Facebook partners with mobile carriers to offer free data for Facebook messaging

Facebook today announced partnerships with mobile operators around the world to provide free or discounted data access when subscribers use Facebook messaging.

The social network has arrangements with 18 mobile operators in 14 countries to provide special pricing for usage of Messenger for Android, Messenger for iOS and Facebook for Every Phone. Facebook recently updated its feature phone application to be optimized for chat and added a number of new features to Messenger, including voice messaging and the ability to create a Messenger account without a Facebook profile.

The social network is making a big global push for its messaging service this year. As the company seeks its next billion users, messaging is going to be a key feature that draws people in. With so many alternatives — from SMS and email to apps like WhatsApp or WeChat — Facebook has a lot to compete against. Now, it’s hoping that subsidizing usage by partnering with mobile providers will give it an edge in emerging markets.

Facebook has used this strategy before, working with carriers in the past to provide free access to 0.facebook.com or Facebook for Every Phone. There’s also the recent Talktime program in India, which gives 50 Rupees (almost $1) in calling credits to users who sign up for Facebook on their mobile devices. Users also get an additional 50 Rupees for every user they refer who signs up to Facebook with a mobile device.

The companies involved with this latest messaging promotion include TMN in Portugal, Three in Ireland, Airtel and Reliance in India, Vivacom in Bulgaria, Backcell in Azerbaydzhan, Indosat, Smartfren, AXIS and XL Axiata in Indonesia, SMART in Philippines, DiGi in Malaysia, DTAC in Thailand, Viva in Bahrain, STC in Saudi Arabia, Oi in Brazil, Etisalat in Egypt, and Tre in Italy.

Facebook says messaging is one of the most popular activities on the social network, with three out of every four people on Facebook send a message on the platform each month.

View the original article here

Betable partners with Frima Studio’s new real-money gaming division, 3OAK

Real-money gaming platform Betable today announced the newest partner in its private beta program: casual game developer Frima Studio’s new real-money game division 3OAK.

3OAK is a new development studio formed to create casual and social games built featuring real-money gameplay.  Like other developers who have partnered with Betable since the company came out of stealth last summer, 3OAK will be targeting international audiences with the games featuring Betable’s API.

Although real-money gaming has only been seen in social casino games so far, 3OAK isn’t working on these kinds of titles right now. 3OAK director Mikael Lefebvre tells us the studio is working to bring real-money mechanics to genres they haven’t really appeared in so far. As a result, the company has a slate of five game concepts it’s working on, based on the most popular social game types. While he can’t share too many details right now, Lefebvre says the company’s first title will be a humorous/light social RPG which is already in the early testing phase and is expected for an early Q2 launch.

Lefebvre says 3OAK tested out real-money gaming by creating a social game prototype with a cash out mechanic. The prototype showed the retention and engagement were significantly higher than the norm in social games, as well as converting users to paying players. He thinks implementing elements like this will is the way of the future because, “all this makes sense because in the current market the cost of acquiring users is getting higher and higher, so we need higher revenue per user and revenue per paying user.”

While 3OAK’s titles will feature real-money gaming in the territories where such mechanics are legal, Lefebvre tells us they’ll also be available as standard social games in other countries with soft and hard currencies.

Betable CEO Christopher Griffin tells us he’s excited about how 3OAK’s implementing his company’s API; according to Griffin, this is one of the first examples of Betable’s technology in social games outside of the casino genre. He tells us there are other developers working with Betable on non-social casino games, but none of them have been officially unveiled yet.

Griffin believes this is just the start of a larger movement in the social/mobile gaming industries to incorporate real-money elements. “I think this is more than a trend and will be more than a trend,” he says. “This has something that will be very core for how these games monetize and will be essential for them to have some element of real money in them if they want to be competitive.”

Although this is the first time we’ve heard of companies making casual games with real-money mechanics, we’ve known this was a possibility since Betable first came out of stealth. When we initially chatted with Griffin back in July, he provided a mock-up graphic showing how his company’s API would look in mobile titles like Words With Friends and Hero Academy.

Betable’s proven a popular partner in the social/mobile games sector ever since it publicly debuted. Griffin reveals the demand to work with the company has been so great that its team has doubled in size. Before this latest announcement, Betable’s announced partnerships with some major casual gaming companies like Big Fish Games, Digital Chocolate, SGN and Slingo.

3OAK’s first games will be launched for mobile platforms, but the plan is to make them cross-platform sooner rather than later. “Everything has to be cross-platform,” Lefebvre notes.

View the original article here

Dragonplay partners with TRUSTe for online privacy and security

Android social casino game developer Dragonplay today announced that it’s partnered with online privacy solutions provider TRUSTe. The new partnership will see TRUSTe certify Dragonplay’s privacy policy, as well as “ensure the utmost fairness and security in Dragonplay’s games.”

The deal will also see Center Space overseeing Dragonplay’s Random Number Generator, a step few mobile game developers have done. However, with more and more companies crowding into the social and mobile casino markets, partnering with groups who can ensure a user privacy and security (not to mention guarantee the fairness of the company’s games) will likely make titles a more appealing choice for new users.

We last heard from Dragonplay back in April, when the company had secured $14 million in funding after its Live Holdem Pro took the top-grossing spot on Android (now, AppData shows the game at the No. 97). At the time, founder Sharon Tal told us the money would be largely put towards acquisitions of smaller studios to help expand the developer’s lineup of casino games.

View the original article here

Konami partners with GREE, launches Dragon Collection in North America

Konami today announced it was partnering with GREE to launch Dragon Collection exclusively on GREE’s new platform for iOS.

Dragon Collection is Konami’s social mobile card battling game that originally came out in Japan. Since launching, the game’s racked up 7 million domestic registered users and won awards including Japan Game Awards: 2011 Future Division from the Computer Entertainment Supplier’s Association.

The game is a card-battling game where players travel through a fantasy world on a search for legendary “Dragon Cards.” The North American version will feature all new monsters designed for this build of the game, but will also include all the gameplay modes from the original game. There are a total of four gameplay modes: Quest (where players openly explore the game world), Battle (players battle both villains and rival players), Card Pack (players compete amongst each other for random in-game prizes) and Enhance (where players merge monsters to create stronger ones).

Dragon Collection also contains a number of social features: Aside from being able to forge alliances with friends and/or battle against rivals,  players will also benefit from having more friends in the game. Players can earn points by “cheering” other players on and helping them defeat powerful enemies.

Card-battling games are immensely popular in Japan and are proving incredibly lucrative here in North America, too. Titles like DeNA’s Rage of Bahamut (as of right now, the No. 4 top grossing app in iTunes) and Blood Brothers are regularly topping the top-grossing app and top-grossing free app lists on both both iTunes and Google Play. Based on GREE’s massive user audience (thanks in large part to its acquisition of OpenFeint in April 2011), it’s not surprising that Konami would publish a card-battling game on that platform.

Dragon Collection is currently available on the iTunes App Store and will come to Android later this year.

View the original article here

New Facebook platform industry hires: Ifeelgoods, Scale Venture Partners, Nanigans, Strutta, more

Ifeelgoods hired an SVP of sales, Scale Venture Partners hired a new executive-in-residence, Nanigans brought on a technical advisor and Strutta has a new director of marketing, among other notable hires made this week at Facebook platform companies.

If your company is hiring new people or making a notable promotion, please let us know. Email mail (at) insidefacebook (dot) com, and we’ll get it into our next post. Also, please note that information about most new hires, below, comes either from the companies themselves or from company updates from LinkedIn.

Looking for new opportunities? Check out the Inside Network Job Board, which shows the latest openings at leading companies in the industry.

Here’s this week’s list of hires:

Ifeelgoods

Tyler Hoffman, Senior Vice President of Sales – former managing director of commerce sales at Google

Scale Venture Partners

Eric Tilenius, Executive-in-Residence – former general manager at Zynga.

Nanigans

David C. Parkes, Technical Advisor – also works as a professor of computer science in the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences at Harvard University.

Strutta

Joeline Hackman, Director of Marketing.

Vitrue

Elisha Phoenix, Visual/UX Designer – former designer at Razorfish.

AdParlor

Mike Empey, Sales Engineer – former software development support specialist at Research In Motion.

Who else is hiring? The Inside Network Job Board presents a survey of current openings at leading companies in the industry.

View the original article here

Facebook partners with mobile billing provider Bango

U.K. mobile billing and analytics provider Bango announced today it signed a deal “to provide payment services to Facebook.”

The arrangement could be part of an upcoming effort to monetize Facebook’s mobile platform. The social network has 425 million monthly active mobile users but so far does not generate “meaningful” revenue from this area, according to its filing for an initial public offering. Facebook might have tapped Bango to help it process payments for apps, virtual goods or other mobile transactions.

Bango did not reveal the terms of the agreement. Facebook, which is in a mandated “quiet period” after filing for an IPO, did not comment on the partnership.

Bango provides carrier-billing services for Research in Motion and Opera’s app stores. This means mobile users are able to pay for purchases on their phone bills rather than a credit card. Many expect the company will to do the same for Amazon’s App Store for Android, following news of a partnership in December 2011.

Facebook opened its mobile platform to third-party developers in October 2011. It currently uses Boku to process mobile phone payments in HTML5 games like CityVille. This is only possible in the mobile web version of Facebook, not native applications because Apple and Android take 30 percent of in-app transactions on their platforms.

The Financial Times notes that Bango is aligned with Facebook’s movement toward a browser-based mobile platform. Following rumors of Facebook’s “Project Spartan” in June 2011, Bango CEO Ray Anderson wrote:

Bango technology has been optimized for browser deployment, and we see the browser as a great platform to enable truly explosive growth of mobile by making apps less dependent on the handset operating system. If you want to share an app or service with others, it makes more sense to mail or tweet out a link to a web app than to try to get your friends to download apps! It seems like Facebook may have the same vision [...]

View the original article here

Sojo Studios partners with Justin Bieber for "social good" Facebook games

Last month, we brought you an in-depth overview of Sojo Studios' WeTopia on Facebook, a game based on the concept of "Play[ing] for Good," where users earn currency called Joy that can be spent on real world charitable projects in both the US and other countries. While the game may not have shown up on everyone's radar just yet, that's likely to change as music phenom Justin Bieber has signed on to provide marketing support for Sojo Studios' lineup of games, starting with WeTopia.

"Playing online games is a lot of fun already, but WeTopia makes it better by helping children around the world. Some of these kids need to go to school or they need clean water," said Bieber in a company release. "I've been so lucky and blessed and that's why I believe so much in giving back, and I know my fans will feel the same way when they play WeTopia."

Combining efforts with the company's first celebrity partner Ellen DeGeneres, Sojo Studios hopes that the reach both entertainers have in their own areas will be enough to inspire fans to take action for great causes within WeTopia (and eventually other games that have yet to be released), such as Save the Children, buildOn and the Children's Health Fund.

"We're thrilled to partner with Justin Bieber, an amazing entertainer and someone who has emerged as one of the most prolific young philanthropists this world has seen," says Lincoln Brown, founder and CEO of Sojo Studios. "Justin is using his voice to inspire millions of fans around the world – including daughters and their moms – to give back. We can't think of a better way to bring the generations together than on WeTopia, which lets players do good while having fun."

Will this turn into a system of themed virtual items, giving Bieber's fans even more incentive to play these Facebook games? That much remains to be seen, but with the ever-increasing power of social media, anything is possible.

Will you play WeTopia because it is now being endorsed by Justin Bieber? Do you need any extra incentive to play a game focused on helping those who otherwise go without? Share your thoughts on this news with us in the comments.

Bookmark this site!

View the original article here

Facebook Careers Postings: Engineering, Data Centers, Interns, Client Partners and More

Facebook seems to be in the market for a lot of engineers this week, posting about a dozen engineering jobs on its Careers Page, in addition to data center, account management, client partner and intern jobs. Then Facebook’s LinkedIn feed showed a few other jobs, for data center and client partner positions.

Software Engineer, Ads (New York)Research Scientist 1111006 (Menlo Park)Software Engineer, Data Center ToolsSoftware Engineer, Data Infrastructure Engineering (New York)Software Engineer, Infrastructure Engineering (New York)Software Engineer, Tools Engineering (New York)Software Engineer, Web Performance Engineering (New York)Datacenter Optimization EngineerManufacturing Process EngineerMechanical Engineer, ServersThermal EngineerHead of E-Commerce, Global Vertical MarketingData Warehouse Operations EngineerMySQL Database EngineerMySQL Database Engineer (Dublin)Software Engineer, NetworkPerformance and Capacity EngineerLearning and Development Consultant (Hyderabad)Product and Sales Training Consultant (Singapore)Technical Recruiting LeadTechnical Sourcing Lead – Menlo Park, CATechnical Sourcing Lead – New YorkPricing and Yield Management LeadAssociate Account Manager, Direct Sales – Contractor (New York)DSO Account Manager (Seoul)Account Manager – Arabic (Dublin)Account Manager – Direct Sales (Buenos Aires)Account Manager – Online Sales Operations (Buenos Aires)Client Partner (Buenos Aires)Client Partner (Finnish)Client Partner (Seoul)Analyst, Pricing & YieldManager, APAC Platform Partnerships (Singapore)Product Marketing ManagerUniversity Business Intern: Mobile Business DevelopmentUniversity Business Intern: Business DevelopmentUniversity Business Intern: Global Business MarketingUniversity Business Intern: Mobile Business DevelopmentUniversity Business Intern: Finance, Business OperationsUniversity Business Intern: Strategic Sourcing SpecialistUniversity Business Intern: LegalUniversity Business Intern: Monetization AnalyticsUniversity Intern: Measurement Platforms & Standards Group: Product MarketingUniversity Business Intern: Risk & PaymentsUniversity Business Intern, Local Business Activation, Marketing API ProgramUniversity Business Intern: Product Marketing, Advertising and MonetizationUniversity Business Intern: Global Agency TeamUniversity Business Intern:Global Accounts: Strategy & PlanningUniversity Business Intern: Direct Sales, Sales OperationsUniversity Intern, Security Engineer, Security Operations (Menlo Park)

Who else is hiring? The Inside Network Job Board presents a survey of current openings at leading companies in the industry.

View the original article here

Facebook Hires and Departures: Engineering, Counsel, Client Partners and More

Facebook hired engineers and Patent Counsel this week, at least it appears so according to posts removed from its Careers Page and listed on the company’s LinkedIn feed.

Zhongxian Chen, Software Engineer – previously Software Engineer Intern.Sanders Chong, Senior Software Engineer – was a Senior Software Engineer at NVIDIA.Gia Kobara, Recruiting Coordinator – previously a Personal and Scientific Assistant at UC Santa Cruz.Patent CounselApplication Operations EngineerMobile Ops EngineerSoftware Engineer 1111004 (Menlo Park)Head of Entertainment, Global Vertical MarketingManager, Account Management – GamingSpecialist, Compensation – ContractStorage Hardware Design EngineerAdvertiser ResearcherFacilities/ Construction Project ManagerAccount Manager (London)Account Manager – Team Lead (London)Manager, Account Management – GamingInternational Client Partner (Hamburg)International Client Partner (Milan)

Who else is hiring? The Inside Network Job Board presents a survey of current openings at leading companies in the industry.

View the original article here

Page Management Industry Interest in Ecommerce Grows as Vitrue Partners with Milyoni

Page management platform developer Vitrue recently announced a partnership with ecommerce app developer Milyoni. The alliance will bring improved shopping and Facebook Credits payment functionality to Page tabs apps available in Vitrue’s app suite.

The partnership continues the growing trend of consolidation between the Page management and ecommerce spaces as brands demand ways to drive direct return on their social media investment. Below, Vitrue CEO Reggie Bradford tells us why the partnership primes his company to sign the next wave of brands joining Facebook.

Over the last few years, brands have concentrated on gaining Likes, but now they’re looking to monetize these fans. This has increased demand for ecommerce apps that permit fans to make purchases without the added friction of being directed away from Facebook to a traditional company website.

Page management companies, previously more focused on publishing, engagement apps, and analytics are now looking for ecommerce partnership and acquisition targets, in lieu of trying to build things they’re less familiar with.

Milyoni is a strong choice for Vitrue, as the San Francisco-based ecommerce developer has been behind some highly innovative Facebook commerce campaigns this year. It powered the movie rental app used by Warner Bros to sell temporary access to The Dark Knight, Inception and other films in exchange for Facebook Credits. It also allowed the Austin City Limits music festival to charge users Credits to stream pay-per-view concerts.

Milyoni raised a $3 million Series A round from ATA ventures and Thomvest Ventures in May to improve its social commerce products. The company has over 50 brands representing over 60 million fans, including the NBA, the clothing label French Connection, and beverage brand Guayaki.

The partnership will strengthen Vitrue’s offering allowing it to attract clients. Vitrue CEO Reggie Bradford tells us Milyoni’s technology will enable it to offer social shopping tab apps such as “flash sales and group discounts” as well as a “full shopping experience within Facebook.” Milyoni will gain distribution to a large set of clients, including some of the world’s biggest brands such as AT&T, Ford, Proctor & Gamble, and McDonalds.

Vitrue has been a major driver of consolidation recently, in part thanks to a $17 million funding round closed in May which helped provide money for acquisitions and partnerships. It bought GamesThatGive so its client Pages can offering games where user’s earn money for charity through their engagement. Last year it partnered with Ads API tool and service provider TBG Digital, sharing clients looking for each other’s advertising or Page management solutions.

Bradford tells us that in the coming year, “you’re going to see substantial consolidation”. He believes this will be centered around Page management companies “as their relationship with brands becomes a key component of a brand or agency’s plan to manage social. Once you have the Page management relationship, you can roll out new features such as commerce, games, Sponsored Stories” by partnering with or acquiring those that develop them.

Virtue’s goal now is to grow through consolidation to offer a ”turnkey solution”. Bradford predicts that “every major brand is going to be using one of these platforms by 2012. Those platforms in the lead now are going to have 100s and 1000s more marketers using their platform.” The partnership with Miyoni for ecommerce is a strong step in this direction.

View the original article here

6waves Lolapps Confirms Funding From Nexon, Insight Venture Partners

Recently merged social game developer and publisher 6waves Lolapps confirmed today that it has raised funding, naming Nexon and Insight Venture Partners as investors.

Though 6waves Lolapps did not disclose terms of the investment, previous reports based on an SEC filing put the total at $35 million.

While the New York-based Insight Ventire Partners has had a history of backing social game companies, Korean company Nexon is fairly new to the space — both as an investor and a developer. Its most recent activity was the public beta launch of Maple Story: Adventures, a Facebook role-playing adventure game based on Nexon’s long-running MMO, Maple Story. Prior to that, the company invested $5 million in social game developer A Bit Lucky.

View the original article here

Facebook Partners with Web of Trust to Protect Users From Malicious Outbound Links

Web of Trust, a crowd-sourced website reputation rating service, has partnered with Facebook to protect user from clicking malicious outbound links on the social network. When users click a link to a site with a poor reputation rating, Facebook will show a warning message.

The Web of Trust partnership should help reduce the risk of phishing, spam and scams on Facebook, improving security, which has been a public relations problem through the years for the social network.

With a 20 million user community and 31 million sites rated, Web of Trust will protect users in real-time, rather than focusing on preventive education like some other risk-abatement programs.

In addition to phishing and scams, Web of Trust will increase protection from unscrupulous ecommerce sites and reduce the likelihood that younger users will click through links on Facebook to adult content.

When users click a URL on Facebook, the social network will scan the site to see if it has been flagged by Web of Trust. If so, users will see a message indicating that the site “has been classified as potentially abusive.” A large button encourages users to “Return to previous page” or they can click a small link to ignore the warning and continue to the site.

Users can download the Web of Trust browser add-on to rate sites and help protect fellow web citizens. If more Facebook users immediately used Facebook’s own flagging system or that of Web of Trust, spammy sites that spread through the news feed via phished accounts could be blocked more quickly.

To date, Facebook has worked to protect users by offering educational resources such as the Safety Center, asking users to provide information to assist with account retrieval in case they are hacked, and added security features such as account owner and login verification. It also recently extended its partnership with McAfee to eradicate worms such as Koobface through the Roadblock feature and provide a free subscription to anti-virus software.

Web of Trust’s reputation model may work well for long-existing risks, but new malicious sites that pop up might not be rated before they threaten Facebook users. Facebook’s security team and internal automated systems for alerting users to malicious links will continue protect users from suspicious outbound links, but now they’ll be augmented with the power of Web of Trust’s crowd.

View the original article here