kaioo

Kaioo is a non-profit social network website that started in November 2007 as a beta version in English and German. It was founded by the German executives Thomas Kreye and Rolf Schmidt-Holtz.

kaioo offers its users standard features of social networking websites. They can create profiles, communicate with friends, join groups, upload pictures, etc. The site features a "match" function first seen on Orkut: a user can express interest in another user, but that user will only learn about it if he/she in turn expresses interest in the first user.

Users can form and join groups favoring specific charities, and the ten charities with the largest groups receive donations at the end of the year, proportional to their support among the kaioo users. The operating costs of the sites are covered by donors.

Purpose of the company

According to the articles of association

"The company’s purpose is the support of science and research, education, art and culture, assistance to young and old people, support of public health services, support of indigent and destitute persons, of environment protection, the preservation of nature and monuments, help for persons persecuted on political and racial grounds or for religious reasons as well as for refugees, expellees, evacuees, war victims, war widows and orphans, the war-disabled and prisoners of war and support for development aid."

In order to fulfill its purpose kaioo operates an "internet-based fund-raising platform", where private persons and companies can set up networks and generate donations of any kind.

Privacy

Currently kaioo users and the kaioo founders are working on the Terms and Data Protection Guidelines. Kaioo users shall be given the right to decide about modifications of the Privacy Terms. Since all data belongs to the users they get to decide how their data is handled. Kaioo does this because as a government approved non-profit community they do not need to maximize their profit and do not have any interest in using data against the will of their users. The privacy terms of kaioo.com can be edited in the wiki on wiki.kaioo.com. This wiki was formerly on a different domain and created by users. These users have now integrated the wiki into kaioo.

The kaioo Wiki

The privacy terms and the general terms and conditions can be modified by every user of the kaioo wikis. The wiki also has the purpose to help organize and work on important issues concerning kaioo, like user-created marketing and discussions. Also groups can discuss and publish their thoughts.

The kaioo wikis are created by kaioo users. Until now there are two external wikis, one in German and one in English. Some users are working on a new wiki which will be hosted on the kaioo servers. It is expected that the wiki will be officially available with the new release in June.