Social Games essential elements of Social Networks, Email may become next essential element

Facebook mail will beat Gmail or not is a big question. But one thing is for sure that Email is now becoming the most essential part of the social networks. Ibibo, Itimes, MySpace, Facebook offers integrated email service in their social networks already and many other are ready to do so.

Social Games have become the most essential element of Social Networks. All social networks offer social browser games or apps to keep the user at their sites for a longer period of time. Now the same trend can be seen for the email service. Some Tech Gurus say that "email is dead" but i feel that traditional email is dead and there is a requirement of some new kind of email which is a bit social.

Social is the word that is more popular than web2.0 these days. The sites which are not social are on a decline. Big internet groups like Yahoo are looking towards new entrant Facebook and Twitter to survive. Now Facebook has launched its own email service so it is very clear that email is also essential to complete the overall social structure.

Gmail is one of the most used Google product and now Facebook is targeting that market also. This trend of mail integrated with social has not been a success in the case of MySpace and Ibibo but can be a success in case of Facebook, as Facebook have equal crazy fans as Apple.

Who so ever win, Facebook Mail or Gmail, but social networks will not start integrating mail service.

Rediff Vs Indiatimes Vs Web18 : Indian Internet War

We have seen several internet wars in the past:

1. Netscape Vs Internet Explorer

2. MSN Vs Yahoo Vs Google

3. Facebook Vs My Space

4. Google Vs Bing

5. Facebook Vs Google [Which still continues]

But they all were in USA and we have never seen this to happen in India till now.

Today when i saw an advertisement in Times Of India showing Indiatimes getting more unique visitors than Rediff and Web18, smell like a new war will start soon. Actually this all happens because of report of Comscore showing Indiatimes over Rediff and Web18 in unique visitors and Web18 over Indiatimes and Rediff in terms of traffic.

Lets see on what front can they fight and who will emerge winner:

1. NEWS: News the most important service given by them. Indiatimes has an advantage that they have the leading newspaper Times Of India, Economic Times and Financial Times so people will prefer reading its online news. Web18 has leading news network woth CNBC and IBN so they may also lead over Rediff. With Rediff we have the advantage that its famous in US so they will be prefered in US which contributes most of the advertising revenues. My rank Indiatimes>>Web18>>Rediff.

2. Mail: Rediff is quite famous and their Rediffmail NG has proved to be one of the best mail service on Mobile at Rs 50. In.com Mail is also good enough and people will like it after they use but it needs to gain market. In.com Mail has done quite an advertising so may be we see it growing. Indiatimes Mail is below standard and even they pay no attention to it. My rank Rediff>>Web18>>Indiatimes.

3. Search: Rediff is light so a preferred home page of many and will go under a seach deal. While other two: Web18 and Indiatimes, have a partnership with google. My rank Rediff>>Web18>>Indiatimes.

4. Social: Rediff has “My Page” which needs revamp. Inditimes has Itimes which has integrated mail service but lacks chat. Web18 has no presence in this area. My rank Indiatimes>>Rediff>>Web18.

According to me its going to be tough fight among them and Rediff seems to be emerging as a winner.

My Rank:

1. Rediff (which may be Google of India)

2. Indiatimes (which may be MSN of India)

3. Web18 (Which may be Yahoo of India)

Rediff focusing back to India

It is very essential to have market in US for a Internet company to be in profit since most of the advertisement spendings comes from there. Indian companies like Rediff kept their focus on NRI to earn the market share in USA.

But with there mobile approach India has emerged as the most important market and now they have their focus primary on India. With the launch of Rediffmail NG they have shown that they will now provide push mail type service on mobile and will try to best Yahoo and Google using this kind of service at Rs. 50.

It will be interesting to see that where does this new Mobile focus approach take them. Still according to me it is the most impressive launch done by Rediff in recent time. They use to be famous among students but lost there market share later. It can be a come back move by them. Still i will say that Rediff should launch a social site as social sites going to give all facilities in future and will be the all in one integrated Internet solution.

So sites which are social will only survive and rest will have to loose their market share. Its already started with the rise of Facebook and Twitter, and fall of Yahoo and Aol.

Facebook Vs Google War II – Facebook Mail will eat GMail?

Facebook Vs Google War I: Won by Facebook by beating Orkut, Buzz and Wave.

Facebook Vs Google War II:

GMail is very popular in India like all other products of Google. Indian net users are bigger fan of Google than they are of Apple. But Facebook has made an equal place among Indian users by offering quality social network. So, we can say that India will accept Facebook Mail as the primary mail address.

Plus points for Facebook Mail:

1. Every social network user has a Facebook ID.

2. Indians love Facebook as much as they love Google.

Negative points for Facebook Mail:

1. GMail is used in corporate and government in India so replacing it will be tough.

2. Offices and Colleges have Facebook blocked so no access to Facebook Mail.

3. Facebook Mail is attach to social network so many will not like to compromise on its privacy.

I feel that this time Google will win the war as war is fought in the Google arena (as GMail is the fastest growing mail service). Unlike the War I which was fought in AOL arena (MySpace) so Facebook looked more serious player than Orkut. If this time Facebook Mail beats Google Mail than Facebook will become unbeatable.

Rediffmail revamped: Rediffmail NG – The NEXT GENERATION

Rediff is all set to make a comeback and get all users back from Ymail and Gmail. Rediff with the launch Rediffmail NG provide a cheap push mail at Rs.50.

Good Points of Rediffmail NG:

1. Faster and Sleek: With the use of Ajax its now faster and better service. Its sleek design give a feel of faster and easy to use look.

2. Send SMS: Now you can send SMS from your inbox, no need to go to any specific site to send sms.

3. Themes: Like Gmail themes, now Rediffmail also have a collection of themes.

4. Tab Features: Like Ymail tab feature, we can easily do multi-tasking using tab feature of Rediffmail.

5. Auto-Forward Mail: Now you can forward all your mails to another email id automatically.

6. Push Mail: Not at just Rs.50 you can get the push mail on your Microteck phone. Even on Android, Blackberry and Symbians etc.

In short, Rediff has worked well and combine some useful features from Gmail and Ymail. Rediffmail is now ready to compete with them in the market.

Bad Points of Rediffmail NG:

1. Compatibility Issue: It works well on IE 8, Firefox 3.6.10, Chome 7, Flock 3 and Epic 1.1 but have design issues in Opera 10.63. Hope will rectified soon.

2. Chat within Inbox Missing: Chat from Inbox is one of the feature in demand these days as we cannot waste time in installing the chat messenger on every system (home and office) we use. Gmail chat got so popular that Google stop working on Gtalk.

3. Lab Feature Missing: People needs to do experiment and want something new. Gmail gives them with the new feature every week and also give them a choice to use or not. This helps Google to analyze the user preference and work on that. Also give a choice to user to select what he wants. This should be included.

All these features are a requirement of next generation so hope that will be included soon.

United States VS Indian Internet Companies

I thought of comparing the US internet companies with Indian internet companies. There is no comparison between them as US companies earn lots more and are more innovative where as Indian companies are lazy and less innovative. The comparison is done by selecting a US internet company and comparing it with the Indian internet company having similar traits.

1. MSN VS SIFY: Both company consider they internet business as secondary and most of the revenue comes from other business. Still MSN takes lots of effort in making internet business profitable with its product like Windows Live, Hotmail and Bing. Where as Sify has a deal with google for Mail and Search, hence focus only on news. Since there are better news sites so Sify will not survive long where as Microsoft's MSN will emerge as one of the leader in Internet industry and profit making business with its aggressive product line up.

2. YAHOO VS INDIATIMES: Both of them are more of a portal with news, local content and services, Indiatimes runs on its news content and Yahoo has popular mail service. Both are a brand and has a high reach to the consumer. Yahoo is searching for a partner that brings some more value to the site so that they can enter and dominate in different areas of online services. Whereas Indiatimes is happy with there business are in no mood to do experiment that might make them less innovative and may lose the market share.

3. GOOGLE VS REDIFF: Both were the startups. Google started when internet was penetrating US and Rediff when internet started its penetration in India. Google turn out to be the biggest global internet company where as Rediff became popular in India but from last four years losing its market. Rediff lost its market share not only because Google's Gmail and Orkut were gaining popularity but also Rediff kept on sleeping and did not brought innovation at the right time. Rediff was lazy and did not brought Chat within Inbox and a social network. If Rediff has done that they must have beaten Google.

4. AOL VS IN: Both the companies work as the subsidy. Both have a good mail service which may turn out there strongest point. IN has one of the best news network where as AOL has bought many startups like tech blog TechCrunch. IN has the potential to be one of the global internet company if it continue to put innovations.

5. FACEBOOK VS IBIBO: There are several social network but lets compare the US company Facebook which is global number one (and also number one in India) and Indian (JV of China and Brazil) Ibibo which is most popular Indian social networking site in India. Both of them give several apps and has chat features. Ibibo has integrates mail, so Facebook has better seach technology to connect the people to friends, brands and adds. Facebook is more innovative and owner is 25 years old so you can understand the aggressive nature of this site. Facebook has given Google and Yahoo a run for their money and market. Whereas Ibibo has not made such a big impact. Facebook connect and integration is used by several sites including Yahoo and Windows Live and even Ibibo whereas Ibibo so not have any such integrations and popularity.

Next Step: Integration of email in Social Network

Facebook and Twitter became popular because they brought innovations like Real Time Update that redefines the way of social networking. Twitter is still busy in bringing new ways to make money. Such spirit of innovation makes them the new leader of Internet which was earlier dominated by Google, Yahoo, MSN and AOL (News Corp).

But what next. We may see that now we see integration of services with Social Network.

1. Think you get the facility to check mail either @facebook.com or @ymail.com, by login your facebook account. Integration of email account is possible soon. Myspace, Ibibo and Itimes already have this facility.

2. May be we see new apps coming and apps no longer be called games and quizzes. We may see Mail, Maps, Search, blogging etc. apps so that we can use them from sitting at our social network.

There might be much more innovative things happing to social networks. I am so confident that there have to be some more innovative thing happening soon is due to recent rapid changes in social networks.

1. Lets begin with MySpace: We use to add friends and send them messages, get there birthday reminders and join some groups.

2. Then came Orkut: Lets users send some open messages knows as "Scraps" which can be read by others friends and social life became more open.

3. Now Facebook: They gave the plateform to update our status which is dispayed on ever friend's page so they are not require to visit each one profile to know what happening and all of them comment sitting at there own home page. Its make the web "Real Time" which is the hottest topin on internet. Facebook also brought the trends of apps like Apple did in mobile phones. As apps start making huge profit from the add revenue, this concept become very popular. Now all major social networks have these apps.

Now this is very clear that you need to bring something new and innovative to survive in the world of social network.

Email registration at India.com reopens on 25th October

In response to query, India.com informed that the registration for their mail service will reopens on 25th of October. Recently they were not accepting any new registration due to the ongoing process of their email service revamp. Now it will be interesting to see that what we get once this service get revamped. I am hoping lots more services like In.com. Web 18 gives lots of innovative services in its mail inbox like future mail, apps, etc.

Now Internet depends on four major growth driver: Mail, Social, Search and News. Most of Indian Internet companies focuses on News and Email. I hope that they will realize the importance of social network and will make one or fund the startups. In the near future we may see more Indian startups in the market due to increase in the Internet penetration in India.

Indiatimes mail do not have the rich version working

Now when Internet companies are focusing more on social, Email, News, Search and going Mobile, Indiatimes is missing this driver of growth. They have brought innovation to their offerings but if they lag behind the main growth drivers then will lose the growth momentum.

When social networks like MySpace and Ibibo are integrating their social web with email facility then how could Indiatimes do not take its email seriously. Yahoo, which also have news as one of the main growth driver, also focus on its email then why Indiatimes do not take it that seriously. Rediff also make the mark because of its email service and later news. Now Rediff has lost its market share due to lack of focus on its email service.

Indiatimes offer only basic HTML version of email (as its rich version do not work). In this era where we want more than just email, this will not be able to make a mark. Their social networking site, Itimes, offers integrated social and email facility is not at all popular. They have the largest selling daily, business and weekly newspaper but do not publicize their products. Indiatimes Mail has no potential if they do not work to improve it.

Indiatimes has a huge amount of potential as they are very popular among news reader but they need to make their product well equipped to hold the users as they have whole lots of potential to attract the user to use their product at least once.

Indiatimes' mail service shut down for two days because of security update

Indiatimesmail is undergoing some security update which is good but because of that reason it is not working properly for last two days and this problem will continue till 19^th as the official mail by indiatimes says. Due to this reason if someone is using it as a primary address for work or searching job, these days will be nightmare for them. This shows it is not serious about its mail service as other which are more popular as they are more serious about the mail service and hence trustworthy.

I would recommend that primary mail id should be on that site which has uptime 24X7 and do not shut down for any update. I would recommend that make primary id on one of these: Gmail, Yahoo mail, Hotmail, Aol, Rediffmail. Now a days in.com has emerged as the new serious contender so you can even have an id on this site as primary mail id.

If Indiatimes is not able to manage their email service well then they should outsource it like Sify had a partnership with Google to manage its mail service. This will help Indiatimes to concentrate on the news section which is the main base for them.

It was a surprise that they shut their mail service for two days for updating security as it was not expected from the third largest Indian internet company in terms of unique visitors. Indiatimes in the past have been in the race with Rediff to be India’s best internet company but they didn’t succeed in doing so and now Rediff and Indiatimes both declining together. I just don’t understand that why Indiatimes which is a lifestyle brand in India become a serious internet company in terms on email and social service.

Itimes have a flop because of the lack of publicity even being the largest selling print media. They had the potential for a good and cheaper publicity as being the best in print media but they didn’t went that way and lost somewhere in the race and is now weaker contender.