Popular social networking utility LAGbook (Ladies And Gentlemen book) on Monday, April 8 2013, changed its name to PickRate.Me in a move to shift from just being a social network for meeting new people to being a social platform for rating pics and meeting new people.
According to Chidi Nwaogu, one of the founders of the social network, ‘In the past, we have always known that we will change our name someday to permit a much steeper growth curve and to prevent any possible form of law suit. We had over ten web applications which include multimedia sharing, marketplace, discussion board, idea-sharing, music, and file-sharing, but we noticed that there was just one app that surpassed others in its daily use and that was our photo-sharing application. Thousands of our users shared hundreds of thousands of photos every month ranging from their moments at school, work and vacation. Other users interacted with these photos especially users of the opposite sex; they like and comment, and sometimes comment more than once on a particular picture. Some engage in lengthy conversations on the comment roll of a photo, and it’s amazing how this goes on and on everyday’.
‘We are simply trying to make what’s fun, much more fun by adding a more sophisticated form of the like button and that’s a rating system. We are still a social network for meeting new people and this is indicated on the tagline of our network, but we are no loner just that; we are also a photo sharing and rating community, and we hope to rival preexisting names in this space. To introduce this new part of our network to our over one million members, we have changed our front page. Our new front page displays trending photos being rated by our users. This encourages other users to share their photos, and tell friends to rate. The more favorable rating you receive, the more trending your photo will be, and the more popular you will become. It’s a win-win thing’, Chidi continued.
According to Chika Nwaogu, one of the founders, ‘Not long ago, we joined Versamel Limited a UK-registered internet company after receiving investment. Versamel was to take charge of LAGbook and its sister websites Jamaa and Befondit, but as time went on, a decision was made to house all websites under the Singapore-based Baazar Media Pte. Ltd, which owns sites like Tambay.ph and DesignHarsh. Versamel was subsequently dissolved. This means that we didn’t only change name but changed parent company. Since Versamel was a subsidiary of Baazar Media Pte Ltd, technically, everything is still the same. We currently have about 700,000 active users, and when I say active users, I mean the number of users that access their accounts within the last thirty days. Over 60% of our users are within the ages 18-25 and are mostly undergraduates in Universities or other higher learning institutions. 25% are within the ages 26-30, while 10% and 5% are below 18 and above 30 respectively’.
‘The greatest thing about this new network is that it is ran on its dedicated server and this means minimal downtime and maximum flexibility, and this means everything to us. All domain names lagbook.com, lagbook.net, and naijabook.com all directs to picrate.me. Based on recent activities, we are glad to say that our users are responding well to the new network. LAGbook was not only a name, but a brand. We recorded great milestones with it, and we hope PicRate.Me repeats same, and record even greater milestones’, Chika continued.
Now with over 1 million registered members and three years since its inception, LAGbook, now becomes PicRate.Me.
PicRate is owned by Baazar Media Pte. Ltd, a company headquartered in Singapore whose mission is to build the best web services in Southeast Asia and Africa. Baazar has development offices in South Africa, Canada and Philippines.
