Diaspora's Co-founder Dies At 22

Ilya Zhitomirskiy, the co-founder of Facebook opponent Diaspora, has died.

The 22-year-old was a of 4 New York-based students who launched Diaspora as a "privacy-aware, user-controlled" amicable network.

It was set up in reply to critique that Facebook was not handling the privacy of its users well.

The result in of Mr Zhitomirskiy's demise is nonetheless to be determined. The San Francisco coroner's office mentioned it will have sum in a few weeks time.

In tribute, the home page of Diaspora featured a hulk dandelion seed head next to an picture of Mr Zhitomirskiy.

Public remembrance services are being programmed for Mr Zhitomirskiy in San Francisco after that this week.

A matter by co-founder Peter Shurman said: "We'll all skip Ilya more than you can say. Ilya was a great buddy and a smart person, a idealist whose work for a improved future online brought hope to many people."

The site was launched a year ago by Mr Zhitomirskiy and 3 associate students at New York University. Facebook's co-founder, Mark Zuckerberg, mentioned he donated an undisclosed sum to the project.

Diaspora featured pages that were identical to the on Facebook but offering easier privacy settings. However, its launch was not without criticism.

When it expelled its initial ethics in September, developers found multi-part safety bugs. Some moreover questioned either the group could broach their vision.

It is a of a few sites - inclusive Appleseed, OneSocialWeb and Elgg - that aims to dare Facebook's model.