Ideas for Web 2.0 in India

I have been an avid netizen for a long long time and have seen emerging trends on the internet. These days Web2.0 seems to be the buzz word. There are hundreds of new websites coming up every other day claiming to be a web 2.0 site. Now the term itself is a topic of discussion and i have seen lots articles and posts debating on what it actually means, what can be considered as web 2.0 and if its really something different or just a hype.Whatever it is.. its in your face right now.. vibrant colors, dynamic user generated content, glassy look and feel, social networking features, mash-ups etc. etc. and it looks like it not going to end anytime soon. Now this observation stands true for most sites originating and targeting US and other western countries. but whats the scene in India? One can actually count the sites which would qualify for the title.

I tried to analyze the reasons for this difference and the answers were pretty straight. Such sites thrive mainly on the user generated content and tend to provide features which a common man can use while collaborating with other online users. Although India has most rapidly growing internet users but still the utility for the internet is still limited to send mails and chat. Some urban users also use it to book tickets or use internet banking at the most. And the most widely used site by Indians is Google, which developers like me dwell on.

Basically, if you think about Web 2.0 ideas that can click in Indian market, you would have a very few options like social networking, video sharing, music sharing etc. Most of these are already captured by international sites like orkut , youtube etc. Despite these, we have some local players trying to make a hold on the same ideas bigadda.com and ishare.com by rediff are a good example for such attempts. These sites are almost the clones of the originals with a little desi touch and a few extra features. Lets see if they make an impact, desimartini.com which was launched a few months back is still sitting dormant.

Now coming back to the point, is there anything else which can sell in Indian internet market ? Especially something which can be called web 2.0 ?