Plurk () is a free

social networking A social network is a social structure made up of a set of social actors (such as individuals or organizations), sets of dyadic ties, and other social interactions between actors. The social network perspective provides a set of methods for an ...

and

micro-blogging Microblogging is a form of social network that permits only short posts. They "allow users to exchange small elements of content such as short sentences, individual images, or video links",. Retrieved June 5, 2014 which may be the major reason for ...

service that allows users to send updates (otherwise known as plurks) through short messages or links, which can be up to 360 text characters in length (as of 2016). Updates are then shown on the user's home page using a

timeline A timeline is a display of a list of events in chronological order. It is typically a graphic design showing a long bar labelled with dates paralleling it, and usually contemporaneous events. Timelines can use any suitable scale representi ...

, which lists all the updates received in

chronological Chronology (from Latin ''chronologia'', from Ancient Greek , ''chrónos'', "time"; and , '' -logia'') is the science of arranging events in their order of occurrence in time. Consider, for example, the use of a timeline or sequence of events. ...

order, and delivered to other users who have chosen to receive them. A unique feature of its timeline is horizontal scrolling which is unlike any other popular social networking or micro-blogging websites like

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

Facebook Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin M ...

, where users can see more posts running horizontally across the

screen Screen or Screens may refer to: Arts * Screen printing (also called ''silkscreening''), a method of printing * Big screen, a nickname associated with the motion picture industry * Split screen (filmmaking), a film composition paradigm in which mul ...

, with previous plurks to the right. Each of the threads shows

timestamps A timestamp is a sequence of characters or encoded information identifying when a certain event occurred, usually giving date and time of day, sometimes accurate to a small fraction of a second. Timestamps do not have to be based on some absolut ...

below the timeline frame, and a counter for the number of responses; a thread can have as many as 300 to a thousand responses. Users can respond to other users' updates from their timeline through the Plurk.com website, by private or

instant messaging Instant messaging (IM) technology is a type of online chat allowing real-time text transmission over the Internet or another computer network. Messages are typically transmitted between two or more parties, when each user inputs text and trigge ...

, or by

text messaging Text messaging, or texting, is the act of composing and sending electronic messages, typically consisting of alphabetic and numeric characters, between two or more users of mobile devices, desktops/laptops, or another type of compatible compute ...

via compatible third party applications.

History

After months of development, Plurk was launched on May 12, 2008. The etymology of the name was explained by the developers as such: *

abbreviation An abbreviation (from Latin ''brevis'', meaning ''short'') is a shortened form of a word or phrase, by any method. It may consist of a group of letters or words taken from the full version of the word or phrase; for example, the word ''abbrevia ...

of 'people' and 'lurk' *

portmanteau A portmanteau word, or portmanteau (, ) is a blend of wordsacronym An acronym is a word or name formed from the initial components of a longer name or phrase. Acronyms are usually formed from the initial letters of words, as in ''NATO'' (''North Atlantic Treaty Organization''), but sometimes use syllables, as ...

of peace, love, unity, respect, and karma *

verb A verb () is a word (part of speech) that in syntax generally conveys an action (''bring'', ''read'', ''walk'', ''run'', ''learn''), an occurrence (''happen'', ''become''), or a state of being (''be'', ''exist'', ''stand''). In the usual descri ...

neologism A neologism Greek νέο- ''néo''(="new") and λόγος /''lógos'' meaning "speech, utterance"] is a relatively recent or isolated term, word, or phrase that may be in the process of entering common use, but that has not been fully accepted int ...

, similar to how

Google Google LLC () is an American multinational technology company focusing on search engine technology, online advertising, cloud computing, computer software, quantum computing, e-commerce, artificial intelligence, and consumer electronics. ...

was eventually used as a

While it is difficult to track down the names of the creators of Plurk, and the "A-Team" link listed under "creator" leads to a page that lacks any real information, it is known that the current CEO is Alvin Woon. In January 2013, it was announced that the company has been headquartered in Taipei, Taiwan, while it has landed nundisclosed amount of funding."

Features and technology

Plurk's interface shows updates in horizontal form through a scrollable timeline written in

JavaScript JavaScript (), often abbreviated as JS, is a programming language that is one of the core technologies of the World Wide Web, alongside HTML and CSS. As of 2022, 98% of Website, websites use JavaScript on the Client (computing), client side ...

and updated through

AJAX Ajax may refer to: Greek mythology and tragedy * Ajax the Great, a Greek mythological hero, son of King Telamon and Periboea * Ajax the Lesser, a Greek mythological hero, son of Oileus, the king of Locris * ''Ajax'' (play), by the ancient Greek ...

. Users can modify the interface using CSS and HTML scripts as well. Users can post new messages with optional 'qualifiers', which are one-word verbs used to represent a thought (e.g., 'feels', 'thinks', 'loves', etc.). There are also advanced features such as sending updates only to a subset of your friends, posting updates on events earlier in the day, and sharing images, videos, and other media. Followers are allowed, but only limited to accounts that are not set as private. Users can upload media files through YouTube, links and webcam or from their computer. Plurks can also be 'liked', as in other social sites. In addition, it has a birthday reminder feature that places a birthday cake sign on all the user's messages on his/her birthday. Every plurker has his/her own Karma value. It is recalculated based on your activities. Higher Karma can access to more emoticons. Plurk also supports group conversations between friends and allows usage of emoticons together with the usual text micro-blogging. Plurk also supports the upload of users' own pictures as emoticons. The Plurk.com developers allowed public access to the

API An application programming interface (API) is a way for two or more computer programs to communicate with each other. It is a type of software interface, offering a service to other pieces of software. A document or standard that describes how ...

on December 4, 2009. Due to messages being sent between users in near-realtime, many users use Plurk as an alternative to chat and interact with each other.

Availability in other languages

To help translate their base list of qualifiers/verbs, Plurk hosts its own translation website where users can submit translations of the Plurk user interface in other languages. As of July 2008, Plurk is translated into over twenty languages.

Reception

Plurk was occasionally referred to as a rival to

, an earlier micro-blogging service, during its first year. In June 2008, Plurk received online attention when it was featured by

Leo Laporte Leo Laporte (; born November 29, 1956) is the host of ''The Tech Guy'' weekly radio show and a host on TWiT.tv, an Internet podcast network focusing on technology. He is also a former TechTV technology host (1998–2008) and a technology author. O ...

and

Amber MacArthur Amber Dawn MacArthur (born 27 June 1976) is a Canadian television and netcasting personality, bestselling author of two books, and keynote speaker. MacArthur (aka Amber Mac) is the former co-host of BNN's ''App Central'' and ''Bloomberg Brink'', ...

on their net@night show in the

TWiT.tv TWiT.tv, which is the operating trade name of TWiT LLC, is a podcast network that broadcasts many technology news podcasts, founded by technology broadcaster and author Leo Laporte in 2005, and run by his wife and company CEO Lisa Laporte. ...

podcast A podcast is a program made available in digital format for download over the Internet. For example, an episodic series of digital audio or video files that a user can download to a personal device to listen to at a time of their choosing ...

network.

Controversies

MSN Juku controversy

In November 2009, MSN China launched an Internet application called MSN Juku in

beta Beta (, ; uppercase , lowercase , or cursive ; grc, βῆτα, bē̂ta or ell, βήτα, víta) is the second letter of the Greek alphabet. In the system of Greek numerals, it has a value of 2. In Modern Greek, it represents the voiced labiod ...

. Observers noted similarity between the MSN Juku

user interface In the industrial design field of human–computer interaction, a user interface (UI) is the space where interactions between humans and machines occur. The goal of this interaction is to allow effective operation and control of the machine f ...

and that of Plurk, which was blocked in China in April 2009. Microsoft later indefinitely suspended MSN Juku, admitting to accusations that MSN China plagiarized about 80% of Plurk's original code, as well as elements of their

CSS Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) is a style sheet language used for describing the presentation of a document written in a markup language such as HTML or XML (including XML dialects such as SVG, MathML or XHTML). CSS is a cornerstone techno ...

and unique user interface features.

Post calling for the assassination of President Ma Ying-jeou

On March 20, 2010, Taiwanese police investigated an

Internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...

threat posted on plurk.com that called for the assassination of the President of the

Republic of China Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the northeast ...

Ma Ying-jeou Ma Ying-jeou ( zh, 馬英九, born 13 July 1950) is a Hong Kong-born Taiwanese politician who served as president of the Republic of China from 2008 to 2016. Previously, he served as justice minister from 1993 to 1996 and mayor of Taipei from ...

References

External links

* {{Microblogging Taiwanese social networking websites Blog hosting services