Will the third internet wave bring opportunities to Vietnam’s social networks that aim to gain users from Facebook?

Lotus, the newly launched ‘made in Vietnam’ social network, aims to focus on distributing content for press agencies and entertainment content producers.

The Vietnamese social network Lotus revealed its plan to attract 60 million users in Vietnam during its official launch in Hanoi last night.

Many uers are invited to log on to a website with their Facebook accounts to ‘watch high quality movies’. As a result, they have lost their Facebook accounts.

VCCorp has announced that the pilot version of its VND700 billion ($30.1 million) Lotus social network will officially be launched on September 16.

Stricter copyright policy and people’s higher awareness about intellectual property have led to the closure of many websites which shared pirated software.

The community of Vietnamese TV service providers has been stirred up by the news that Baidu and Tencent have begun selling VOD (video on demand) with subtitles in Vietnamese, collecting fees from VIP subscribers in Vietnam dong.

To build a Vietnamese social network and cement its position in Vietnam, the first thing that needs to be done is to defeat Facebook.

Many Vietnamese pay a fee to have their Facebook accounts protected, but experts have recommended against it.

A social network, called Gapo, created by Vietnamese and designed for Vietnamese youth, has been launched.

If it operates as a social network, Zalo will at a disadvantage compared with foreign social networks.

Vietnam needs to have its own social network and search engine to replace foreign platforms Facebook and Google, said Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Manh Hung at a recent meeting with IT firms in HCMC.