Tempted by the fast growing Indian internet audience, Wikipedia, the world’s largest online encyclopedia, is considering a proposal to launch Wikipedia.in, a local India chapter, similar to its country-specific portals in China, Germany, US and UK. Read more »
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In its latest bid at a revenue model, YouTube has taken a page out of Hulu’s book, to begin testing an online movie rental service with independent films from the Sundance Film Festival.
The service will be initially limited to five Sundance titles, as well as a small collection of videos from partners in industries such as health and education, and will be available to web surfers through the end of the month. Read more »
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In a round that reportedly closed in December last year, Sequoia Capital India has invested around $10 million (Rs46 crore) in online travel agency Via (formerly FlightRaja).
Via had earlier raised $5 million from NEA-IndoUS Ventures in 2007, and is believed to be the largest business-to-business (B2B) online travel agency (OTA) in India. Read more »
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Looks like 3G might just be getting closer to reality, with the government deciding to go ahead with the auction of three slots of third generation (3G) spectrum for all 22 telecom circles on February 25, and scheduled to be completed by March 3rd to 5th. Read more »
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For brand marketers, social media is seeming to be the ideal platform to get their message across, but what does it take to get followers for their brand?
While learning about specials and sales continues to be the top motivation of those who friended or followed a brand online, this was followed closely by learning about new products, features or services. Read more »
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The total worldwide search market boasted more than 131 billion searches conducted by people age 15 or older from home and work locations in December 2009, up from 89 billion in December 2008, representing a 46% increase in the past year according to comScore.
This implies a staggering 4 billion searches per day, or 175 million per hour, or 29 million per minute. The U.S. represented the largest individual search market in the world with 22.7 billion searches, or approximately 17% of searches conducted globally. China ranked second with 13.3 billion searches, followed by Japan with 9.2 billion and the U.K. with 6.2 billion. Read more »
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The LinkedIn India member base has passed the 4 million mark, while the global count has topped 55 million. Not all that much when you consider the 350 million+ on facebook, but then LinkedIn is geared toward professional networking, and is pretty much the most successful social network to add value to your professional life.
Looks like the financial meltdown has been good for LinkedIn
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iYogi, a remote technical support provider from India, has raised $15 million in it’s third round of funding from Draper Fisher Jurvetson. iYogi had raised $3.1 million in 2007 from Canaan partners in it’s first round, and $9.5 from SAP Ventures, Canaan Partners and SVB India Capital Partners in the second round. Read more »
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A study released by IAMAI and IMRB has found that India has just about 2 million users accessing the Internet through their mobile phones and other mobile devices on an active basis (where active is defined as accessing the Internet on their Mobile at least once a month). Read more »
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Bharti’s dreams of overseas acquisition is finally coming true, with the approval to purchase 70% stake in Warid Telecom and to invest $300 million in the company. According to Reuters, the $300 million was an initial payment and Bharti could pay more for a 70% stake in Warid Bangladesh. Launched in 2007, Warid has nearly three million subscribers in Bangladesh, and is ranked #4 in the Bangladesh mobile market. Read more »
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