The social network VKontakte is a successful example of a hyper-popular Internet project. The network appeared in 2006 and currently has about 60 million registered users. A controlling stake in 2014 was bought by the Mail.ru group.
Idea
It is believed that the idea of the VKontakte social network belongs to the main developer of the project, Pavel Durov. He, according to the testimony of partners, proposed the original name. The aim of the project was to provide a service, namely: to create a portal that will allow student youth to stay in touch.
In 2004-2006, Durov was involved in the development and administration of student web projects. One of the most popular was the site project durov.com. The site offered answers to exam questions in humanitarian universities. It was on this site that the first links to the new VKontakte project were posted. Obviously, good traffic to durov.com has become a springboard for the VKontakte network.
Implementation
At first, Durov and his associates tried to post the project on the forums by adding new fields. However, the rather rigid format did not make it possible to exchange personal information, since then (and now) there were rather strict restrictions on the publication of personal data on the forums.
Overseas facebook.com gave a new impetus to the development of the project. One of Durov's friends told him about the American social network. It was decided to take the American approach into service. The project participants understood that an extensive database of students was needed for a successful start, so it took a lot of time to collect information about educational institutions, faculties, and specialties. Since it was not possible to create a comprehensive database, it was decided to leave users the opportunity to enter information in additional fields.
The alpha version was launched in the summer of 2006, and in the fall the beta version started with the possibility of registration on the site by invitation. Registration soon became free. This was preceded by a huge number of students' demands for the removal of restrictions on joining the network. Further, the popularity and traffic of the site grew like an avalanche. In the summer of 2007, VKontakte is in the top of the most visited sites on the Russian Internet, and in the winter of 2007, only mail.ru is behind the first place in the rating.
By 2009, along with its growing popularity, the network has become one of the largest sites containing pornographic material. At the same time, scammers, hackers and pirates literally storm VKontakte. The project regularly finds itself at the center of high-profile lawsuits. The process on the claim of the copyright holders of the film "The Island" received a great public response.
By 2010, the number of registered users exceeded 60 million, but the number of double registrations reached 20 million. In February 2014, the founder of VKontakte, Pavel Durov, sold his stake in the company, and in April of the same year announced his resignation from the position of general director of the project. Today the number of users exceeds 100 million. The network continues to grow.
