Now, a social networking site on cricket

When India takes on arch-rivals Pakistan in a high-voltage clash at the World Cup semi-finals on Wednesday, not all cricket buffs would be hooked solely to their television sets this time.

Many of them would be simultaneously glued to their computer screens discussing ball-by-ball updates with fellow netizens on 'soch.la', which advertises itself as the world's first social cricket platform.

Combining the elements of Facebook and Twitter, the new social networking website has thousands of passionate cricket fans commenting, chatting and sharing their opinions as every game unfolds in the ongoing World Cup.

Apart from being a platform to share the frenzy around the countrys most popular sport, the one-of-its-kind site launched by digital marketing firm Digital Vidya also updates its users on live scores, teams and players.

"Cricket is a game which is best enjoyed with friends. Rather than just watching the match, 'soch.la' gives cricket lovers an opportunity to come together and enjoy cricket with their friends and family, while cheering for their favourite teams," the site's co-founder Pradeep Chopra told PTI.

The social network uses the Twitter's terminology of "followers" as users get updates of comments posted by those whom they are "following". On the other hand, the process of commenting on posts is similar to that of Facebook, the world's largest social networking site.

Led by the current mania over cricket due to the world cup matches and the upcoming glamour-rich IPL, the site, with an unusual domain name, is turning out to be a favourite among sport followers.

"After I logged onto soch.la during a recent match, it was for the first time that I didn't watch cricket on TV while I was at home. Unaware of Soch.la, my wife saw me smiling while I was engaged with my friends on Soch.la and enquired why I was not watching the match," said Vikas Kaushik, a cricket lover and CEO of an IT company.

The idea of the niche social network cropped up when Chopra was discussing with his IIT friends Kapil Nakra and Manas Garg few weeks ago on how to have more fun around the ongoing World Cup.

"We have always believed in creating something which is useful for us first and then making it available to others. This time we got a reason to fulfill our passion for cricket through Soch.la," says Chopra adding that they are evolving the website almost on a daily basis based on real user inputs by focusing on "user experience and user growth."

Encouraged by the positive response, the founders are now planning to monetise the venture by building up a business model around advertising and introducing "social games". Currently, soch.la is open only for Facebook users as one need to have a Facebook account to register as a member of the website.