Recently in mobile social networking Category

Verizon is now offering Social Beat, a free social media application that allows Verizon Wireless customers  to easily interact with  their mobile social networking with a single app on their LG enV , LG Chocolate or feature phones.

Social Beat makes it easy for Verizon Wireless customers to connect to popular social media sites, including Facebook, MySpace and Twitter.  Social Beat also displays more than 50 customer-selected feeds from the hottest names in news, sports and entertainment sources, which can be viewed in one central location. Customers can easily view and manage their social networks through live feeds and real-time notifications.

When customers sign in to Social Beat, they can easily view friends' activity, news feeds, status updates and new photos. Customers can even post new status messages and tweets, send comments and messages, and receive updates from their personalized news section through a single stream on their mobile phone in real time.

Social Beat is available now to Verizon Wireless customers as a free download on more than 20 feature phones, including the LG enV, enV2, enV3, the LG Chocolate, and Chocolate 3, as well as many other popular Verizon Wireless handsets. Customers can download Social Beat from their wireless phones by selecting Get Going in the Media Center/Get It Now®, by texting SOCIAL to APPS (2777) or by visiting the online media store at http://www.mediastore.verizonwireless.com or http://bit.ly/socialbeat.

AT&T has launched an app for social butterflies who want to be in multiple places at one time. AT&T Social Net, a free mobile social networking application that combines access to Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and customizable news feeds within a single application. The apps works on many of the popular AT&T feature/texting/web phones such as LG (Vu, Neon, Shine, etc), Motorola RAZR and Samsung (Jack, Propel, Eternity, Impression.)

Through a single carousel menu, users can view and manage their social communities, communicate and track events in real time, and get live news feeds from over 35 leading news, sports, and entertainment sites. Once a user populates the application with his or her information, users can see and respond to tweets, status updates, wall posts, profile comments, photo activity and friends' news feeds across their communities. Users can also access new or unread articles from their customized content feeds.

Users can even be notified that they have updates on their social networking accounts when the AT&T Social Net application is closed. When certain actions like comments from a friend, new wall posts or photo updates occur, users will receive a pop-up notification with an option to launch the application and check their updates. Users who wish to disable this notification feature can do so in the application's settings menu.

Customers can download AT&T Social Net at no cost in the AT&T MEdia Mall, accessible directly from handsets and online at www.att.com/mediamall. Standard data and messaging rates apply during use of the application, and an unlimited data plan is strongly recommended. For more information on AT&T's data and messaging plans, go to www.att.com.

"Five of the top 10 searches on our mobile Web portal are for social networking sites, a clear indication of the growing popularity of mobile social networking," said Mark Collins, vice president of voice and data products, AT&T Mobility and Consumer Markets. "With this app, we're satisfying the increasing demand for aggregation apps that make it easy for customers to be active in multiple communities simultaneously."

Moblyng Games’ m:Mafia is now available in the Ovi Store.Moblyng Games’ titles allow players to connect with friends across multiple networks and devices, including Facebook, the iPhone, Android and the Nokia 5800 and N97 more platforms than any other social gaming developer.

“Nokia has the distinction of servicing a vast majority of the world-wide wireless market,” said Stewart Putney, CEO and founder, Moblyng Games. “Adding the Nokia platform and the Ovi Store marks a step for Moblyng Games towards global mobile gaming — a feat we are proud to pioneer. Each time we add to the list of supported Moblyng Games devices and markets, truly cross-platform gaming becomes available to millions of additional players, and that is revolutionary.”

Wouldn't it be nice, if you could let all your friends or family know what you are up to to in a few clicks without hassling with lots of typing and entering updates into several different social networking sites?

The quub, (pronounced cube) app for BlackBerry ( BlackBerry Bold, BlackBerry 8800 Series, BlackBerry Curve 8300/8900 and BlackBerry Storm) helps users update their status with predictive pre-populated suggestions and then automatically updates status to Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Hi5, Tumblr, Plaxo, MySpace, Plurk, IM platforms and the quub web interface.

You could say quub is instant social-networking updater app. We named it our BlackBerry (Storm) App of the Day, because it helps everyone socialize and know what's going on with friends.

Say for example, you leave the office to go to Starbucks and you usually go around 3:00pm, when you begin to enter "Starbucks on Main St,'" the quub app will suggest your most probable choices for that time of day. quub for BlackBerry also offers pre-written choices, limiting the need for typing. Your friends then receive that update on whatever platform your chose and can contact you quickly to let you know that they can meet you there for some java.

Other uses  of quub for BlackBerry  include posting a status that you are driving or going a plane, letting people know not to bug you. Family members could use the service to all meet at the same place at one time.

Windows have released a Facebook app especially for Windows Mobile smartphones.  They claim it is the first app to enable users to upload video directly from their handsets to their Facebook pages.

The best part of the Windows Mobile Facebook app is the integration contacts, calendar and data in the phone. Facebook events can be syncedto the phone's calendar. The app can sync in Facebook friends' phone numbers and profile pictures to the phone's contact list.  The shared data can be used to text, call, or message Facebook friends.

Facebook for Windows Mobile gives users the ability to:

• Send messages to any of the people in your Friends list.
• Take pictures and videos on your phone, then upload them right to Facebook.
• Send messages or call people in your Friends list.
• Manage your profile and post anytime, anywhere.
• Status updates right from the phone.
  

A study released using Nielsen Mobile's data, shows mobile user demographics and market penetration of, and

According to Nielsen data from the fourth quarter 2008 SMS Media Report, both services are clear industry leaders with an overwhelming 50 percent of their respective community market share in terms of SMS activity. Twitter's service has grown remarkably in the past year to take the leading position in terms of share of SMS transactions with carrier such as AT&T and Verizon. During the fourth quarter of 2008, it has bypassed other free mobile services including ESPN, Facebook, and Google. At the same time, Predicto remains the undisputed leader in the premium mobile space, further distancing itself from NBC in second place.

MySpace reported that their mobile usage increased almost 450 percent in 2008, with 7 billion mobile page views per month at Nokia Developer Summit 2009. Vice President of Mobile Operations John Faith revealed the growth of MySpace mobile.

In one year, mobile traffic increased from 10 percent of all MySpace traffic to more than 35 percent. They predict in the next few years, 50 percent of all users will access MySpace via mobile.

“We’ve seen greater user engagement in MySpace mobile applications than we have on the mobile web,” said John Faith, “Smartphones are creating a culture of expectations among users.”

32 percent of MySpace’s mobile page views are from accessing profiles, while 19 percent originate from users browsing photos, while another 19 percent are devoted to reading messages. Friend requests make up only 1 percent of mobile views.

When MySpace launched their BlackBerry app it generated more than 400,000 downloads in its first seven days of release.

Some folks who tried the new BlackBerry Facebook app, we mentioned, earlier this week, have had a few problems with the calendar and friends were blasted with requests.

For some using the 1.5. first version Facebook for BlackBerry,  the default calendar could have been replaced by a Facebook calendar.

People who didn't list a phone number on his or her Facebook profile page were sent requests to share numbers.

The new version 1.5.0.32 is now available http://www.blackberry.com/facebook.

MySpace is offering the official MySpace uReport through a partnership with FOX News where people can submit news via MySpace or their mobile device. Users will have the chance to be featured on FOX News.

Currently, one of most recent stories is "Spencers' Bunny" with the description Our dog Spencer was a rescued dog. He makes all of us smile. Our Rabbit Betsy is also a rescued animal and is a diva rabbit.

Ahh citizen journalism .....

Trinity Wall Street Church has taken a mobile approach to Good Friday, they offer a web-based Stations of the Cross.

Stations of the Cross

A contemporary recreation of Christ's Passion, the online Stations allow you to meditate on Christ's final hours at your own pace. Experience the Stations in a modern dramatic recreation including photos, scriptural passages and prayers, and meditative music.

Users find a main image that consist of a cross made up of 14 squares, taken from black and white photos of a recent staging of the Stations in Lower Manhattan. When clicked, each square will open to reveal one station of the cross.

The Passion Play was Tweeted earlier today which  may have been the world's first Passion Play performed through the social networking application Twitter.

MySpace will support Microsoft Windows Mobile and Microsoft Silverlight. The new MySpace mobile application, available this summer, will run on Windows phones and use Silverlight, Microsoft's free browser plug-in.

The companies are in close collaboration to offer a MySpace for Windows Mobile app which will be available for download later this summer.  The application integrates MySpace's main social features and functionality with the Windows operating system to provide access to the community in a way that's familiar to the Windows Mobile user.
 
The MySpace application will be available on Windows Mobile 6.1 phones later this summer and then in the fall of 2009 through the Windows Marketplace for Mobile, directly through phones, and the Web. LG will preload the MySpace application on their Windows phones, making it even easier than ever for users to gain real-time access to their global MySpace network. The new Windows phones are expected to be available in the second half of 2009.
 

According to a new Nielsen report "Global Faces and Networked Places," two-thirds of the world's Internet population visit social networking or blogging sites, accounting for almost 10% of all internet time. Social networking is also becoming more mobile.

Time spent on social network sites is also expanding:  Worldwide 2008 activity in 'Member Communities' accounted for one in every 15 online minutes - now it accounts for one in every 11.

The popularity of social networks increased demand to access them on mobiles. UK mobile web users have the greatest propensity to visit a social network through their handset with 23% of them (2 million people) doing so, compared to 19% in the US (10.6 million people). The numbers of people doing so are a big increase on last year - 249% in the UK and 156% in the US. The report says that at the end of 2008 almost 3 million U.S. users were texting Facebook on a regular basis.

Buongiorno at the Social Networking World Forum in London, revealed the new beta version of blinko

They claim blinko is the first mobile social network which allows users to select 20 people with whom to share constant and meaningful relationships, in total privacy, based at the same time, on timely and up-to-date information.  I

A recent survey conducted by HPLabs and Cornell University has shown revealing data about the fact that each individual is in regular contact with about twenty people, who represent their key points of reference in everyday life. This means that any social network contains two sub-sets: one packed with "acquaintances" with whom we have little genuine interaction and the other, more select but full of interaction and brimming with confidence.

With blinkos exclusive SMS notification service, blinko allows you to use the mobile to share and interact with the top "20 favorites", without necessarily having to start a mobile internet session. blinko users can also send 30 free SMS a day to the circle of "20 favorites", as well as follow up to 10 "Channels".

Fring today announced the launch of a brand new version of its social community and communication service for the new Nokia 5800 touch screen device.

Their news release says, “This has been one of the most hotly anticipated fring launches ever; as soon as Nokia announced the launch of its 5800, fring’s forums, Twitter and Facebook pages have been red hot with fringsters asking for a new fring version to run on the device. “

In response, fring created an early access group of around 100 users to receive R&D versions of the release and provide feedback during the development phase, helping fring to bring its 5800 version to market as quickly as possible and in line with exactly what users really wanted.

The result is a newly designed fring that takes advantage of all of the 5800’s touchscreen features, such as the ability to tilt the screen from profile to landscape and use of the on-screen keyboard.

Users with a 5800 can download the new version of fring now from www.fring.com.

Here's a new twist on contests to get more people to use TurboTax software. TurboTax has launched a campaign through social networking and widgets, only. They launced a  social networking website Freeloader Nation on myspace and are offering games with prizes for social networking status updaters only.

TurboTax SuperStatus is a contest where TurboTax gives users a challenge to solve it by updating their status on Facebook, MySpace and Twitter.

This weeks' prize is to a trip to New York to see a taping of Saturday Night Live by posting a status about TurboTax. Other prizes include, cash, iPods & DVDs, and tickets to sporting events and top NBC shows. The grand prize is a tripled TurboTax Refund up to $25,000. The game can be played through Facebook, Myspace, and Twitter, or all three.

The game requires that the user grab the widget or visit SuperStatusContest.com to find out when each TurboTax SuperStatus game is happening, read the challenge, and check out the prize that's up for grabs.

Then social networkers get to play on one or all of the social networks by updating status with answers to the challenge.There is a deadline and counter clock to see when the contest ends.

How to Play on Twitter:

1. Become a follower of TurboTax on Twitter
   
2. Tweet your response to the challenge
   
3. Increase your chances: play as many times as you want during each challenge countdown. Repeat steps 1 and 2.

The new Late Night with Jimmy Fallon may be a beacon for gamers, mobile social networkers, uber-geeks and technoholics. Gavin Purcell former producer of G4's Attack Of The Show and now co-producer of Late Night with Jimmy Fallon says he will use the latest tech for the show

Late Night with Jimmy Fallon which premieres Monday night already has launched webisodes online.

Purcell said in an interview that his team was trying to get the Palm people on the show to show the Palm Pre.

Fallon said in an interview,  "I'm interested in tech, and I'm interested in gadgets. I want tech people to come on my show, whether it's Bill Gates or the guy who designed the new Palm Pre, to talk about new inventions."

When Jimmy Fallon was asked what will separate his show from other late night show choices, at press conference he answered, "We're younger, we're into, like, tech stuff, gadgets, phones, video games. We'll treat a video-game premiere like a movie premiere. I'm just going to be honest with what I do, what I enjoy."

EDITORS NOTE: As far as we can tell there is no "one guy" who designed the Palm Pre.  The most entertaining televangelist for the Palm Pre is Roger McNamee, in two videos he waxes poetic about the almost physic functionality of the Palm Pre and why he invested in the company. Another important person in the development of the Palm Pre was Jon Rubenstein who came from Apple to revamp the Palm device and OS. Mitch Allen is best at discussing the webOS operating system in the webinar.

iSkoot added Twitter support to its  Kalaida mobile services platform, which can deliver real-time Internet functionality to almost any handset sold today.

iSkoot's Kalaida platform lets consumer handsets connect to Twitter and other communications tools the way PCs do: all at once and in real time. A single sign-in activates all services to keep the experience simple while preserving handset resources and battery life.

"The Kalaida platform works with today's devices and networks to make even the simplest handsets smarter," said Mark Jacobstein, CEO of iSkoot. "We designed Kalaida to incorporate new services as quickly audiences engage with them, and we're very pleased to now make mobile access even easier for the millions of people who actively use Twitter worldwides soon and supporting more handsets, including BlackBerry.

MySpace will launch a new, more integrated and optimized mobile website.  MySpace said it reinforced its continued commitment to the mobile social web with plans to develop new applications for Nokia in their S60 web runtime environment and Palm's new webOS, on the Palm Pre.

The new mobile website (m.myspace.com / wap.myspace.com) enhances the look and feel of MySpace on mobile. New user interface elements have been optimized for devices with screen sizes 176 pixels wide (and larger). It features the familiar "MySpace blue" color scheme and includes the ability to configure email photo upload. 

The redesign also has been built upon a fully updated architecture, which will allow the mobile MySpace experience to scale rapidly as more users discover m.myspace.com.  The new mobile website is supported in 13 languages and localized for 29 countries.

MySpace has 20 million worldwide unique users on the mobile web and applications combined, and more than 7 billion page views (internal reporting).

Openwave Systems Inc. revealed research on trends for the mobile internet in North America, based on its Mobile Analytics product.

Social networking is the number one area of interest to the mobile internet user. The top two search terms on both Google and Yahoo! OneSearch were the major social networking sites Facebook and MySpace. This suggests a significant appetite for mobile social networking. In addition to the named social networks, 'social networking' was also the top category of search terms found by Openwave's research.

Carriers may be underserving mobile social networking is the fact that the mobile-tailored social network Mocospace, a Boston-based startup that provides a social network for mobile phone users, attracted far more of mobile internet users' time. Mocospace users spent an average of 6.05 minutes online per session, versus MySpace's 3.79 minutes and Facebook's 1.89 minutes, suggesting that more effort to tailor social networking sites to the mobile environment could lead to greater data usage and customer satisfaction.

Opera's latest State of the Mobile Web examined social networks. In this month's report, Opera reviewed the top social networks in key countries.

Globally the top 10 social networks for Opera Mini users are (ranked by unique users):

1. vkontakte.ru - 909.17% growth in 2008
2. facebook.com - 693.11% growth in 2008
3. friendster.com - 670.13% growth in 2008
4. orkut.com - 296.78% growth in 2008
5. odnoklassniki.ru - 545.40% growth in 2008
6. peperonity.com - 396.65% growth in 2008
7. hi5.com - 372.60% growth in 2008
8. myspace.com - 618.42% growth in 2008
9. mamba.ru - 1055.51% growth in 2008
10. mocospace.com - 834.89% growth in 2008

In the United States, Facebook edged out MySpace thanks to an impressive growth rate during the year, with unique users growing 1632%, while MySpace user growth was almost 52%.