WeGlu

I've just been playing with the recently launched WeGlu. It's caught my attention because it purpose and mission sounds similar to naked. The team behind WeGlu say they built the site because they "wanted to create something that helps us stay close to our friends - the people we see all the time". They also talk about 'living in the moment' - i.e. you shouldnt be tethered to your PC, so they've the launched the web app at the same time as a J2ME version. (Jason Delport over at Paxmodept has an overview of the J2ME client).



The most striking thing you notice about WeGlu is the intentional move away from tradition UI and UE paradigms. The application presents elements in a very different way to other SN apps, and is comparatively quite complex. A status update or 'what I'm doing' message is now 'Currently doing', 'Location', 'PostCode', 'I'd love to', and 'I'm feeling'. The design does feel fresh and funky, and therefore is likely to be targeted at generation 'why' - something that is reflected in their marketing tie-up with the E4 show 'Skins'.



WeGlu enables you to send 3 types of messages in addition to the 'updates'; an Event, Place or Message, although all three types appear to use the same message format. Once you've created the message, you then choose who you want to share this with, presumably enabling you better control over what you share with who - so what you send to your friends, might not be visible to everyone.




There seems to be a strong community element to the app, where WeGlu members can check out what others are doing and saying. This seems somewhat in contradiction to the teams gripe in the 'about' that other social networks "were trying to get us to spend time on their website in the hope of meeting people we’d never really ever meet".

WeGlu is a bold move, and a neat re-combination of the SN experience. I've yet to check out the J2ME app, but their decision to include this from launch illustrates the need for closer and tighter integration of web and mobile. One to watch...