Anybeat, which just publicly launched to serve as a pseudonymous digital place for discussion, ranks users based on how active they are, in addition to how often users interact with them on the platform.

While Klout judges your activity across all social networks, Anybeat takes into consideration activity on this specific platform and gives users "Cred" to brag about their reputation on the network.

"Many people first fell in love with the Internet because of AOL's chat rooms," an email sent to Anybeat users states. "In these pseudonymous social environments they were able to meet people that they would have never met, have open conversations about all kinds of topics, and create long lasting digital relationships that often translated into the physical world."

Although a user's real name is hidden, his or her profile stays consistent and grows a reputation, or cred, over time.

"When we are forced to use our official first and last name in a service, it changes the way we communicate," Dmitry told LAUNCH in September. "We start to watch what we say because we understand that everything we say can be used against us, including in a court of law."

Earlier this month, Facebook lost a nym war to award-winning author Salman Rushdie. Facebook had changed Rushdie's first name to his birth name, which he had never used before. After expressing his frustrations on Twitter, Facebook gave in and let him keep his pseudonym.

Anybeat's recent integration with Facebook goes hand-in-hand with Anybeat's goal.

"Facebook serves as our digital home, while LinkedIn serves as our digital workplace," the email states. "Anybeat aims to be our digital "third place.'

Google+, which opened to the public in September, initially had a fairly strict real-name policy but is starting to loosen up by making its atmosphere comfortable even with the use of pseudoynms, Vic Gundotra said at Web 2.0 in October.

Google+, which has 40M users compared to Facebook's 800M, continues to struggle with fading user interest, according to data from traffic measurement firm Hitwise. Google+ traffic has experienced a drop in 11 of the 21 weeks since its launch in late June (see graph below.)

Back in October, Google Software Engineer Steve Yegge posted a rant to Google+ where he revealed that Google doesn't understand platforms very well, which he later apologized for.

Anybeat, founded by former MySpace Music CTO Dmitry Shapiro, launched in private beta Sept. 13. Watch Dmitry beta launch Anybeat on This Week in Startups episode #187 here.

Google+ traffic chart courtesy of the Los Angeles Times.

LAUNCH Blog