none of these categories, nor sadly, is Tribe. While OLX might widen your exposure somewhat, its hardly the same scale. Apples and oranges, IMO.
I could see OLX as a replacement for the listing feature of Tribe. It's not ideal, but it would be easier than it is presently on Darren, I'm sure. Despite how the google search doesn't work right, I understand why it was done. I could even see an enhancement being made to where tribe mods could specify the default search criteria used on OLX when the tribe user clicks on that tab within a tribe. So you click on the tab and you go an OLX search results page maybe? Some clarity would be good, maybe a popup that informs the user they are going to a non-tribe site?
I agree very few probably come here to do much business. I come here for the conversations, and the occasional funny picture. Tribe should definitely still support some sort of listings type feature, but I'd understand if they outsourced it. Besides, outsourcing it to OLX means existing OLX users may come to tribe too. I'd agree, I don't believe the listings are in much use at all, except maybe in specific tribes, so outsourcing might be fine from that standpoint too. So I don't see it as "bad" per se, except its a sub-optimal relationship because OLX is a struggling startup too. Tribe would benefit more from a relationship with the Big Boys, but that's not likely to happen soon.
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Re: olx?
Sat, April 19, 2008 - 4:48 AMIf you guys want a laugh....
Info I have from WAY back about tribe was some of the following:
They never anticipated anyone having more than 50 friends
The event system was designed around a Evite knockoff
The tribe Listings were to directly compete with Craigslist
Taking those things into account, and looking at tribe, you can see that it's mildly funny. Clear case of the design not exactly matching up with real life.
Personally, for listings, I think there needs to be a CL gateway API or other system for people to incorporate it into web sites for classifieds. Have the gateway operate in a way that if you are looking at listing, tribe ones are either organized to be first, or integrated so as you browse you see that the tribe ones are highlight and cross linked to a profile, putting a face to the otherwise anon listings.
With something like that, you could still post an anon listing on CL (mind you, when I talk about listing I'm always implying BUY/SELL or RENT) and tribe could filter for you with an anon re-direct or something, which to me would be a positive feature service.
That's just me though.
Falls into the realm of while this might not be something some of you could want, it could be an appealing featire of tribe that could attract a lot of new users and pump some new blood into the place.
Could OLX work towards this? I donno. I do know that darren set up the tab to spawn a new tab/window signifying that you are leaving tribe. Maybe it's just a functionality test or a test drive he's taking it for. While the tab is there, maybe it just wasn't worth mentioning yet.
I suspect he'll chime in soon on this thread though. He's psychic like that.
--S
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Re: olx?
Thu, April 17, 2008 - 6:54 PM"I think its wise of Tribenet to do away with the events and listings or give an alternative that wont crash..."
What exactly do youmean by that? Take away what makes this community what it is? Discouraging me from using the resources of tribe as they were meant to be does not exactly make me want to participate in your site. -
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Re: olx?
Fri, April 18, 2008 - 9:16 AM"Re: olx?
"I think its wise of Tribenet to do away with the events and listings or give an alternative that wont crash..."
What exactly do youmean by that? Take away what makes this community what it is? Discouraging me from using the resources of tribe as they were meant to be does not exactly make me want to participate in your site. "
I've been part of the bugs tribe and know that listing and events are fraught with bugs.. none of which have been addressed. There are quite a few users who like me will never use that feature again. It just isnt worth the aggrevation. The frequent crashes of tribe make most of those events and listings unaccessable. having an off site events and listing means that even if Tribe crashes the folks who need the information can have access to it. and its not my site.. I pulled that from their who we are info... -
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Re: olx?
Fri, April 18, 2008 - 11:20 AMYes, I am aware of all this and I have stated more than once that I want my money to go toward FIXING THE APPLICATIONS THAT MAKE TRIBE WHAT IT IS, not to add bells & whistles and links outside of my community.SO I will continue to state this.
Most of us just want Tribe to be the Tribe it was four years ago. If Darren would just address the issues that we keep asking for instead of trying to tie all the unused social networking sites that most of us don't ever go to into this one many of us would shut up and stop whining.
You prove to me that your site works I might consider using it but I'm sorry, there just hasn't been enough action on it to make it worth my time.
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Re: olx?
Sat, April 19, 2008 - 12:47 PMAbout OLX:
They gave us money. We put an unobtrusive link where our users could see it and click on it if they want. End of story, really.
There will be some announcements as soon as I figure out what to tell you guys on Monday (or tomorrow? I forget what I said. OH YEAH, 4/20). -
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Re: olx?
Sat, April 19, 2008 - 6:18 PMI actually cruised it. Not too bad. shawn said "a poor mans Craigslist". Pretty much sums it up. It's another option to find treasure in one mans junk ...
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