₦airaland Forum

The Nwaogu twin brothers, who sold LAGBook to Canada’s Gulf Pearl Ltd earlier this year, have officially launched Available.fm, aimed at becoming Africa’s next social networking giant.



Chidi Nwaogu, one of the Nigerian brothers, said they were approached by Emre Sokullu, the founder of GROU.PS, with the idea of restoring LAGBook under a new name.

HumanIPO reported in June, the brothers Chidi and Chika did not regret selling LAGBook in January for US$10,000 to a Canadian entrepreneur.

The brothers told HumanIPO they have already had 1,000 members log into their accounts via mobile and desktop on the new Available.fm site.

“Emre Sokullu, the founder of GROU.PS, sent us a message containing his messages with Shidan, which made us aware of why LAGbook was moved,” Chidi said.

“In the same message, Emre expressed his interest in partnering with us to restore and administer the old LAGbook under a new brand name. We loved the idea, and named it Available.fm. Before then, my twin brother and I had decided to halt our game development project after Shidan expressed his dissatisfaction in our level of involvement in LAGbook.”

He described Available.fm as the restoration of LAGBook.

He said: “Available.fm is LAGbook restored. The same member login with the same member size, the same contents like photos, videos, files etc.

“Everything is basically still the same. The only difference is the brand name. We had to change the brand name since Shidan bought the rights to the previous one.”

He also revealed that they got several messages from the former users of LAGBook.

“Many members of LAGbook had contacted us expressing their dissatisfaction in the name change and the new platform, so Available.fm should be good news to such members,” he said.


Sourcs: (www (dot) humanipo (dot) com/news/7333/LAGBook-restored-as-Availablefm)

VENTURES AFRICA – Nigerian computer programmers and twin co-founders of African social network, PicRate.Me (formerly LAGbook), Chidi and Chika Nwaogu have been contracted to redesign MTV’s TagWorld from scratch.

According to one of the twin programmers (Chika) who sealed the deal last month, they will redesign the look and feel of TagWorld from scratch and will be working with GROU.PS on TagWorld as it designers.

“[we] have completed the first round of design for TagWorld. Now everything looks just the way it should, and the exciting part is that more is coming because our fingers are itching.”

Mehmet Emek, an Engineer at GROU.PS said, the firm ”look forward to new designs and updates from the brothers.”

According to Chidi, “LAGbook was developed on the GROU.PS social groupware platform, and they say that we have built extensively on their platform, showcasing the full potential of what their platform can do.”

“I guess they love what we did with LAGbook, and want us to do the same with TagWorld,” says Chidi.

TagWorld is a social network created in 2005 by American serial entrepreneurs, Freud Krueger and Evan Rifkin as a rival to MySpace, another social network. TagWorld reached a million user in 2006 and received $7.5 million in funding before MTV acquired it in 2008 as the growth of the social network continued.

In 2010, American social groupware platform, GROU.PS acquired TagWorld and its users while MTV continue to own the firm’s social media technology.

Source: Ventures Africa - www [dot] ventures-africa [dot] com/2013/06/nigerian-programmers-to-redesign-mtvs-tagworld/

GraphicsPlus: Lacks creativity. Must u imitate facebook. U even tried using the same font facebook used to for their name. Lagbook? The name has no idea in it and may lack future. Just think of Facebook. Twitter. Digg. LinkedIn. etc. It's either u stick to unilag or u change the name. Here are good names: Meeting, Connected, Reunion, Found, OnPoint, etc.

Check Wikipedia [en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LAGbook] - LAGbook is a backronym for "Ladies And Gentlemen book" and that's why the LAG are in caps.

@Dual Core

Dual Core: Why do I only get to know or read about Lagbook when they want to tell a lie?

You guys know you can achieve these lies if you do some honest publicity?

There is no lies here. See www [dot] lagbook [dot] com [slash] people to see the people directory from A-Z

African social networking website Ladies And Gentlemen book (LAGbook) today reached the one million registered members milestone, and launched its 'social apps' project.

Today, Ladies And Gentlemen book (LAGbook) reached the milestone of one million registered members and launched its 'social apps' project. The social network which was initially created as an exclusive social network for students of University of Lagos on April 17 2012, today has expanded and grown into one of Africa's largest social networking utility in less than three years.

"The 'social apps' project is a collection of useful third party applications that is made readily available to all registered members at the speed of 'a click'", says Nosa Ilegbinehi, the Publicity Chief at LAGbook.

According to a recent report from Josh Osemwegie, the Finance Chief at LAGbook; the top nationals on LAGbook are:
1. United States: 369,561 (36.96%)
2. Nigeria: 318,344 (31.83%)
3. India: 37,618 (3.76%)
4. United Kingdom: 31,800 (3.18%)
5. Canada: 23,488 (2.35%)
6. Ghana: 18,741 (1.87%)
7. Germany: 14,711 (1.47%)
8. Philippines: 12,618 (1.26%)
9. Spain: 12,066 (1.21%)
10. Others: 161,053 (16.11%)

"We have been working on this project for the past couple of months, and today we officially launched it. It has existed in the past as 'third party' apps, but have not been collated and introduced as a single platform of third party apps that will give our over one million users the power to extend the possibilities of LAGbook", says Chidi Nwaogu, co-founder of LAGbook.

According to Chidi, "The social apps come with a prominent display block on some pages on LAGbook that makes our users aware of the presence of third party applications on LAGbook, and how they can use them to extend the possibilities of our growing social network. Examples of these third party applications are games, music resource, chatrooms, recommendations, virtual noticeboard, and video chat. The good part of it all, is that we'll be adding more apps as we continue to grow in Africa and beyond".

"Presently, our social apps are made available to our users via the traditional i-frame HTML technology. These third party apps are built independently on different platforms and written in different languages, and they do not work with our API technology. We want third party applications that will run with our API, and serve our users great social contents that will be unique to them, thus giving them a greater social experience", says Chika Nwaogu, co-founder of LAGbook.

According to Chika, "With this in mind, we have decided to focus our energy into getting our users aware of the presence of our 'developer platform' that gives them the power to create third party applications that will run on LAGbook and with our API technology thus giving a greater social experience than the present social apps we have".

"We have added to the menu list of our network a category called 'DEVELOPER' that gives our users the power to create a third party application that works just fine on our platform and with our API. It's really simple and it's just a click away. We have provided them with API tutorials to get them along, and a forum that enables us to share our updates with them and theirs with us, plus a channel in which they can request for an API key and secret to get their app kicking", says Emmanuel Alugo, the Technology Chief at LAGbook.

LAGbook is Africa's fastest growing social network with 3,000-6,000 daily new signups and one of the largest social network to be born our of Africa with over 1,000,000 registered users from 220 countries around the world. The fast growth and acceptance of the social network has been recorded on The Guardian, Vanguard, Business Day, National Mirror, African Business Review, Ventures Africa, Entrepreneur, TechCrunch, Yahoo! News, and much more.

Dual Core: Son, a domain's creation date will NEVER reset to a particular date if it was transfered.

Son, a domain's creation date shows the date it was registered at control price which is about 10 USD (as opposed to your silly 10k USD)

Son, NO human will have any continued ownership right over any domain once it has expired. So keep that BS story of the domain being sold after it was left to expire.

When a domain expires, it enters renewal period...if the owner refuses to renew it enters reactivation period...if the owner refuses to pay the reactivation fee to reactivate and renew, the domain is deleted and open to the public to register at control price and ONLY then are the domain details deleted. At no point in the expiry, renewal or reactivation periods will a domain's record be reset if an owner renews it. So save your BS for those in the politics section, they will bow to you there... not here.


You're just too foolish to know when to shut up so keep babbling, fools at the same level with you will take you seriously.

Fool ignored until yet another (expected) foolish stunt in the future.

I usually do not argue with nairaland users as most of them are not gainfully employed and waste their time on a forum on a working day when their mates are in the office making stuffs happen but I will let this one slide

You just said it all, after all said and done an expired domain will eventually go into the marketplace for purchase, and like I have said they will only pay the said amount to the owner and not to dynadot for leasing the domain for them by letting it expire so they can purchase it...so with this I think I am done....and pls guys stop the BEEFING!

soloqy: Nonsense! Total Fabu.

BEEF

Dual Core: Why do people think its idiots that operate in this section?
Why must every trash be hoped to thrive here?

From the silly thread about the Nigerian guy that has done a concept-less and incomplete "logo advert" site to this yet another very silly story of a rediculous purchase.

Please why? Tell us...do we post like idiots and silly people here? Why is our IQ judged so low?




WHOIS record for lagbook.com
Domain Name: lagbook.com
Registered at http://www.dynadot.com

Registrant:
LAGbook Inc.
Chidi and Chika Nwaogu
P.O. Box 1337
Record expires on 2013/04/25 UTC
Record created on 2010/04/25 UTC

Domain servers in listed order:
ns1.dynadot.com
ns2.dynadot.com





WHOIS record for naijabook.com
Registrant:
LAGbook Inc.
Chidi and Chika Nwaogu
P.O.Box 1337
Festac Town, Lagos 1337
Nigeria

Record expires on 2013/11/14 UTC
Record created on 2012/11/14 UTC

Domain servers in listed order:
ns1.dynadot.com
ns2.dynadot.com




This said domain said to be purchased for 10k USD by lagbook was registered 2 days ago by the same owner of lagbook.com.

A useless and senseless name like naijabook.com cannot appreciate to 10k USD in 2 days. (Assuming this was not even registered by the owner).

A domain cannot be transferred to a different registrar within 3 months of its registration (assuming this fool wants to say the domain was bought and then transfered to his registrar after the 10k usd purchase).

Registrar-registrar transfer of a domain takes nothing less than 5 days from date of request. (So how can you buy over a domain that's 2 days old from another person?)



All these lies for what? Attention?

The next time you want to fool people, meet any of your less foolish friends and let them do a dry run on your foolish idea before coming out to commit site suicide.

Foolishness, you never thought for a minute that buying the domain name may have never involved a transfer, but rather a bargain that the owner leaves the domain to expire right after they purchase it... Why do Nigerians always think they are smart when they are far from that

Ladies And Gentlemen book (LAGbook) yesterday acquired the top-level domain name Naijabook [dot] com for $10,000 USD from an undisclosed owner residing in the United Kingdom.

Yesterday, Africa's largest and fastest growing social networking website LAGbook acquired the top-level domain name Naijabook [dot] com from its owner who chooses to remain undisclosed. The domain name was purchased at $10,000 USD from its owner who resides in the United Kingdom.

"When LAGbook expanded to the Nigerian population three months after inception, we wanted to purchase the domain name Naijabook [dot] com and rename our social network, but at that time, we had little money to get it done. So we stuck with our name LAGbook, and rebranded to emphasise the capitalisation of the 'LAG', which means 'Ladies And Gentlemen'", says Chika Nwaogu, co-founder of LAGbook.

Chika continued, "Though we have purchased the domain name yesterday, we do not intend to change our name what-so-ever, and this is because of two reasons. One; we are no longer a Nigerian phenomenon; we are a global one with strong and rising international penetration especially in India, United States, Germany, Denmark, and the United Kingdom. Two; we have gotten appreciably popular with the name LAGbook, and we think it's going to be super uncool to change name now".

"Naijabook [dot] com is not the only domain name that takes our fancy. We hope to purchase in the nearest future domain names like Africabook [dot] com, Datebook [dot] com and Socialbook [dot] com", says Chidi Nwaogu, Co-CEO at LAGbook.

Chidi continued, "We do not intend to build sites on these domain names once purchased. Just like we did with Naijabook [dot] com, we intend to buy them, and forward them to LAGbook [dot] com; this means users visiting Naijabook [dot] com will be simply redirected to the LAGbook social network".

"Purchasing the Naijabook [dot] com domain for $10,000 USD is a great financial decision. When I was appointed LAGbook's Chief Financial Officer in August 2011, LAGbook was much of a Nigerian thing, and I was aware of the fact that Chidi and Chika wanted to purchase the domain name Naijabook [dot] com but were unable due to insufficient funds. Naijabook [dot] com is a top-level domain; a domain name many Nigerian-born social networks will die to have in their possession. So, I think it will do us a whole lot of good if this domain doesn't go into any other hands for a very long time", says Josh Osemwegie, CFO at LAGbook.

"Top-level domains already have a significant amount of traffic to them, so acquiring the domain name Naijabook [dot] com will top-up our publicity", says Nosa Ilegbinehi, Chief Publicity Officer at LAGbook.

In just 2 years, LAGbook has become Africa's largest and fastest growing social networking website with over 600,000 registered users and 6,000 daily new-signups.

PRESS RELEASE

Yesterday, Africa's largest and fastest growing social networking website LAGbook acquired the top-level domain name Naijabook.com from its owner who chooses to remain undisclosed. The domain name was purchased at $10,000 USD from its owner who resides in the United Kingdom.

"When LAGbook expanded to the Nigerian population three months after inception, we wanted to purchase the domain name Naijabook.com and rename our social network, but at that time, we had little money to get it done. So we stuck with our name LAGbook, and rebranded to emphasise the capitalisation of the 'LAG', which means 'Ladies And Gentlemen'", says Chika Nwaogu, co-founder of LAGbook.

Chika continued, "Though we have purchased the domain name yesterday, we do not intend to change our name what-so-ever, and this is because of two reasons. One; we are no longer a Nigerian phenomenon; we are a global one with strong and rising international penetration especially in India, United States, Germany, Denmark, and the United Kingdom. Two; we have gotten appreciably popular with the name LAGbook, and we think it's going to be super uncool to change name now".

"Naijabook.com is not the only domain name that takes our fancy. We hope to purchase in the nearest future domain names like Africabook.com, Datebook.com and Socialbook.com", says Chidi Nwaogu, Co-CEO at LAGbook.

Chidi continued, "We do not intend to build sites on these domain names once purchased. Just like we did with Naijabook.com, we intend to buy them, and forward them to LAGbook.com; this means users visiting Naijabook.com will be simply redirected to the LAGbook social network".

"Purchasing the Naijabook.com domain for $10,000 USD is a great financial decision. When I was appointed LAGbook's Chief Financial Officer in August 2011, LAGbook was much of a Nigerian thing, and I was aware of the fact that Chidi and Chika wanted to purchase the domain name Naijabook.com but were unable due to insufficient funds. Naijabook.com is a top-level domain; a domain name many Nigerian-born social networks will die to have in their possession. So, I think it will do us a whole lot of good if this domain doesn't go into any other hands for a very long time", says Josh Osemwegie, CFO at LAGbook.

"Top-level domains already have a significant amount of traffic to them, so acquiring the domain name Naijabook.com will top-up our publicity", says Nosa Ilegbinehi, Chief Publicity Officer at LAGbook.

In just 2 years, LAGbook has become Africa's largest and fastest growing social networking website with over 600,000 registered users and 6,000 daily new-signups.


Source: PRLog

Prominent Nigerian social networking website, Ladies And Gentlemen book, popularly known as LAGbook, on 18th June, 2012, signed an 8 weeks sponsorship deal with Research in Motion (Blackberry) Nigeria, valued at N1.2million. Before the deal, LAGbook had over 75,000 registered members with international media attention from Webrazzi and TechCrunch, the world's foremost technology news portal on the Internet. LAGbook was created initially as an exclusive social network for students of University of Lagos on 17th April, 2010 by Chidi and Chika Nwaogu, Nigerian computer programmers, internet entrepreneurs and twin brothers. Less than 2 months after inception, the social network with 3,000 registered students expanded to the Nigerian population at large. After recording over 20,000 members, the social network expanded its reach to the 21 African English-speaking countries (including Nigeria). With over 60,000 members on Jan 2012, LAGbook expanded, targeting the youth demographic (18-30) around the world. In the past, LAGbook has partnered with Etisalat Nigeria as a social earning network where Etisalat subscribers around the world unwind, mix-up, connect with one another and share their daily Etisalat experience.

Recently, LAGbook started massive promotional campaigns for Blackberry as official Blackberry artworks "Don't Wait, Activate!" replaces the backdrop of the Login/Sign-up page of LAGbook.com, the cover photo of 5 LAGbook fan-pages on Facebook with over 20,000 fans and the backdrop of LAGbook's twitter handle with over 1,200 followers. The young Nigerian social network also sends periodic messages to its over 130,000 members about Blackberry. The sponsorship deal is expected to end on 11th August, 2012, if there is no roll on. Since 13th June, 2012, LAGbook's growth curve peaked, attracting over 3,000 new members daily with popularity in India, Turkey, Canada, United States, Malaysia, Philippines and most especially Nigeria in the city of Yaba, Lagos, where the social network was incepted and currently ranks #3 in traffic, right after Facebook (#1) and Google (#2). With LAGbook's recent growth curve, the social network is expected to become Africa's #1 largest social networking website with about 500,000 members by year end. According to Chika Nwaogu, the 22 year old co-founder of LAGbook, "The deal was initiated by Tunji Ademiluyi, RIM's Carrier Marketing Manager. It was miraculous. My phone rings and guess who's calling me? Blackberry!"

"The deal was handled by Blackberry's Ad agency in Nigeria, Yellow Brick Road Ltd." says Chidi Nwaogu, CEO at LAGbook and nominee of the 2011 Nigeria Youth Merit Award for ICT. "We worked closely with Ayisola Iroche and Caroline Daniels of Yellow Brick Road Ltd." Chidi continued "and maybe there might be a roll on, which is solely RIM's decision". According to Wikipedia, LAGbook is "a social network focused on expanding the social experience of people and giving them an incentive to do what they love doing the most - making new friends." LAGbook doesn't limit their members to connecting and sharing with the people in their life or the people they already know, thus they go by the name; "social discovery network", a social network for meeting new people everyday. When speaking to Chika Nwaogu, LAGbook's Chairman, on LAGbook's next step, he said "We have started a massive viral campaign and the results reflect on our current user-size and rapid growth rate. We're working to better our services and double bandwidth. We ought to be 500,000 members strong before the last week of 2012, thus we're making foundation steps toward becoming Africa's largest social networking website before 2013. I'm excited!"

LAGbook on Wikipedia: en [dot] wikipedia [dot] org/wiki/LAGbook
LAGbook on Crunchbase: www [dot] crunchbase [dot] com/company/lagbook

Source: www [dot] prlog [dot] org/11918417