Mediaboss Marketing

A new website in Kazakhstan is seeking to organize today's social web by ancient clan identities.

ALMATYWhen Kazakhs meet for the first time, two key questions are all it takes to figure each other out: What part of the country are they from? And what horde and tribe are they?

The answers immediately establish a person's roots, history, and allegiancesa holdover of ancient tribal divisions that remain relevant in modern-day Kazakhstan.

Now, a new social-networking site is hoping to tap into Kazakhs' tribal identity by grouping users according to their hordes and tribes.

The site, Rulas.kzbased on the Kazakh word for tribematelooks much like any other networking site, with photographs of stylish, mainly young, members decorating a brightly colored homepage.

But in addition to standard registration information like name, e-mail address, and password, Rulas asks applicants to categorize themselves according to zhuz, or horde, and any one of the dozens of ru, or tribes, belonging to each horde.

Magzhan Turysov, a young Kazakh actor, was one of the first members to register on the site, using an app on his cellphone. Smiling, Turysov said it's interesting to belong to a site that immediately divides and distributes its users according to hordes and tribesbut admits he has some reservations.

We have a saying, Let the face of those who divide people by hordes burn, Turysov said. So I sometimes have doubts. Maybe it will work for some people.

He said he had just registered and so far had not seen any results. He said he got onto the site hoping to see some of his acquaintances, but so far they hadn't turned up.

Kazakhstan's clan system has existed since the days of the Mongol Empire, with legend holding that Genghis Khan himself laid the groundwork by dividing territory into thirds and granting each to one of his sons. He thereby created the Great, Middle, and Junior hordes that still define modern-day Kazakh society.

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Social Networking by Tribe