Posts Tagged ‘Partnership’

Twitter Announces ‘Strategic Alliance’ With Yahoo Japan

Published by pratyushkp on June 16th, 2011 - in Social, Technology

Image via CrunchBase

Twitter has just announced a partnership with Yahoo Japan, according to a blog post on the company’s site.

As part of the partnership Twitter says that “Tweets will be integrated into various services on Yahoo Japan, beginning with real-time results pages. This partnership will allow Twitter content to reach even more users in Japan, one of our biggest international markets.”

This is a big deal because not only is there a huge Twitter userbase in Japan, but it is also the country that the service has worked most closely with since their inception.

Twitter also recently struck a deal with NTT DOCOMO, Japan’s largest carrier, to include Tweets and Twitter content in NTT DOCOMO i-mode portal search results.

It’s also important to note that Yahoo was reportedly looking to sell Yahoo Japan to Japanese carrier Softbank, which already controls 42 percent of the subsidiary. If that deal takes place, it would be convenient considering Softbank already has a deal in place with Twitter to include the messaging and communications app pre-installed in Softbank’s cell phones.

Source :- http://techcrunch.com

  • Twitter Announces Firehose Partnership With Yahoo Japan (techcrunch.com)
  • Twitter partners with Yahoo Japan for real-time results (venturebeat.com)
  • In Japan, Twitter Users ‘Tap to Follow’ Friends Using NFC (nytimes.com)
  • In Japan, Twitter Users “Tap to Follow” Friends Using NFC (readwriteweb.com)
  • Japan’s NTT Docomo & Twitter Teaming to Deliver Richer Mobile Search Results (socialtimes.com)
  • May 2011 Japan IT Links (Part 3) (asiajin.com)

Facebook Is Taking A Special Interest In RockMelt’s Social Browser

Published by pratyushkp on June 16th, 2011 - in Social, Technology

Image via CrunchBase

Ever since RockMelt launched its social browser, it’s been known unofficially as the Facebook browser. Facebook chat, status updates and sharing are all built right into the browser. Now Facebook and RockMelt are officially working together in a product partnership, and the first fruits of that collaboration can be seen in the latest release available today, RockMelt 3.

RockMelt is still an independent browser with only a few hundred thousand active users. Facebook made no investment in RockMelt, nor is it going to help promote or distribute the browser, at least initially. Its product teams, however, are working closely with RockMelt to make sure that its Facebook features shine. “The partnership is based on a shared belief that social should join navigation and search as fundamental capabilities of the browser,” says RockMelt CEO Eric Vishria.

There are several new features in RockMelt 3. To start with, RockMelt 3 adds Moves your Facebook buddy list from the left edge to the right edge of the browser. The buddy list is now scrollable, and it can be expanded to view not just pictures of your friends’ faces, but their full names.

The second new feature is that Facebook notifications, messages, and friend requests—what Facebook engineers internally call “the jewels”—are now visible at the top of RockMelt right in the chrome itself. You can visually see when you have a new notification, friend request, or message, and pop down a window to read more.

RockMelt is now integrated with Facebook’s unified messaging system. So if a contact is online, a chat window pops open. If he or she is not, it reverts to Facebook messages.

RockMelt also knows when you are on Facebook.com, and strips away the redundant features from the site which are part of the browser. So the notification counters at the top pf Facebook disappear because they are now a feature of RockMelt. And when you are on Facebook.com, and a friend wants to chat, RockMelt’s version of Facebook chat opens up instead of two chat windows duplicating each other, which is what happened before.

So far, RockMelt has not taken off as much as its initial launch hype would have suggested. Since it opened up its beta to the public in March, it’s seen modest growth, but high user engagement. A Facebook endorsement could help its cause.

So did Marc Andreessen, who is both a Facebook and RockMelt board member, have anything to do with this partnership? Not initially. “Someone on Zuck’s staff was an alpha user—one of our first 100 users—he showed it to Zuck and that is what got the partnership going,” Vishria tells me.

Certainly, it is not too difficult to imagine why Facebook would be interested in supporting the development of a social browser.

Source :- http://techcrunch.com

  • Facebook Is Taking A Special Interest In RockMelt’s Social Browser (techcrunch.com)
  • Facebook Collaborates With Social Browser RockMelt (mashable.com)
  • Facebook helps itself by helping RockMelt browser (seattletimes.nwsource.com)
  • RockMelt’s browser becomes even more social with a Facebook partnerhsip (venturebeat.com)
  • Facebook and RockMelt announce new partnership: Features like Facebook chat to be added to social browser (zdnet.com)
  • RockMelt and Facebook Partner on Social Web Browser (socialtimes.com)
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