DeNA and Daum Target 10 Million Game Subscribers by End of 2012

Photo: Korea Times

Earlier in the month we told you about DeNA’s (TYO:2432) partnership with Korean web portal Daum (KDQ:035720) to promote its Mobage platform in South Korea. Today we received word that the partnership was formally signed, and that it will be branded as ‘Daum Mobage.’

The two companies held a press conference in Seoul today to discuss the partnership, and the slides that were presented can be found below. Included are a few interesting factoids that shed some light on the Daum Mobage plan.

The most notable is that Daum Mobage is aspiring to reach 10 million smartphone user subscriptions by the end of 2012. Daum already has over 38 million registered users, and hopes that the community platform will facilitate easy promotion via organic word of mouth, and easy sign-in with Daum credentials.

The service is scheduled to launch early next year, with Korean versions of popular titles like We Rule and Tap Fish coming to the Android market. Choi Sae-hoon, the CEO of Daum communications was quoted as saying:

Games are the number one category in smartphone application markets. When comparing the market size of Korea with that of Japan, the one here has huge growth potential considering the infiltration of smartphones. — Korea Times

You can see more about the growth opportunity that Choi describers in the slides below.

The presentation also includes a very nice mapped overview of DeNA branches and subsidiaries (see page 14). We’ve been trying to keep up with DeNA’s expansion, as well as other Japanese companies looking abroad, and this maps helps give a good overview of the scope of the company.

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Kayac Releases Smartphone Transportation Game “Go Go Cargo” For North America

KAYAC Inc.[J] has released a smartphone transportation game application called "Go Go Cargo" for North America, and it's a free download at App Store and also Android Market.

"GO GO CARGO" is a simulation game in which the player serves as an operator of an express company and delivers the requested load by designing a transportation route across the tracks. As each designed delivery route carries a load more efficiently, the delivery area is expanded, with the goal of becoming the "transportation king." They are going to add actual US' places in the map.

"Unity" is a game engine for developers.
A map and GUI (graphical user interface) that lets you use many scenes simultaneously and control multiple cameras. Particle physics bring the track to life, with train smoke and a lively town that looks real.

The fundamental way of playing of GO GO CARGO
1) Choose Quest, choose a load and its delivery route, and send a load to the destination.
2) If a load is successful, you earn experience and money. If a delivery route is designed well, you get bonuses such as better gas consumption.
3) The map of the delivery area can be reset for each new attempt.
4) Try to clear the entire delivery area.

GO GO CARGO features
Try to make the best designed track across all areas, such as price, speed, load size, and other aspects.
A maximum of 32 tracks can be owned.
If you have a friend, you can work toward common goals and use each other's maps.
Your friends can earn experience and reliance points, which can increase their rank to get additional bonuses and gifts.
You can also customize the different towns by bringing decorations to them on the train. You can plan your towns freely after each trip.
You can earn many titles, but only the best can become the Transportation King.

Download：
Android https://market.android.com/details?id=com.kayac.gogocargo
iPhone http://itunes.apple.com/app/id469051412?mt=8

Kayac Releases Smartphone Transportation Game “Go Go Cargo” For North America

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inSing.com ripped?

Surprise surprise. So it looks like even SingTel’s inSing.com has found itself an evil twin. Here’s the real site:

And here is, what we think, a rip-off of the Singaporean site:

Spotted the difference?

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How to Snuggle Softly With your Product Error Messages

I am a huge fan of companies who focus a lot on ‘small things’ that have a long term impact on products and the way these offerings are perceived (read: A Nifty Product Management Lesson From Google Chrome).

A products’ soul actually comes out when things go haywire and you, as the developer/as the creator need to find a place to hide yourself.

So what do you do?

Apologize for the error? Throw a very generic message? Show Donuts? A failwhale?

Well, the team at Asana ( mentioned earlier in Online Task Management Services For Startups and Small Teams) does interesting things with error messages.

When you encounter an error message on the site, you will see these random sentences in the error messages. So while reporting an error, just share these error messages and Asana team will diagnose the problem.

How does it work?

Imagine representing 32 bits of information (numbers up to 4 billion) as a sentence instead of a jumble of digits. Each sentence can have the same predictable structure, and the number will be used to choose words from a dictionary to fill in that structure—like Mad Libs.

One possible sentence structure can be: count + adjective + plural noun + verb + adverb, e.g. “6 sad squid snuggle softly.” We can divide the bit-space of the number like so:

• 5 bits for the count (2-33, so it is always plural)
• 7 bits for the adjective (one of 128 possibilities)
• 7 bits for the plural noun (one of 128 possibilities, which we made all animals just for fun)
• 7 bits for the verb (one of 128 possibilities)
• 6 bits for the adverb (one of 64 possibilities)

Now, given a dictionary containing words categorized in this way, we can generate 4 billion unique (and sometimes very memorable) sentences. In Asana, the ID used to generate the error phrase is random, so the same sentence is unlikely to occur twice. It collects a bunch of useful information about the crash (stack traces, log snippets, application state, user and session information, etc.) and automatically groups similar problems and imports them into an internal Asana task list [Asana blog].

That is, you aren’t shown a stupid stacktrace, but random sentences which makes the product look less sucky (and the sentence helps Asana team in debugging).

What’s the Big Deal?

Not much if you ask logically.

Products are about perception and the way you handle error messages speaks of your product soul. Basically, it’s the last mile in your product user experience and is often neglected.

And focusing on such ‘neglected areas’ is more of a UX/support service than anything else. It actually defines who you are (as a company).

What’s your opinion?

Aside, if you plan to have similar error messages in your product – download from Github.

Related posts:

1. How Helpful Are Your Error Messages [DNA of Great Products]
2. You Have Got An Error Message! Who Do You Blame?
3. Send Voice Messages This Valentine’s Day Using mCupid
4. A Nifty Product Management Lesson From Google Chrome
5. Exclusive: SMSgupshup users can send picture messages…and 1:1 SMSes too

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Not All is Well With BigAdda – 80% Inventory Cleared, Call Center Has Been Shutdown

BigAdda started as a social network and pumped in a lot of money – a LOT of money in branding/Bollywood partnerships etc. But one fine day, the team realized that copying Facebook isn’t all that cool and they “pivoted” to ecommerce site/
They were selling electronics, gadgets etc etc. just like everybody else in the industry. Actually, just like everybody and without any clear differentiation.

And now, sources tell us that the whole business is going through rough phase and they have even cleared 80% of the inventory, shutdown their call center and a lot of employees have been asked to leave the company. As far as the fate of this business unit is concerned, we are told that Reliance will take the final decision by March 2012.

As far as call center support is concerned, the numbers displayed on the site (9223322211 and 9223306677) aren’working and sources tell us that BigAdda will now share call center/support infrastructure with other Reliance properties (BigFlix/Zapak).

Very recently, BigFlix shutdown its physical distribution service and has now started focusing on video on demand service.

[If you have more details on this, feel free to share them anonymously using the contact form.]

Related posts:

1. Bigadda To Shutdown Social Networking – Converts to eCommerce
2. What’s the big deal about BigAdda?
3. Jaxtr India Numbers shutdown (illegal usage)
4. Indian Call Center for Obama [PI Cartoons]
5. BigAdda’s Traffic Decline – SEO Gone Wrong?

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News Roundup: MapMyIndia Launches Portable Gadget Charger

MapmyIndia Launches Portable Gadget Charger

MapmyIndia has launched portable gadget charger which helps users charge their portable devices on the go, such as Navigator, CarPad, Mobile Phones, iPods, Portable Gaming Devices, Bluetooth Handsfree devices etc.

RInfra Launches Security Deposit Receipt Download Service For Mumbai Consumers

Power distribution company, Reliance Infrastructure Limited (RInfra) has launched an online initiative for Mumbai suburban consumers. RInfra consumers, who have made their Security Deposits payment online, can now download their payment receipt and save it on computer and / or can take a printout[ source].

airtel launches iRadio

Airtel digital TV, the DTH service by Bharti Airtel, today announced the launch of iRadio – a 24/7 entertainment application that has 21 Radio channels available to all its customers, at no additional cost. The introduction of the 21 channels on iRadio is consistent with Airtel digital TV’s efforts of enabling customers to enjoy their entertainment experience in a language of their choice, wherever they go in India.

This latest addition to Airtel digital TV’s portfolio caters to the growing demand by customers for entertainment in a language of choice. AIR Radio has been a favourite of listeners across the country its unique entertainment mix of Music, News, Talk Shows, Variety, Interviews, Current Affairs and documentaries. iRadio is yet another compelling reiteration of DTH’s clear advantage over analogue systems in offering unique non-channel content across genres like education, music, movies, farming and lifestyle.

iRadio is now available along with the other five attractions, iFasal, iGoodlife, iDarshan, iLearn and iAstro. [PR]

FlashMob

Flashmob hit Mumbai and has been a phenomenal rage. If you are wondering what a Flashmob is, well its a group of people who assemble suddenly in a public place, perform an unusual and sometimes seemingly pointless act for a brief time, then disperse, often for the purposes of entertainment, satire, or artistic expression [wikipedia].

Watch the video.

Related posts:

1. MapmyIndia launches portable gadget charger
2. News Roundup: Fibre Glass LPG Cylinders In India, Vodafone Launches FB Phone
3. News Roundup: Airtel Money Launched in Chennai, Sify Launches Internet Radio
4. News Roundup: iPhone4 Coming to India Very Soon, airtel Launches USSD based Facebook access services
5. News Roundup: Aircel Launches 3G Services, Gujarat Bans Bulk SMS

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Indonesian Startup Brings Instagram Fun to BlackBerry [INTERVIEW]

We all know how famous Instagram is with millions of users snapping and sharing grungy pictures with it on their iPhones – even in Indonesia. Yet, with most of us smartphone fans here having a Blackberry by our side, we wish it would be ported to RIM’s (NASDAQ:RIMM) OS.

Our wish has sort of come true – perhaps for the second time, as Pikubo tried back in August – with BibbyCam (pictured above), which was made by Grace Tahir and Ronald Komalaputra. Although not officially launched yet, the app has gained some word-of-mouth hype, and we thought it’d be interesting to see what the founders have to say. So, we chatted with the duo via email:

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1. What’s the Bibbycam app about, and what inspired you to start/make it?

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Bibbycam has 15 filters including lomo, old photo and over-saturated, plus a double filter feature to create your own filter. Users can link their photos to other sites such as Facebook and Twitter, they can comment and ‘bibb’ (or ‘like’) each others’ pictures as well. We created this application because we realized there’s a dearth of photo-filtering and sharing apps for Blackberry users, and as avid photographers and Blackberry freaks, we wanted to do one that can meet that need. We hope this application can also be fun and useful for other Blackberry users out there. We do plan to have it available through the Blackberry App World as well.

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2. Instagram is famous for its filter-photo-service, partly because the iPhone has got a great camera. Can you replicate this on a Blackberry?

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Obviously we won’t be able to compete or change anything about the hardware, but that’s precisely the reason why we did BibbyCam just for Blackberry. Even though the RIM OS and hardware aren’t as great and versatile as the iPhone’s iOS, and we realise a lot of people and critics have undermined Blackberry. However, there are still a lot of Blackberry users out there and a lot of them want a photo-filter service. The market for iPhone and Android photo apps is amazingly crowded and competitive – we realized this and we did not want to go into that market. We wanted to empower Blackberry users, to give them a choice.

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3. Some local social networking apps – such as Menoo and Bouncity – have gotten into trouble getting traction because most Blackberry users in Indonesia are getting the cheapest data plan that includes only Twitter, Facebook and Instant Messaging. How will you overcome this?

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We can only overcome it by creating a product that is super great and engaging, so people will want to upgrade their data plan to be able to use BibbyCam. This is why it’s free; BB users can use that extra money instead to upgrade their data plan.

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4. It has been launched for a few weeks now; what are the early adopters saying?

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It has not been officially launched, the current users have found us through word-of-mouth. We do plan to launch it officially early next year. We are in talks with three big consumer brands in Indonesia to launch BibbyCam not as a “techie” product but as a lifestyle product. Thus far, we have seen an increase in registered users week after week, and they have been very supportive in sharing the app with their friends and even giving us suggestions for future updates.

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5. What is your plan for BibbyCam next year since we’re close to the end of this year?

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As mentioned before the first thing we’re going to do is to launch BibbyCam officially, and next up we are planning to introduce a photo-filtering service on the website so we can grab more market share. We are also planning a series of contests and games with local brands.

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6. What do you think about the start-up ecosystem here in Indonesia?

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We are new to this industry, but we have seen great camaraderie in the start-up environment here in Jakarta. All the different developers want one thing, which is to see this industry grow and mature, so we do support each other’s projects.

Head on over to the Bibbycam site to sign-up and get the app.

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Want to form the “Singapore Alley” at SXSW 2012?

For the first time ever, the South by Southwest (SXSW) Interactive section of the larger SXSW Conferences and Festivals (including Music and Film) saw official Singapore representation earlier this March. Held yearly in Austin, Texas, SXSW is a place where people meet, new technology showcased, ideas exchanged and new ones emerge.

It was my first time attending the festivities this year, which happened to coincide with the aforementioned first official Singapore delegation. There was a Singapore pavilion which had the startups showcasing their products and even a Singapore party one evening [check out pictures].

Having had a large hand in making the Singapore pavilion happen this year and being encouraged by the results, the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA) is planning for another Singapore presence at SXSW 2012.

Drawing on lessons learnt from the 2011 festival, there are some changes planned for the 2012. In lieu of a pavilion space, each participating startup will get a 10’x10’ booth of their own. The vision is to have enough companies to form a Singapore Alley that visitors will walk through. This will provide stronger brand identity for individual companies and yet be covered under the umbrella of Singapore’s brand name. IDA will also look into a SXSW Block Party to draw visitors to the booths. Last but not least, IDA is planning to work with partners to facilitate personalized 1-to-1 meetings between Singapore startups and SXSW attendees.

Timeline: Singapore Delegation At SXSW
Singapore Alley Exhibition: 12-15th March 2012

The cost for each start-up is estimated to be US$500 to cover booth space, advertisement, booth setup and related marketing activities. Startups will need to cover their own airfare, transport, SXSW Interactive passes and accommodation. IDA is required to make a decision very soon, so for those who are interested, please provide an indication by Monday 5th Dec 6pm to ida_startup@ida.gov.sg.

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Report: Smartphones only have 19% penetration rate in Asia

While cutting-edge iOS and Android smartphones have been hogging the headlines lately, it is the feature phones that are still dominant in Asia.

Market analysis firm VisionMobile has estimated in a report that smartphones only have a 19 percent penetration rate in Asia, due to the prevalence of cost-sensitive developing markets.

The report also revealed that smartphones have a 50 percent peneration rate in developed markets but less than 20 percent in developing markets. For instance, 46 percent of Singaporean mobile phone users own smartphones, leading the region.

Things could change rapidly in some emergent markets however. Almost half of netizens who do not own smartphones in Southeast Asia have the intent of purchasing one in the near future.

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