Ebuddy.com
Though eBuddy shows promise as a Web-based instant messaging service, its current version is hamstrung by a confusing interface, an inability to connect to multiple IM services at once, and limited customization options.
The service's home page provides links to the only three IM services that it supports: AIM, MSN Messenger, and Yahoo Messenger. Unlike many of its competitors, eBuddy doesn't allow you to connect to multiple services simultaneously. All of its IM services are available in two versions, however: a Classic version and a New (or, in the case of AIM, Beta) version. The Classic versions are older, HTML-based services, while the New versions are Ajax-based and are designed to approximate the experience of using a desktop client more closely, the company says.
If only it had succeeded.
I logged on to the Beta version of eBuddy's AIM client. At first, I was impressed: The log-on process was quick, and within a few seconds I had connected to my buddy list. From there, however, things went downhill. The interface was crowded and often confusing, and my buddy list appeared in a pop-up window that was overloaded with ads. While I understand the company's need to make money to support this free service, I could do without flashing graphics running across the bottom of the screen and the words "ACNE PRODUCTS" in large letters running down the side.
The buddy list itself is well organized, though its customization options are limited. My buddies were grouped into online and offline users, and a Settings button at the top of the screen let me change that. I could sort by my predetermined groups, as well.
New messages appear in this same window, which can be slightly confusing. The only way to distinguish messages from your buddy list is by a hard-to-see tab near the top of the window. Fortunately, you can undock the message window so that new messages appear in a separate area. And you can opt for audio notification of new messages to make their arrival more noticeable.
The message window lacks a typing indicator (while working with AIM, at least) and a time stamp, but it does give you some control over the appearance of text. You can change the font size and add effects such as bold, italics, or underlining. You can also add emoticons. Messages seemed to arrive quickly, without any noticeable delay.
A pull-down menu lets you set your status as online or away, but you can't create a customized away message. And though your contacts can see your status as away in their buddy lists, they won't receive an auto-reply notifying them of your status if they send you a message while you're away. When I changed my status back to "online," it took a long time (more than an hour, in one case) for my buddies to see that change.
Another oddity: When I attempted to close the window containing my buddy list, I got a message telling me that if I did so, I would be signed off of the service. But for some reason, I never got disconnected. My buddies still saw me as online, and could send me messages to me, though I never received them.
I also tested the Classic version of the AIM client on eBuddy. As the company had warned, it performed noticeably more slowly than the Ajax-based Beta version at everything from logging on to creating and sending messages. I preferred the basic look of the Classic version's interface to the Beta version's relatively busy interface. Messages automatically appear in their own window, which makes them easier to recognize.
One complaint about both the Beta and the Classic versions: Whenever I sent a message to someone on my buddy list, they received a separate spam message advertising the eBuddy service.
eBuddy says that it is currently working on an update to its service. The company expects that a beta of the new version, called Oberon, will be available in the next few months, and says that it will correct some shortcomings the current version. Specifically, it will add support for more IM services and will allow users to log on to multiple services at once. I couldn't test Oberon in time for this review, but I recommend that interested readers wait until that version is available.
Morange
Morange.com
This is one of the largest and most influential competitions in the mobile industry in China held once a year by Mobile China Media, the authoritative magazine in the mobile field, and Sony-Ericsson, the globally renowned mobile device manufacturer.
Mozat was invited to enter Morange in the competition in April this year. After more than two months of voting from end users and a rigorous evaluation and review by mobile industry researchers, investors and analysts, Morange beat over hundred other candidates, winning the Golden Olive Award for Best Mobile Entertainment Service. Ms. Judy Fei, Mozat’s marketing manager for China, attended the Golden Olive Award Ceremony held in Beijing on June 27th and gave a short presentation.
Dr. Michael Yin, CEO of Mozat, said, “We are very honored to receive the Best Entertainment Service Award in this year’s competition. This is very important to us because it indicates Morange has been recognized by both mobile experts and ordinary users in China. Morange is our key product, which was developed in Singapore and released in the end of 2006. It has accumulated millions of global users and has been recognized internationally.”
Earlier this year, Morange was nominated as one of the ‘Top Innovator’ mobile applications at GSMA in Barcelona, the world’s largest mobile exhibition. In the coming years, Mozat is working to bring Morange to China and localize the Morange service according to the expectations of Chinese users. The mission of Mozat is to unleash the power of any mobile phone and to establish a mobile communication and social-networking platform for every mobile user.
Added Dr. Yin: “We believe Morange will change people’s mobile lifestyle and we hope everyone will enjoy Morange and support us.”
Morange, a leading appliction suite for all your communication needs, can be downloaded at www.morange.com. A beta version of Morange V is now available for testing. Morange currently has several million registered users, mainly in Asia, and has seen a doubling of its user base in the first half of 2008.
About Morange
Morange is a Mobile Social Networking application and service platform with the following features:
- Global friends searching and chatting
- Mobile Photo Sharing
- Mobile “Sayings”
- Instant Messaging (MSN, Talk, Yahoo! Messenger, ICQ and AIM).
- Push Email
- Integrated Web Browser
- Global Weather
For more information, please visit www.morange.com
About MOZAT Pte Ltd
MOZAT Pte Ltd was incorporated in 2003 by a group of PhD research scholars from the National University of Singapore. With offices in Singapore, Guanzhou and Shanghai, the company has a strong focus on internal research and development. The company is currently providing custom implementations of Morange to a series of leading mobile operators around the world.
MOZAT has won industry awards by providing complete, reliable and scalable mobility solutions that work across devices and geographies. The mission of MOZAT is to establish a global mobile community and let people communicate without boundaries.
For more information, please visit www.mozat.com
About “The Golden Olive Award”
The 3rd China Mobile Application Golden Olive Awards showcased China’s mobile content industry and recognized the technical innovations of Chinese mobile developers and content creators. The Golden Olive Awards ran from April 1 to June 26, 2008 and nominations were submitted on the competition’s official website www.goldenoliveaward.cn
Sony Ericsson Developer World sponsored 16 of the award categories, in what translates from Chinese as the “Sony Ericsson Cup”, including mobile music, imaging, games, themes, flash and mobile Internet.
“By sponsoring these awards, we place great emphasis on China’s wireless content and application development, and show our respect for China’s content developers. At the same time, we hope that, through the award nominations, we will see more new, innovative and interesting content and applications become available for Sony Ericsson’s mobile phones in China,” said James Liu, Manager of Sony Ericsson Developer World China.
For more information, please visit http://www.goldenoliveaward.cn/
GetJar
Getjar.com
April 2nd, 2008 - Sophisticated free mobile applications including social networking, video and messaging products have firmly established themselves as mass market leaders, according to data from GetJar (www.getjar.com/wap.getjar.com), the world’s leading mobile applications portal. With over 200 million applications downloaded from GetJar in the last two years alone, trends show that free application content is driving both product development and user activity across the mobile landscape.
“As the quality, variety and relevance of free mobile applications has grown, so specialist, niche products have become mass market brands,” explained Ilja Laurs, Founder and CEO of GetJar. “The hottest free applications including Mig33, eBuddy and cellity are see massive growth in user numbers, and will continue to do so as major industry forces such as carriers expand their offering of free applications.”
GetJar is also seeing significant developer and users interest in personal productivity applications, such as calendars, reminders and synchronisation tools, especially for the Windows Mobile and BlackBerry platforms. Video applications are also growing in popularity, with current offerings overcoming some of the problems associated with mobile video in the past, such as their ability to deal with multiple video formats, and the amount of quality video content available to users.
GetJar predicts that GPS technology is likely to provide further impetus to the mobile application market. As phones are increasingly manufactured with powerful in-built GPS capabilities, the variety of applications is likely to grow dramatically. “This will include both functional applications of the type we all know already, such as navigation, to much more elaborate GPS-based games, where the user location is central to gameplay,” predicted Laurs.
While mobile games remain very popular, the extent to which they are being downloaded now makes up no more than 20% of all mobile applications, according to GetJar. “The popularity of all the other types of mobile application demonstrate the sheer diversity of use to which mobiles are now put,” said Laurs.
About GetJar
Founded in 2004, GetJar (www.getjar.com/wap.getjar.com) is the world’s most popular mobile application distribution and developer community, with over 200,000 registered developer and beta-tester accounts.
GetJar operates a groundbreaking business model in which all industry groups from consumers and developers to publishers and advertisers are connected in an interactive environment, which also gives users an active role in product development.
With over 200 million downloads from the site in just two years, and currently averaging over 8 million downloads per month, GetJar sits at the heart of the mobile development world, with visitors to the site coming from 135 countries worldwide.
GetJar is based in the UK and Lithuania.
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