Social Networking Watch

Virgin Mobile Partners With MySpace

LIVEMINT -- Jan 6 -- Under the agreement, MySpace would provide its social networking services on Virgin Mobile's WAP-enabled phones. FULL ARTICLE @ LIVE MINT

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10 Mobile Social Networks To Check Out

READ WRITE WEB -- Jan 4 -- With 975M mobile web users expected by 2012, this is a potentially very lucrative market.
Dada - a mobile SNS that enables users to update personal blogs with pictures and video
Strands - enables its users to find music and network with their friends via their mobile phones
Itsmy - wants to be MySpace for your phone
Frengo - Frengo toolkit allows developers to monetize applications via the company's social advertising platform or via premium SMS
Twango - combines online storage with social networking, allowing users to organize and share photos, videos and other personal media
Shozu - enables you to share your videos and photos via your mobile phone
Brightkite - allows for your network of friends to keep track of where others may be at any moment
Zyb - aims to be a mobile contact organizer for your social network
Groovr -  is your mobile network's night out on the town
Fon11 - could become the hottest mobile social network for the iPhone
FULL ARTICLE @ READ WRITE WEB

Loopt Snags AT&T

TECH CRUNCH -- Dec 18 -- Mobile social network Loopt goes live on three AT&T phones today, which was the last major carrier holdout. Loopt is now available in the U.S. on Sprint, Verizon, Metro PCS, T-Mobile and Boost. The service is free for a year and then a $4/month fee kicks in. FULL ARTICLE @ TECH CRUNCH

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Talk Is Cheap But Talki Is Cheaper

MARKETWIRE -- Dec 15 -- Talkster introduces software for mobile phones called Talki, that gives users unlimited text and picture messaging plus long distance and international calls for the same cost as local calls. Talki is available in more than 35 countries. FULL ARTICLE @ MARKETWIRE        

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Surfing Mobile Social Networks Can Be Dangerous

PRESS RELEASE -- Dec 10 -- A survey carried out by itsmy.com, a mobile social network, shows 64% of respondents worldwide already bumped into someone else or fell over something while they were surfing mobile internet and walking down the street. Therefore itsmy.com submitted the concept for a new street sign to the EU in Brussels that should call the attention of all road users to mobile internet usage outdoors.

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SnapMyLife Raises Additional $5 Million In Funding

BUSINESS WIRE -- Dec 10 -- SnapMyLife, the mobile photo-sharing site, has raised a new $5m round of funding, led by current investors North Bridge Venture Partners and Carmel Ventures. This investment will be used to further expand SnapMyLife's service with new features, stronger international presence and global partnerships. FULL ARTICLE @ SOA WORLD MAGAZINE

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Mobile Social Networking Survey Released

PRESS RELEASE -- Dec 3 -- According to itsmy.com's survey, 95% (US) resp. 96% (UK) already use the mobile as main means of communication with their beloved ones. And 42% of them never used a (PC) online social network. Complete Survey - PDF download. FULL ARTICLE @ TECHWHACK

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All The Social Networks, Together On Your Smartphone

NY TIMES -- Dec 3 -- Virgin Mobile will announce a new service, Helio Connect, which delivers updates from MySpace, Facebook, Twitter, Flickr and YouTube on a single page. For those who want to stick with their existing carriers, there is an alternative to Connect, but there will be a fee. Intercasting offers its Anthem mobile hub for social network fans on Verizon, Sprint and AT&T. On  Verizon, the service is called SocialLife, and it costs $1.50 monthly. On AT&T, it is called My Communities, costing $3 a month, and on Sprint it goes by the name Social Zone, for $3. (T-Mobile is testing the service on a handful of devices; pricing is not yet set.) FULL ARTICLE @ NY TIMES

MySpace Takes Video To Mobile

TECH CRUNCH -- Dec 2 -- MySpace has partnered with RipCode to give mobile users access to MySpace videos. The content will be available at m.myspace.com, which currently generates around 3 billion monthly page views. FULL ARTICLE @ TECH CRUNCH

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MobaMingle Adds A Japanese Flavor To Mobile SN

TECH CRUNCH -- Dec 2 -- MobaMingle is the internationalized version of Mobage-town, one of Japan's biggest mobile social networks. The premise behind MobaMingle is to blend elements of virtual worlds, social networking, gaming and mobile blogging into one integrated concept. MobaMingle is being backed up by a large-cap parent company in Japan (DeNA), which has already managed to build a highly successful mobile social network in that country. FULL ARTICLE @ TECH CRUNCH

Emoze Pushes Facebook On Any Mobile Device

PR NEWSWIRE -- Dec 1 -- Emoze, free, mobile, push email service, now allows Symbian users to add their Facebook messaging in combination with any number of email messaging systems, to their mobile device. There is no need to purchase a Smartphone to tap into Facebook messages on-the-move. Users can simply add Facebook to their emoze portfolio on any handset. FULL ARTICLE @ MARKET WATCH

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Facebook Mobile Sees 3X Growth

READWRITE WEB -- Nov 11 -- Facebook has seen users of its mobile site, m.facebook.com, jump from 5m to 15m this year. The most recent change made to the site, allowing comments to be posted on status messages from your phone, resulted in more than 1 million mobile posts in the first 24 hours. Facebook Mobile is now probably bigger than the entire userbase of Mixi, Japan's leading social network. Last week 6 leading Japanese social networks, including Mixi, MySpace Japan, Yahoo and others, announced that the companies are forming a mysterious alliance that could include content and widget sharing across their mobile sites. FULL ARTICLE @ READWRITE WEB

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Facebook And MySpace Lock Horns For SN Future

GUARDIAN.CO.UK -- Nov 7 -- At the Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco Mark Zuckerberg said he would continue the plan to expand aggressively around the world – while the head of MySpace suggested the company might bring out its own music player to rival the iPod. Over the past year the two websites have been jostling for top spot. Facebook has already seen remarkable growth in the last 12 months, growing from 50m users at the start of 2008 to around 125m today. Also Zuckerberg hinted that bringing Facebook to mobile phones could be a crucial next step for the company. Technology industry analysts ABI Research recently predicted that SN via mobile phones could be used by as many as 82m people within five years. FULL ARTICLE @ GUARDIAN.CO.UK

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6.5 Million Americans Watched Mobile Video In August

PR NEWSWIRE -- Oct 31 -- Among the top operators in the United States, AT&T claimed the most mobile video viewers, with 4.4% of subscribers accessing either programmed or on-demand mobile video. With 1.3M viewers, amateur videos, such as those on YouTube, represent the most popular type of content, followed by music videos and comedy videos. FULL ARTICLE @ CNN MONEY

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MySpace Finally Supports Mobile Photo Uploads

READ WRITE WEB -- Oct 24 -- MySpace did not have a way to easily upload photos from mobile phones directly to users' profiles until now. According to a recent entry on the MySpace blog, mobile photo uploads are finally supported. They noted this feature was "a long time coming." Everyone's friend "Tom" also confirms that the MySpace Blackberry app announced last month is almost ready. That's almost a year after Facebook released theirs. FULL ARTICLE @ READ WRITE WEB

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Utterli Launches Free Group SMS

READWRITE WEB -- Oct 22 -- Utterli - formerly known as Utterz - is offering the ability to send SMS messages to friends - and groups of friends - for free from within Facebook or Bebo. "There is this massive need - particularly with kids - who are on fixed rate plans where they have a limited amount of texting per month," said Aaron Burcell, Chief Marketing Officer at Utterli. "Texting is really expensive." FULL ARTICLE @ READWRITE WEB

Mark Brooks: WAYN.com also offers the ability to SMS multiple friends at once. Their International rate is $20 for 300 SMS, so 7c an Intl SMS. Not too shabby.

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Top Ten Android Launch Apps

TECH CRUNCH -- Oct 22 -- The first Android phone, the G1, goes on sale at T-Mobile stores. Here is a list of the top ten apps worth downloading and checking out.

1. imeem Mobile: It's a jukebox in your pocket
2. ShopSavvy: This turns your phone into a barcode scanner and then gives you price comparisons both online and in nearby retail stores.
3. Pac-Man: The original arcade game from Namco.
4. BreadCrumbz: You can leave photo and voice marker breadcrumbz along any route that others can then follow later on.
5. Wikitude: A travel guide that pulls up information from Wikipedia.
6. Shazam: Put the phone up to a radio or speaker playing a song and Shazam will tell you the name and the artist.
7. SplashPlay: Teaches you how to play the guitar. 
8. iSkoot for Skype: Lets you use your Skype account to IM your contacts, make Skype calls over the Internet, and uses the phone for SkypeOut calls.
9. MyCloset:  Helps you plan out your outfits.
10. Cab4Me Light: A simple app that gives you phone numbers of cab companies based on where you are.
FULL ARTICLE @ TECH CRUNCH

MySpace Deployed On The gPhone

MASHABLE -- Oct 20 -- MySpace mobile application for the Android platform is already live ahead of it's official release on Wednesday, when the Google G1 is made available to the public. The app joins other platforms MySpace has made themselves compatible with, including the Sidekick and the iPhone, as well as the upcoming release of the app for the Blackberry platform. FULL ARTICLE @ MASHABLE

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Imeem Puts Jukebox In Your Pocket

TECH CRUNCH -- Oct 20 -- Imeem Mobile is the musically-oriented social network's first foray into the mobile arena. Imeem is one of the few music Websites with streaming licenses from all four major music labels, plus most of the independents. (MySpace Music is another). Imeem offers its music streams for free, supported by advertising and affiliate fees from music downloads. With imeem Mobile, the most popular songs from its catalog are available for streaming on the Android phone. FULL ARTICLE @ TECH CRUNCH

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MySpace & Facebook Becoming Leading Mobile SNS

MARKETWATCH -- Oct 6 -- According to a recent online survey conducted by ABI Research, nearly half (46%) of those who use social networks have also visited a social network through a mobile phone. Of these, nearly 70% have visited MySpace and another 67% had visited Facebook. No other social networking site reached 15% adoption mobile adoption. FULL ARTICLE @ MARKET WATCH

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