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FRIENDSTER TEXT ALERTS NOW AVAILABLE IN INDONESIA
Over 80 Million Indonesian Mobile Subscribers
Can Now Receive Friendster Updates via SMS Text Messages
SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA AND JAKARTA, INDONESIA, September 25, 2008 - Friendster, Inc. (www.friendster.com), a top-10 global website based on traffic and the #1 social network in Asia,* today announced that its millions of users in Indonesia can now subscribe to Friendster Text Alerts, a full suite of alerts covering activity in their Friendster network that are sent directly to their mobile phones via SMS text messages. Friendster Text Alerts is Friendster’s second mobile offering and it complements Friendster’s successful mobile site, m.friendster.com, which launched in May 2008.
Friendster Text Alerts allows users to subscribe to receive text message alerts for friend requests, new messages, comments, bulletins and more. When such activity takes place within their network of friends on Friendster, they will receive an SMS text message on their mobile phone. Users will also be able to share and communicate on Friendster by sending a text message to Friendster to update content on their profile, such as posting shoutouts and bulletins, sending messages, and replying to friend requests. Friendster Text Alerts will increase timely communication among users and support and encourage network activity while Friendster users are away from a computer.
“Since SMS text messaging technology is universally available on mobile phones in use today in Indonesia, our millions of users in Indonesia with mobile phones can now subscribe to Friendster Text Alerts and stay connected when they are on the go and away from a computer,” said David Jones, vice president of global marketing for Friendster.
Friendster users must opt in, or register, to use Friendster Text Alerts by going to http://www.friendster.com/registermobile.php and entering their mobile phone details and selecting which mobile text alerts they wish to receive. Friendster does not charge its users for Friendster Text Alerts, but users are subject to text messaging usage fees from their wireless service provider. Friendster Text Alerts was recently launched in both Malaysia and Singapore, and will also be available in the Philippines in the coming weeks.
Friendster Text Alerts has been launched in collaboration with Mesdaq-listed mTouche Technology Berhad (“mTouche”), a provider of mobile value-added services to more than 40 Mobile Network Operators in Asia. mTouche is providing Friendster with mobile messaging integration with the mobile network operators in Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore. Through its relationships with mobile network operators, mTouche manages the delivery of Friendster Text Alerts to the Friendster member’s mobile phone and replies to those alerts.
“Recent studies have shown that about 90% of Asia’s mobile phone subscribers use SMS text messaging, and some of the highest per subscriber usage of text messaging is in countries in Southeast Asia. It’s only natural to combine the most popular mobile feature – text messaging – with the most popular social network in Asia – Friendster,” said Jones.
Friendster Leads in Indonesia
Friendster is the #1 social network in Indonesia and more than 5 times larger than the next largest social network in Indonesia. In Indonesia, Friendster has over 8.2 million monthly unique visitors to Friendster.com as of July 2008.** Since there are over 20 million Internet users in Indonesia, about 41% percent of Indonesia visited Friendster in July. With over 12 million registered users in Indonesia, about 60% of Indonesia’s Internet users have a Friendster account. A typical user spends 30 minutes a day on Friendster and visits Friendster several times a week, communicating with friends and sharing and consuming content through a suite of features.
Friendster Leads in Asia and is a Top 10 Global Website
Friendster is the #1 social network in Asia, with over 60 million registered users and 33 million monthly unique visitors from Asia.* In Asia, Friendster is almost twice the size of any other social network.
Friendster is the 3rd largest social network in the world in terms of traffic, with over 19.4 billion page views a month.* Friendster is 1st in “user engagement” among the top five global social networks with visitors to Friendster.com spending an average of 190 minutes per visitor per month.*
About Friendster
With more than 80 million members worldwide, Friendster is a leading global online social network. Friendster is focused on helping people stay in touch with friends and discover new people and things that are important to them. Online adults, 18 and up, choose Friendster to connect with friends, family, school, social groups, activities and interests. Friendster prides itself in delivering an easy-to-use, friendly and interactive environment where users can easily connect with anyone around the world via www.friendster.com or m.friendster.com from any Internetready mobile device. Friendster has a growing portfolio of patents granted to the company on social networking, with more expected over the next several months. Headquartered in San Francisco, California, Friendster is backed by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Benchmark Capital, DAG Ventures, IDG Ventures and individual investors. For more information, visit: www.friendster.com.
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Media Contact:
Lerin O'Neill
The Hoffman Agency for Friendster
+1.408.832.7083 (m)
+1.408.975.3037 (o)
press@friendster.com
*comScore Media Metrix, July 2008
** Google Analytics and Friendster Internal Data, July 2008