HTML5, the future of the web.

More and more game companies are turning to the HTML5 web format to create cross-platform games. The latest is Pangalore, a social and mobile game startup based in Seoul.

Pangalore was founded in May to create games that can run on multiple platforms by using HTML5 as their technical foundation. Pangalore built from scratch a game engine that can work within the limits of HTML5, said Doyon Kim, chief product officer and co-founder of the company who runs the office in San Jose, Calif., in an interview.

Pangalore is announcing two new Facebook and mobile games today: Artfit and Wild West Solitaire. Both are slow-moving, cartoon-like titles that accommodate the main weakness of HTML5 now: slow speed. Pangalore is also working on two more titles, Pop the Candy and Bubble Prince, for release later. Kim says the company will release titles every couple of months.

“The benefit of HTML5 games is that you can start them on one platform and then finish them on another,” Kim said. “We designed our games from the start to be multiplatform games.”

While young, the company has a big staff. It has 25 employees and funding from NHN, the largest online game portal in Korea. The good thing about HTML5 games is they can run on just about any platform, from Facebook to Android phones and tablets. It runs on browsers on mobile devices, PCs, and Macs. Pangalore is also making native format games for the Apple iPhone.

Kim said that deeper strategy and role-playing games are in the works as well, using the Unity 3D game engine. Those games, including a simulation title, will be coming in early 2012. Among the team are some experienced game creators including those who created Ragnarok Online, a massively multiplayer online role-playing game with 3 million players in North America.

The games are free-to-play and are accessible from a single Facebook account that works across all devices. Kim co-founded the firm with Brian Kang, former chief executive of Gravity and a former venture capitalist. Kim previously founded Dialpad Communications, Opinity and Spotplex. Rivals included other HTML5 game makers such as Moblyng and Zynga.

The Wild West Solitaire game sets players on a card-playing journey along the historic Oregon Trail, where you race against the clock or friends to play solitaire challenges. Artfit is a falling blocks game where players must place the pieces into forms to score points and advance through increasingly complex levels. Over time, HTML5 is expected to show better performance so that a wider variety of games will be playable on it. Pangalore hopes to be ready when that happens.

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Study from Yahoo shows that 50 percent of all tweets come from just 20,000 users

This is a shocking result. 50 percent of all tweets come from just 20,000 users. Via: TheNextWeb.com's Article. View Full Article:

In a recent study by Yahoo Research, 50 percent of all tweets consumed are reportedly generated from just 20,000 elite users. Media presents the bulk of the information, where celebrities are the most followed.

These supposed 20K elite users only represent 0.05% of the actual Twitter population, though dominate the information that most of us on Twitter regurgitate to others on the platform.

“It’s really dominated by this media-celebrity-blogger elite,” says Duncan Watts, one of the researchers. “It’s a small number of users who are hyperconnected, and then there’s everybody else just paying attention to those people.”

Of the 50 million Twitter users who actively log in every day, not all of them are tweeting. In fact, we already know that most of these users are simply digesting tweets and consuming content. The study also confirms what I’ve previously mentioned: Bloggers rebroadcast the most information, with other bloggers tending to follow blogging accounts, celebrities following celebrities, and so on.

From personal experience, I definitely tend to rebroadcast or tweet content from accounts that have more credibility — I like knowing that my own followers can rely on me for sourcing accurate or credible news. However, it’s true that the Twitter experience would not be what it is without the mixing pot of content streaming in from friends and family.

If Twitter content was restricted solely to tweets from the 20,000 elite accounts, I just wouldn’t enjoy the platform as much. Half the fun on Twitter for me or any other active user, I’m sure, is the back-and-forth feedback coming in from both those we follow as well as our own following.

Knowing the above, however, I’m curious: Do you think you’re following one of the 20,000 elite users, keeping in mind that these accounts mainly consist of celebrities, bloggers and media broadcasters? And do you tend to rebroadcast content from these accounts, or more typically from your friends and family? Weigh in below.

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Facebook Now Has Over 800 Million Active Users

It has been announced that the world’s most popular social networking service has reached over 800 million active users.

The 800 million figure isn’t just the total number of signups, these are 800 million active users: users who have logged in to Facebook at least once during the past 30 days. Now that’s a big, big achievement for FaceBook!

Read more: http://blog.dreamstarts.in/facebook-now-has-over-800-million-active-users/

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WDYL.com by google – What Do You Love?

www.wdyl.com is Google's new product based search engine that was launched quietly today. WDYL (What Do You Love?) lets you search across all the google products like 'Google Translate', 'Google Trends', 'Google Books', 'Sketchup', 'YouTube', 'Google Alerts' at one place.

As usual the user interface of WDYL is very simple and clean with single search box with a button image of white heart on blue background. Cute... The interesting part is that when you brows WDYL without www., you get a 404 (page not found) error.

Type in search box and click on heart, WDYL will display search result from different google’s products on single page neatly arranged in a grid format. There’s a slider on the left part of the page which you can move to quickly access bottom of the page. A big thing that is missing here is Google search result. I think Google search result was supposed to be the first one to be included in this. I have no idea why Google has excluded "Google Search Result" from WDYL?

The concept of WDYL reminds me of iGoogle, a service that lets you add simple apps/websites to your own personalized portal. Overall, it’s a cool idea. You will be able to browse more of the found content without leaving the page. I also found out a few Google products that I didn’t know existed. Cool Idea but I can’t see much use of it in long term. I am including WDYL in my Google’s failed products list. Just another failed product by Google.


WDYSAWDYL (What Do You Say About WDYL(What Do You Love?)?). Why don’t you try out WDYL with different search query and share your interesting discoveries and experiences with me through comment to this post below?

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Google +1 Vs Facebook like button

For past two-three months, google has been using google’s + 1 button on its websites and this is also available to the third party websites. Google +1 button wants to encourage user engagement and social interaction. This is an interesting idea, clearly influenced by the Facebook “Like” button.

With a single click, Google users can recommend a service, a website, an article, or a topic. Consequently, their friends, families, networks or even the rest of the world may easily see their recommendations. For example say you want to search best pub in Bangalore and you will be able to see recommended pub sites, your friend has pressed the +1 Button on. This is an interesting idea, clearly influenced by the Facebook “Like” button, but very much depends on people taking the time to press the +1 button. The Like button on Facebook allows users to publicly show they like a certain person, status, event etc. meaning it is far more a tool of self-expression than recommendation. Both Facebook’s like and Google’s +1 button aim to increase users’ exposure and awareness to an association of persons of the same trade, pursuits or mutual interests, and subsequently gather them through a social network.

Google and Facebook values what their users are sharing with their friends. They use this to know more about the users and to be able to place appropriate ads (targeted marketing) on web pages. Google will be able to personalize the user's search result and search ads. With the help of the +1 button, people with Google accounts who are signed in may see the recommendations from people in their Gmail or Google Talk chat list.

In my opinion, Google +1 will not be able to compete with Facebook in the social networking arena. Facebook has the edge in this area because its users spend a lot of time sharing their thoughts, links, and photos to their friends. This is a problem for Google because the Google doesn't have access to this information and it can’t be indexed as well.

My concern is, do we really need Google +1? We already have FaceBook, Twitter, LinkedIn and hundreds of social networking websites too. I think Google has arrived too late to make a big impact in the social networking world. Is google +1 another failed products by google?

I have added +1 button at the start and at the end of this post. Please do share it.

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Google to scan 250,000 old British Library books

Google Books has an ambitious mission statement: "Google Books is an effort to make all of the knowledge contained within the world's books searchable online."

That's a tall order, but the company will make a dent in it with a new agreement to scan 250,000 books from the British Library.

The books, pamphlets, and periodicals are all out of copyright and come from between 1700 and 1870. This is a nice companion project to the British Library's new 19th Century Books app that will eventually put thousands of old books on your iPad.

To put it in perspective, these books were generated during some famous events you may have heard of, including the French Revolution, the invention of rail travel, and the end of slavery. Google will foot the cost for this mammoth digitizing effort.

The digitized books will be available free online through Google Books and the British Library site. Readers will be able to view, copy, and share the text for non-commercial uses.

Thank you Google. I appreciate it.

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Epic Browser 1.2 : India’s first-ever Web-Browser

We had received an e-mail announcing the release of Epic Browser 1.2. For those who doesn't know about Epic browser, Epic browser is India's first-ever web browser developed by a Bangalore based Internet company "Hidden Reflex". Epic has already cleared more than 500,000 downloads in 178 countries.

• Epic has support for more than 12 Indian languages
  
• It includes more than 1500 apps such as gmail, twitter, facebook, orkut, travel, job, yahoo messenger, gtalk, cricket and games
• This is the first browser which has antivirus and antispyware integrated with it
  
• It has more than 1500 wallpapers and themes
• you can directly access My Computer
  

In newer version of epic, Hidden reflex mainly focused on Epic's speed and Security. These are the two things users always look for in web browser.

Epic 1.2 is faster, leaner and more powerful.

Here are the primary changes done in Epic 1.2.

Faster Load Times: Nearly 20% faster start-up times and faster rendering.

One-Click Super-AntiVirus Scan for file Downloads: When you download a file in Epic, you'll have an option to scan the file first via VirusTotal, our partner. They'll check if the link is considered malicious and scan the linked-to file with 40 different anti-virus engines including Symantic/Norton, McAfee, Kaspersky, K7, AVG, Avira, Panda and 33 other a-v products! They have removed antivirus scanner which was causing instability.

Facebook, twitter with Popup Alerts: Complete facebook, twitter sidebar.

Hide-able sidebar: You can hide the sidebar for more browsing space.

Easy Access to Auto-Saved Text Fields: If your computer crashes while you were typing a long e-mail, Epic saves your text and nothing is lost!

I have been using it from last 3 months and let me tell you this is awesome. Speed is still a concern but I am sure it will improve in every version. Epic is "all in one" browser.

You can download Epic from it's official site http://www.epicbrowser.com/index.html. I have only one request to my readers, use it, give feedback and promote this Indian browser.

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Internet Explorer 9 : First look

Internet Explorer 9 (IE9) is upcoming new browser by Microsoft. Microsoft has released its Beta version 3 days back on 28^th October. Internet Explorer 9 is Hardware-accelerated HTML5. Internet Explorer 9 moves rendering of text and graphics from the processor, to the graphics card. That means, your website’s contents/images will be clearer and video will play smoother on Internet explorer – 9. When I first came to know about IE9, I had few questions in my mind.

1. is it fast enough?
2. is it compatible with different versions of windows?
3. What are the new security features in this new browser?
4. is it good/cool enough to win back former IE users who have migrated to Firefox, chrome and other browser?

Geek’s review:

The first thing which disappointed me a lot, was the system requirements. IE9 is not supported in windows XP & is only for windows 7 and Vista (32 and 64 bits). Thus answering to my 2nd question of compatibility. Sadly Microsoft has ignored its best OS the Windows XP. How hard is it for Microsoft to make a version compatible to windows XP? I still do not understand why Microsoft is wasting money and time on Vista & why Microsoft wants to kill windows XP?

Any way you can download its beta version from http://windows.microsoft.com/en-US/internet-explorer/download/ie-9/worldwide, the size of the installer is around 19 MB and installation is very slow, frustrating and forces you to restart your system after installation. But in the end I was able to install it on my laptop.

First look of IE9:

Ya, it's impressive. It is clean, simple and very minimalist. The address bar box works both as address bar and the search box. Browser options like home, file, history, bookmarks and tools are shifted to top right of the browser and represented by 3 icons only.

Pin website: IE9 has this very impressive feature to pin your favorite website in task bar as apps. You will just need to drag the favicon from the IE9 box down to your taskbar so that whenever you want to open this website just click on the icon in taskbar.

But how much is the use of this functionality is still to be seen? I really do not want to fill my task bar with different websites. Or my task bar space will not be enough for it. As a developer I would like to develop an app or add-ons which will show me the option to choose the website from pined websites when I do a right click on my task bar. Actually this will be very useful for the user if we integrate this option with “pin the website” feature. Regarding to website apps pining functionality I would say it’s new, refreshing but not much useful.

HTML-5 Test (How well does your website support HTML-5?) : Microsoft says that IE9 supports HTML-5 and CSS-3. But when I did html-5 test on http://www.html5test.com/ IE9 scored only 96/300 when firefox 3.6 scored around 130 and chrome scores 231 out of 300. IE9 is lacking behind in HTML-5 support by a huge margin in comparison to chrome and firefox. But ya, there is definitely an improvement from IE8 to IE9. IE 8 scores only 26 in HTML-5 test.

Speed/Security/other features: I can clearly see IE9 is faster than firefox 3.6 but slower than chrome. IE9 has no default ad blocker integrated with it. IE9 uses SmartScreen filter that warns you if the website that you are visiting contains threats.

Finally, Microsoft has realized where search box should be open when we press Ctrl-f. In IE9 it gets opened in the top of the browser just below URL bar, not like IE 8 which opens search bar in the middle of page.

Well, IE9 is cool, cleaner, simpler, fast and secure. Now all 3 browser giants are at equal level. Browser war is on now. This is a very good move by Microsoft to get back it's browser market share. It will be very interesting to watch how browser users will reply to IE9. For me, all three are equals now. I have more option now. But still my priority will be chrome-> Firefox -> IE9.

Write your IE9 experience or your questions about IE9 as comment to this post. Remember IE9 is still in Beta version. Use it on your own risk.

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Oracle’s strategic acquisitions

This is a guest article by a very good friend of mine and author of www.mindcron.com.

Mergers, Takeovers, Buying businesses and Strategic acquisitions are the best management activity to become the no. 1 and expanding the business throughout the globe. Most of the corporate icons have eagle eyes for the strategic acquisitions in current corporate scenario.

Why not? There are lots of successful examples in front of us. Mittal Steel Company is sitting on the top of the steel world, Bharti Airtel has got 5th ranking in telecom industries after acquiring Zain and there are lots of lot stories.

IT industries are more aggressive in acquisitions and mergers. Microsoft has more than 200, IBM has more than 90, HP has around 100, CISCO has more than 140 and TCS has around 12 acquisitions and mergers to show global presence.

ORACLE is not lagging behind of anybody and has a remarkable record of corporate strategic acquisitions in the world of information technologies.

DATABASE e-Test (March 2008) Innobase (October 2005) Moniforce (December 2007) mValent (February 2009) Secerno (May 2010) (pending) Sleepycat (February 2006) TimesTen (June 2005) TripleHop (June 2005) APPLICATIONS AppForge (April 2007) Haley (October 2008) Interlace Systems (October 2007) LogicalApps (October 2007) Market2Lead (May 2010) Silver Creek Systems (January 2010) TempoSoft (December 2005) PRODUCT LINES Agile (May 2007) Hyperion (March 2007) PeopleSoft (January 2005) Primavera (October 2008) Siebel (January 2006) Telephony@Work (June 2006) IMPLEMENTATION AND INTEGRATION TOOLS Global Knowledge Software (GKS) (July 2008) SERVER AND STORAGE SYSTEMS Sun (April 2009) Virtual Iron (May 2009) INDUSTRY SOLUTIONS Communications and Media Convergin (February 2010) eServGlobal's Universal Service Platform (USP) (May 2010) (pending) HotSip (February 2006) MetaSolv Software (October 2006) Net4Call (April 2006) Netsure Telecom Limited (September2007) Portal Software (April 2006) Sophoi (October 2009) INSURANCE AdminServer (May 2008) Skywire Software (June 2008)

MIDDLEWARE AmberPoint (February 2010) BEA (January 2008) Bharosa (July 2007) Bridgestream (September 2007) Captovation (January 2008) ClearApp (September 2008) Context Media (July 2005) HyperRoll (September 2009) GoldenGate (July 2009) Java (April 2009) Oblix (March 2005) OctetString (November 2005) Sigma Dynamics (August 2006) Stellent (November 2006) Sunopsis (October 2006) Tacit Software (November 2008) Tangosol (March 2007) Thor Technologies (November 2005) ENGINEERING AND CONSTRUCTION Primavera (October 2008) FINANCIAL SERVICES i-flex (August 2005) HEALTH SCIENCES Phase Forward (April 2010) (pending) Relsys (March 2009) INDUSTRIAL MANUFACTURING Agile (May 2007) Conformia Software (June 2009) Demantra (June 2006) G-Log (September 2005) RETAIL 360Commerce (January 2006) Advanced Visual Technology (AVT) (October 2008) ProfitLogic (July 2005) Retek (April 2005) UTILITIES LODESTAR (April 2007) SPL WorldGroup (November 2006)

Position associated with oracle after acquisitions:

• 11 of the top 11 global aerospace and defence companies run Oracle's mission-critical back-office applications and technology
• 9 of the top 10 global aerospace and defence companies run Oracle's Siebel customer-facing applications
• 8 of the top 10 European Union member Ministries of Defence run Oracle applications
• 20 of the top 20 global automotive OEMs and suppliers depend on Oracle applications to accelerate innovation and time to market.
• 15 of the top 15 North American automotive OEMs rely on Oracle applications to optimize their demand-driven supply chains.
• 15 of the top 15 Fortune 500 automotive manufacturers run Oracle software and hardware
• 5 of the top 10 global chemical companies run Oracle applications
• 8 of the top 12 high performance chemical companies run Oracle applications
• 2,700 chemical companies run Oracle technology
• 780 chemical companies run Oracle applications
• 98 of the top 100 telcos run Oracle Applications
• 97 of the top 100 telcos run Oracle Fusion Middleware
• 100 of the top 100 telcos run Oracle Database
• 10 of the top 10 network equipment providers rely on Oracle's Sun hardware
• 43 of the largest U.S. school districts run Oracle applications
• 10 of the top 10 academic universities worldwide run Oracle applications
• 10 of the top 10 research universities run Oracle applications
• 15 of the top academic institutions in Europe run Oracle applications
• 8 of the 11 Big 10 university conferences in the U.S. run Oracle applications
• Oracle is #1 in Financial Services customer relationship management
• Oracle is #1 in Financial Services human capital management
• 20 of the 20 top banks run Oracle
• 9 of the top 10 securities firms use Oracle applications
• 4 of the top 5 mutual fund companies use Oracle applications
• 4 of the top 5 world stock exchanges use Oracle applications
• 40 of the top 40 high technology companies run Oracle
• 30 of the top 30 Electronic OEMs run Oracle applications and technology
• 8 of the top 10 Semiconductor companies run Oracle applications
• 14 of the top 25 High Technology Distributors run Oracle applications
• 10 of the top 10 Fabless Semiconductor companies run Oracle applications
• 8 of the top 10 Electronic Manufacturing Services (EMS) companies run Oracle applications
• 9 of the top 10 Software companies run Oracle applications
• 9 of the top 10 global manufacturing giants run Oracle applications
• 9 of the top 10 Fortune's Most Admired Firms run Oracle applications
• 10 of the top 15 office equipment manufacturers run Oracle applications
• 20 of the top 20 insurance companies run Oracle applications
• 20 of the top 20 pharmaceutical companies run Oracle applications
• 10 of the top 10 contract research organizations (CRO) run Oracle Applications
• 20 of the top 20 medical device companies run Oracle applications
• All of the entertainment companies in the Global 500 run Oracle Applications
• 12 of the top 15 U.S. media companies run Oracle applications
• 6 of the top 15 publishing houses run Oracle applications
• 6 of the top 12 U.S. newspapers run Oracle applications
• 3 of the 4 major U.S. television networks run Oracle applications
  
• 3 of the top 4 global advertising organizations run Oracle applications
  
• More than 160 upstream companies run Oracle applications
• 9 of the top 10 oilfield service companies from Reuters Online run Oracle applications
  
• More than 100 downstream companies run Oracle applications
  
• 9 of the top 10 integrated oil companies from the PFC Energy 50 run Oracle applications for their downstream businesses.
• 9 of the top 10 Global IT Services firms run Oracle applications
• 8 of the top 10 "Best Firms to Work for" in Consulting Magazine run Oracle applications
  
• 27 of the top 35 companies on InformationWeek's list of most innovative consulting and business services firms run Oracle applications
• 10 of the top 10 leading outsourcing service providers run Oracle
  
• 20 of the top 20 global retailers run Oracle
• 10 of the top 10 global fashion retailers run Oracle
• 20 of the top 20 global grocers run Oracle
• 10 of the top 10 European retailers run Oracle
  
• 10 of the top 10 North American retailers run Oracle
  
• 10 of the 10 top hotels get better results with Oracle
  
• 4 of the 5 top ports get better results with Oracle
  

• Let’s go for another!!!

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Google's Failed Products

"GOOGLE", whenever we hear this word there is only one thing which comes to our mind i.e "INNOVATION". Yes, Google is a synonym of "SUCCESS" and "INNOVATION" and my readers might have observed that till now we (Team GeekOnNet) have written only about it’s successful projects/product or successful innovation. But this time we are going to change the trend and we are going to write about Google’s failed product/project

My readers must be wondering, but it's true. Like other biggies (Microsoft, Apple etc.) Google too has a list of failed products/projects . Let's discuss some of its biggest flop products one by one.

1) Google Video: It was a clone of Youtube and other video sharing sites, But unfortunately it wasn’t able to generate traffic or revenue. This product became useless after the acquisition of youtube. I have no idea why is google video still alive.

2) Google Lively: Lively was a Three-Dimensional universe where user could create different 3-d a avtar and could interact with other avtars. Google launched Lively on July 8, 2008 as an experiment in providing people with more ways to express themselves on the Web. Again, people didn’t like it and google had to close down this project on 31 dec 2008.

3) Google Buzz: Yes, I am considering this Twitter look-a-like product as failed product. I have already predicted that this product is not going to be as useful as other Google products are.

4) Orkut: issshh... Is it a failed product? I think it is a semi failed product. As you can see in my "war of online social networks" post, orkut has least number of active users compared to 2 other biggies like Facebook and MySpace. Orkut is popular in south Asian countries like India, Pakistan and South American countries like Brazil, Argentina etc.

5) Friend Connect: Friend Connect allows users on the internet to connect with their friends on different websites. I see only few websites and blogs are using this service.

6) Wave: I have no idea what is happening with this over hyped product.

7) Google Page Creator: Google Page Creator was a website creation and hosting service by Google. The service had been shut down in 2009, while existing published pages migrated to Google Sites.

8) Google latitude: I have not heard a too much about this product. This product allows a mobile phone user to allow certain people to track their location.

There are few other products like Knol, Google Health which never met their target audience and became useless. Sometimes it happens that our expectations and predictions go wrong. I think the above list is not too big for a company like Google.

I am sure we will keep loving Google even after seeing the above list. Google is something which has changed everyone's life and continues to make life more comfortable.

If you have any other Google’s failed product in your mind please write as comment to this post. I will add that to my list.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I would like to thank Mr. Sanjit for his valuable information. I am enhancing the above list.
iGoogle, Google click-to-call, Google NoteBook, Google SideWiki, GOOG-411, Google Answers
Thanks again!!!

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Decorate Your Google Search Home Page.

Google is always upto something new. But this time it enters the already trodden path of Microsoft's Bing. Like Bing it would give you an option of personalizing your search background. Bing had this feature right since its launch.

How does one configure it? Its very simple, go to the Google search home page, you can see a link "Change background image" on the bottom left of the page. Click on the link and you get a popup where you can upload your favorite image from your PC, from your picasa album or from google's public album.
Upload the image and you are done. Your favorite search engine page is now customized and personalized for you.

If you really like the old black & white classy background, click on link "Remove background image" and revert your changes.

What is Google trying to prove with this feature? Is Google trying to say that it's main competitor is Bing? I have almost forgotten Bing, but thanks to Google, I am reminded of Bing again. Is Google forcing us to use Bing?

Please write your ideas and views as comments to this post.

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FireFox 3.6

You often see a pop up window in order to upgrade your older version of firefox. More than 1 million users have downloaded and installed firefox 3.6 since its launch in mid January.

I have observed that since last week or two this pop up is appearing rather frequently. Does this mean that Mozilla is aggressively forcing us to upgrade our firefox?

This popup window appears after 60 seconds of keyboard activities and comes with 3 options "Ask Later", "No Thanks" and "Get the New Version". If you opt for "Ask Later" the popup window will come after 24 hours. If you chose - "No Thanks" and decide later to upgrade firefox, you will just need to run "Check for Updates" from help menu.

Performance: According to Mozilla, Firefox 3.6 is some three times faster than Firefox 3.0, and about 20% faster than 3.5. The most noticeable new feature in the new Mozilla browser is Personas, which allows users to personalize the look of Firefox. Other new features are, a "plug-in updater" that will detect out-of-date plug-ins, "form complete", and open video and audio via HTML 5 for full-screen display and poster frames.

Firefox 3.6 is not a major release so please do not expect any revolutionary changes in web browser technology.

Should we dump IE (Internet Explorer)? Tell me your answer as comment to this post.

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Social Wars!!

"When everyone is playing social games with friends, then why play akele?" This is the main tagline of an Indian social networking website for its recently launched social games. Being a Internet freak I feel that these games are just a newer version of the old stand-alone games. With better internet speeds and lots of social networking, the games have spread their wings from just being played on standalone PCs to now being played directly in the cloud. We can name this family of games as Game 2.0.

Game 2.0 is simply an integration of simple games made on some server side scripts, action scripts like JS or ajax, Flash and implemented on Web 2.0 (aka social networking).

For the newbies, let me tell you that social games are web based games which you can play with friends, mostly on social networking sites like Facebook, Orkut, Myspace etc. In this post I will give a brief about the biggest players in development of social games, and compare them in terms of market share, funding, revenue and business model.

We are already familiar with the popularity of the first generation social networking startups like Facebook, Myspace, Orkut etc. Now a new generation of application developers have taken center stage, who are based mostly on these gen1 social networking sites, and are making big money. The top 3 in my list are:

1. Company: Zynga (www.zynga.com)
   Funding: $219M
   Major Apps: Farmville- 61M Players, Mafia Wars- 25.8M , Yoville- 19.8M, Texas Hold Em’ Poker- 18.3M
   Revenue: Estimated $200M
   Zynga is a srong candidate for 2010 IPO.
2. Company: Playfish (www.playfish.com)
   Acquired: by Electronic Arts (EA Sports) for $400M
   Major Apps: Pet Society- 20.5M, Restaurant City-17.3M, Country Story- 8M
   Revenue: Estimated $135M
3. Company: Playdom (www.playdom.com)
   Funding: $47M
   Major Apps: Mobsters -14M, Bumper Stickers-11.7M, Own Your Friends-10.1M, Sorority Life-7.1M, Mobsters 2-3.5M, Poker Palace- 1.5M
   Revenue: Estimated $60M
   

Let me just remind you that these companies are startups and have existed for not more than three years. So, how are they making this much of BIG money? All of them have two revenue models, and these two models are like the necessary practices for companies in this domain.

• The first model is very simple and straight forward. It begins when you start playing any of these games. Initially everything is free in the game. But as you move ahead in the game you will need a lot of virtual stuff - like seeds for your farm or guns for your gang - which you would have to buy from an online store using a credit card, PayPal etc. The idea is very simple here - get addicted to the free version, then start spending real money for virtual stuff. Playdom has gone a step ahead and even opened offline stores for virtual goods.
  
• The second model is the traditional online revenue model using ad clicks, lead generation and toolbar installation, but in an entirely new fashion. If you do not have a credit card or a PayPal account, then you sign up on some other website to get virtual money, which you can use to buy some virtual stuff. The cache here is that when you sign up for that website you are actually generating leads for them. When you signed up on the other website, the gaming company gets real money for the lead generation. You can call this SGL (Social Game Lead), and this lead to companies is a guaranteed lead, as the user needs the virtual stuff, which means he is willing to pay if you can sell him the virtual stuff, i.e. if you can do some SGM (Social Game Marketing).
  
• Toolbar installation revenue model is more interesting. When you install a toolbar, it will make Ask.com (say) the default search engine on your browser. Ask.com makes money from search ads and pays money to gaming company or the toolbar developer for every installation of the toolbar. Ask.com pays about $1-$2 for every installation. Just imagine how the money is flowing back to the game developer. Ask --> Toolbar developer -->Zynga --> Facebook (for ads) --> Zynga. This is an endless circle. Hats off to this revenue model.

In the beginning of this post I had quoted a tagline - ...why play akele (i.e. why play alone)? This tagline is being used by an upcoming Indian social gaming website - Ibibo.com. The tagline suggests how new players are trying to capture the potentially large Indian market. The reason I wrote 'potentially' large market was that though the Indian market is very large, but the revenue models might not work out here that easily. You will find less than 5% of the Indian gamers buying online stuff. So, your game might be a very big hit here, but you might not be making any money out of it.

If you were not able to make money out of this market, then this potentially big market could turn out into a potential risky market. Another reason why I say so is that these game developers are not paying any attention to localization, rather Indian-ization, of the games. The big developers have simply imported their international versions to India, and the local developers are merely copying the international games. They have not even cared to give Indian names. For instance, Ibibo has a game called Teen Patti, which is a card game. They have explained the rules using names like Aces and Jacks, which most of the Indian audience would not understand. Had they cared to mentioned that Ace means 'Ekka' and Jack means 'Gulaam' the public out here would have simply loved it.

Zynga and Playdom have opened up their Indian development centers in Bangalore, and they are planning to develop games purely for the Indian audience. I hope they keep their promise, and also hope that the Indian developers like Ibibo give some genuine thought rather than simply copying ideas. The competition is going to become more fierce as biggies like EA are soon going to join the race.

We still have a few unanswered questions to ponder over - will the potentially big Indian market grow into a real market for the developers, and what new things can be integrated with social networks to make more money out of this seemingly big market?

Your views and comments are welcome.

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