India’s largest online game portal, Zapak, announced that it has joined hands with Hong Kong-based application developer, 6waves.
Zapak, according to their deal, will become the leading marketer and payment partner of 6waves’ games in the Indian market.
6waves’ has around 20 games and 17 million monthly users on Facebook. 6waves games on Facebook include games like Mall World (attracting over 5 million users), World Poker, Animal Paradise, Happy Hotel, and Dress Me Up. Zapak has earlier launched Zapak Games App on Facebook through which users can play Zapak games.
Zapak is set to display 6waves’ games by creating a Zapak Social channel on its portal. Zapak will also integrate domestic and other payment options to facilitate virtual item purchases in the 6waves games as the latter only has payment options for international credit cards.
Facebook mobile users had a lot coming their way over the last few days – Facebook Mobile Privacy Settings update, free VoIP calls from Vonage, and Facebook Android app update. Moreover, Facebook Android app update and Froyo update (Android 2.2) rolled out on the same day making Android users the happiest of the lot.
But, over the last few days, HTC EVO and Motorola Droid owners started complaining battery life suffering, pointing the finger at Froyo.
However, Facebook’s new Android app update happened to be the real culprit, which is sucking the battery life out of phones even when the phone looks off.
The root of the problem was trace to something called ‘wake lock’ bug present in the updated Facebook app, according to Android Development Talk. This ‘Wake lock’ keeps part of the phone running, even when it is not in use, resulting in faster drain on the battery life.
Hi folks, a number of you have commented on seeing a battery drain on your device since installing the new Facebook for Android app. We have identified the bug that is causing this battery drain and are working on a fix now. As soon as the patch is ready, we will push out an update. Thanks for the quick feedback and for your patience as we get this fixed!
So, if any of you are experiencing this battery tragedy, then you know who’s to blame. Hopefully, Facebook will come out with the update soon. Till then ciao!! to battery life or Facebook – the choice is yours
Here are some of the top Facebook users’ stories of the week.
WikiLeaks Whistleblower Awaiting Trial Army Pfc. Bradley Manning, 22, served as an intelligence analyst in Iraq. He was charged with leaking of classified material on WikiLeaks and illegally obtaining more than 150,000 classified State Department cables. The leaked information included more than 76,900 secret Afghanistan war records, and more notably of a helicopter cockpit video from Iraq posted by WikiLeaks on April. It is also believed that he received help from civilians in leaking the information. He also posted his rage on Facebook.
Manning was flown to the Quantico Marine Corps Base in northern Virginia last Thursday and is awaiting possible trial on 12 offenses. Source: AP, CNN
Anne Rice Quits Christianity Vampire stories like the Twilight and its sequels made a lot of wave. More recently, Novelist Anne Rice, troubled by the recent controversies surrounding christian churches, posted several Facebook post declaring that she is no longer a Christian. One of the post read:
“I quit being a Christian. I’m out. In the name of Christ, I refuse to be anti-gay. I refuse to be anti-feminist. I refuse to be anti-artificial birth control. I refuse to be anti-Democrat. I refuse to be anti-secular humanism. I refuse to be anti-science. I refuse to be anti-life. In the name of … Christ, I quit Christianity and being Christian. Amen.”
Anne Rice is best known for her series of vampire novels and her mega-selling novel – Interview With A Vampire. Source: PinkNews
Facebook User Sentenced For Trolling Jessica Chantelle Cook, 22, hailing from Gympie in south-east Queensland was recently charged for defacing a Facebook tribute page devoted to Justine Jones, who was murdered last month. Ms Cook was reportedly posted hateful comments and indescent photograph.
She was awarded a three-month suspended sentence and banned from using social networking sites. Source: ninemsn
Facebook, Twitter Helps Police Nail Gang Just last week, we read about how law authorities used Facebook to track down a computer technician accused of killing nine people in the northern city of Angles. Two days ago, Philippine police said they used Twitter and Facebook to solve another high-profile case, in Manila, involving a gang of young men and women who robs the rich to carter to their drug habits.
Police says they have killed the gang leader Ivan Padilla, arrested three others and is on the hunt for six other gang members. Source: AFP
According to Silicon Alley Insider, Google has agreed to buy Slide in a deal worth $228 million. The deal will be announced on Friday.
Google has also recently invested a significant amount of money between $100 and $200 in Zynga, Facebook’s leading game developer.
Sarah Lacy reports on Techcrunch that Slide’s apps will be a big part of the Google’s Social gaming service, expected to launch by the end of this year.
Slide Inc, develop applications and widgets. Super Poke!, Top Friends, and SuperPoke! Pets are some of the popular Facebook apps Slide has to its credit. It currently ranks 16th among the top Facebook app developers according to AppData.
Lacy also reports that Google will be going shopping again.
Now, will Facebook go out for another shopping spree and top Google’s spending?
This time, according to a VentureBeat, Facebook acquired 18 key patents related to social networks from MOL Global.
Out of the 18 patents, seven were awarded to Friendster, while the remaining are still pending. The seven patents and eleven patent application is said to have been transfered on June 7.
According to VentureBeat, the patents include:
a “system and method for managing an online social network,” “feeding updates to landing pages of users of an online social network from external sources,” and a “system, method and apparatus for connecting users in an online computer system based on their relationships within social networks,” among others. Together, they appear to give Facebook control over a substantial portfolio of intellectual property covering the basic operations of any social network.”
The overall deal, which included cash was valued at $40 million, reports GigaOm
The deal makes Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg undisputed king of social network, not only in terms of social service and users, but also in terms of intellectual properties.
How would you feel, as a Facebook user, if you found that you spouse had married someone else without your knowledge and you find about it through Facebook?
Well, that’s exactly what happened to an Ohio Woman.
According to report on abc.com, Lynn France says she recently discovered her husband had married another woman through wedding photos on Facebook.
She said she and John France got married with a lavish ceremony on Italy’s Amalfi coast in 2005 and John became a stepfather to Lynn’s older son.
They had two children together and everthing seemed fine until 2008, when she became suspicious about her husband.
She reportedly found her husband with another woman, who told her that they were engaged. John reportedly moved out shortly after the incident. The incident took place at a hotel whose website her husband left opened on the couple’s computer.
In June 2009, Lynn took her estrange husband in, when he came and persuaded her to reconcile, against the advice of her attorneys.
Three months ago, her husband took their two boys and drove off.
Adding more twist to the story, John and his lawyer said that his marriage to Lynn was legally not valid – leaving Lynn with an invalid marriage, an estrange husband, kids she haven’t seen for months, and a Facebook album of around 200 photos of her husband’s other marriage.
Facebook announced in their blog that they have enabled a mobile version of its privacy dashboard for users of its mobile site m.facebook.com.
“As mobile devices have become more sophisticated and widespread, we’ve noticed that people are creating content and accessing Facebook at every moment of the day, in many locations—not just from desktops,” wrote Michael Eyal Sharon, mobile product manager at Facebook.
More than 150 million actively uses Facebook through mobile devices, often engaged in updating their status, and uploading photos and videos.
Now, you can make real time decision over who get a taste of every bit of information that you shared on Facebook.
Users can can take charge of their privacy controls, either by going to m.facebook.com/privacy or by going to the ‘Settings’ page and clicking the “Change” link available next to “Privacy Settings.”
Once inside the ‘Privacy Settings’ page, you can select who see the content you post, customize your granular settings, and also edit/customize Block Lists, Public Search, and your Basic Directory Information.
Brian Womack reports on Bloomberg that Facebook’s biggest advertisers boosted spending by at least 10 times in the past year and expects Facebook’s revenue to reach $1.4 billion in 2010.
Some advertisers’ spending even reached 20-fold according to Facebook Chief Operating officer Sheryl Sandberg.
So far, Facebook has been acquiring start-ups to increase it’s talent pool.
Vaughan Smith, Facebook director of corporate development, said he plans to hire another corporate development executive, adding to the one person helping him secure deals presently.
It is worth mentioning that Facebook took Bret Taylor, who was recently appointed CTO, under it’s wings after Facebook bought FriendFeed for $50 million a last year. Facebook also acquired Octazen, SahreGrove, and Hot Potato, to name a few, this year alone.
“As we get bigger and our platform gets more stable, I fully expect that we will be doing more significant acquisitions. This is working for us, and it’s working for the people that we’re acquiring,” Smith told Bloomberg reporter.
Smith also said that Facebook intends to keep up its acquisition pace and also start making bigger acquisitions in the near future, potentially those companies focusing on virtual currencies, mobile social networking, and start-ups that can further boost its advertising effort.
With half a billion users worldwide, acquiring more talents to carter to the needs of it users while tapping into its strong user base to generate more revenue, Facebook is certainly heading towards the right direction.
VoIp provider Vonage has launched a new mobile app that allows iPhone and Android Smart phone users to make free calls through Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) to any of their Facebook friends who have the app.
The app can be use on iPod Touch too, but only outbound calls can be made at the moment. Support for iPad and Blackberries can be expect in the near future.
One does not need to pay for the app nor subscribe to Vonage.
To get started, you can download the app from the iTunes Store, Android Market, or Vonage fan page on Facebook.
The application will list Facebook contacts, indicating who have downloaded the app with a Vonage logo next to their names in one group and those who haven’t downloaded the app, but can still be connected through instant messaging on Facebook in another group.
The application can also run in the background and rings the phone even if the application is closed, just like the most recent Skype Mobile release.
The caller’s profile picture and most recent status update displays on the screen during incoming call from Facebook friend using the app.
Facebook have released the new version of their Facebook for Android application.
Though relatively similar, the home screen of the new version displays messages, notifications and friend request separately.
The bottom of the home screen sports stream of recently uploaded pictures and videos by your Facebook friends.
Notifications are now shown through a slid-up bar along the bottom of the screen. This is one notable update, as you don’t have to exit to the main screen.
If you are using Facebook on your Android devices, you will be notified of the update asking you to download it. If you don’t get the update notifications, try searching for “Facebook” in the Android Gallery and reinstall the official app.
