Archive for the ‘Jordan’ Category
Folowen Releases Public Beta With New Features
Mohamed Marwen Meddah | June 23, 2009 – 2:08 pm |
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Folowen, the social media search tool that aggregates social profiles of people and organization’s on several social media sites into one search result, and that was previously covered here, has just gone into public beta.
The tool makes it easier for users to follow a person or organization’s social web; be it a Facebook profile, page, group, a Twitter account, a LinkedIn profile, a YouTube channel …etc.
Currently, folowen uses Google AJAX Search API to find user profiles in 20 social media sites.
A number of new features have been introduced with this public beta, based on the feedback received from the private beta users, among them are:
- Search is now open without sign up.
- Search results will list up to 4 links for each service for you to browse through to find the account you want to follow.
- Direct Follow: It is now possible for you to directly follow the person/organization you searched for directly from the search results page. This feature is currently enabled for only four services (Twitter, YouTube, FriendFeed and Facebook) that you need to connect folowen to from your Settings/Direct Follow page.
Int@j Introduces 20 Jordanian ICT Companies to Intel Capital
Mohamed Marwen Meddah | June 16, 2009 – 8:36 am | Comments
Int@j, the Information Technology Association of Jordan, recently conducted an event with Intel Capital, the venture capital investment arm of Intel Corporation, including more than 20 companies from the ICT community in Jordan.
The event focused on introducing the Jordanian ICT sector to Intel Capital and sharing various business aspects and relations among the various ICT sector companies and Intel.
Since its establishment as an ICT industry-support association in 2000, Int@j has been exerting a lot of efforts aiming at advancing the Jordanian ICT sector. Int@j has been looking for various partnerships with different institutions on the local, regional and international levels aiming at creating better ICT industry in Jordan, increasing the awareness of ICT services and products and stressing on the benefits of integrating ICT in other sectors.
The meeting included one-to-one presentations by member companies of int@j where they presented their plans, products, services and solutions to Intel Capital focusing on local capabilities, companies’ talented resources and value added services blended together towards positioning Jordan as the regional ICT leader and point of access.
Intel Capital has been quite active in the region lately, as part of its ongoing push to support local entrepreneurship in the Middle East and fund companies in the internet and technology sectors through its $50 million Intel Capital Middle East and Turkey Fund, which is aimed at assisting the companies in pursuing regional growth and development plans in addition to extending their product offerings.
Feroz Sanaulla, Intel Capital’s Director of Middle East, Turkey, and Africa said “’Intel Capital has a history of pioneering successful technology investments in developing markets to foster growth and innovation. We believe Jordanian ICT companies are well positioned in the region and we are keen on helping them drive technology adoption locally and identify new business opportunities globally.”
ATH Moves To Invest In Mobile Technology In The Arab World
Mohamed Marwen Meddah | June 10, 2009 – 12:34 pm | Comments
Accelerator Technology Holdings (ATH) has announced that it is working on establishing a company to fund investment in mobile technology in the Arab region.
ATH is a holding company that acts through a group of companies established in Jordan and Bahrain to identify, invest in and help build best of breed ventures in the ICT value chain in the Arab world, and that has already funded a number of Arab startups through its IV Holdings venture capital arm.
They’re currently working on raising an initial US$10 million in funds, after which they will move on to hiring a management team to launch and run this new company.
They are particularly looking at areas like security and authentication, based on their expectations that financial transactions over mobile platforms will become very widespread in the region in the future, especially with several of the region’s big mobile network operators launching mobile payment initiatives recently.
This new company will operate as a cross between venture capitalist and commercial investor, building ties and working with foreign companies to bring new mobile technologies to the region. They’ve already started talking to businesses in the UK, Switzerland and Norway about bringing their mobile products to the Arab world.
# Source: The National
JoCr8, An Online Community For Visual Communicators And Artists In Jordan
Mohamed Marwen Meddah | June 8, 2009 – 10:19 am | Comments
JoCr8 is a portal created to connect visual communicators and artists in Jordan, and to be a one-stop resource for them for everything related to design and visual arts.
The site is open to everyone who practices any of the visual arts disciplines; from the traditional painter to the designer to the 3D artist.
Users can register to the site to start uploading their work to build their portfolio, that other users will be able to go through and that they can use as a showcase when applying for jobs.
Signed up users can also go through other users’ uploaded material; leave their ratings and comments on their work; and get in touch with them really easily through the interface.
The portal also plays the role of an e-zine with interviews and articles on visual media whether in Jordan, the region, or around the world. It also publishes art and visual media related news and events mainly happening in Jordan.
On the other hand, JoCr8 makes it possible for users to post and share tutorials on different subjects and topics related to design and art, making the site a source of interesting documentation and learning material too.
Another part of the portal is a job postings section that provides information on visual media job opportunities in Jordan and around the region. Job applications aren’t handled through the site though, it’s just a listings section, and users apply seperately to the jobs.
Jocr8, which was founded by Tambi Jalouqa and is a product of Binary Interactive Studios, won the silver award in the online communities category at the Jordan Web Awards 2008 show.
D1G Appoints Ex-Yahoo! Vice President Usama Fayyad As Executive Chairman
Mohamed Marwen Meddah | June 6, 2009 – 10:53 am | Comments
Social Networking and video portal site D1G, which allows users to share, discuss, and distribute rich online content, has tapped into the knowledge and expertise of online data mining and data strategist, Dr. Usama Fayyad, to help catalyze the company into its next stage of growth.
Dr. Usama Fayyad served as Yahoo!’s Chief Data Officer and Executive Vice President of Research & Strategic Data Solution. Dr. Fayyad was responsible for Yahoo!’s overall data strategy, architecting Yahoos data policies and systems, prioritizing data investments, and managing Yahoos data process infrastructure which processed and mined over 25 Terabytes of data per day resulting from Yahoo!’s over 500 million users globally.
Fayyad was also responsible for the advanced technology arm of Yahoo! in Yahoo! Research — the group that is driving innovation in social systems is Search Technology, in Microeconomics and in monetization technologies. He was also responsible for user targeting and grew ad targeting at Yahoo! by 20-fold from when his company was acquired by Yahoo! in 2004 till he left Yahoo! in later 2008.
Fayyad invested into d1g.com, and has become the company’s new Executive Chairman. His entry into the company should provide great value in helping scale the company’s infrastructure to accommodate increased users’ activity and to grow the business to the next level.
“Arab audiences are really thirsty for new-generation rich content and social media represented by the Web 2.0 offerings of d1g.com. I am very excited about d1g.com. I have been informally advising the firm since its early days, and I am very bullish about their potential to grow and provide some of the most dynamic experiences for their audiences and marketers alike.” said Dr. Fayyad. “Since my departure from Yahoo! in the autumn of 2008, I have been evaluating various investment opportunities in the regional online space, and I was very impressed with the skills, expertise and dedication of the company’s leadership.” added Dr. Fayyad.
The company and Fayyad are hoping that he will play a particularly crucial role in helping the d1g.com management team better monetize the company’s inventory through more targeted ad offerings that allows marketers to dynamically generate ads that target various audience criteria such as geography, demography, and browsing behaviour. He will also help expand the offering to our rapidly growing user base across the entire Arabic speaking world.
Sejaal, An Online Community For Arab Poets And Poetry Competitions
Mohamed Marwen Meddah | June 3, 2009 – 3:47 pm | Comments
Sejaal is a new online community portal for Arab poets and poetry competitions that was recently officially launched by Jeeran, a leading Arabic user generated content portal, in its efforts to enrich the Arabic internet with a new type of genuine content and a new crowd of users.
Sejaal’s vision is to be the place for poets from around the world, and to provide poets with tools that help them express their talent and share their creativity with other poets and people online.
A “Sejaal” is a traditional activity that Arabic poets used to enjoy throughout ancient times. This form of poetry has faded in the last century due to the invasion of modern lifestyles, as well as cultural dilution. The web site was specifically designed to replicate the real life experience of a traditional “Sejaal” and therefore revive this form by riding on the most popular medium today –the Internet- making it available to anyone, anywhere in the world.
With the beta version launched earlier in January of this year and even though sejaal is an invitation only site where only the good poets are allowed to join, to maintain the level of quality of the poetry at this very early stage, over 300 competitions were created, the topics of which reflected the general mood of events taking place in real life. For example, a competition on the sad events that took place in Gaza was started by Sejaal users through which the poets wrote 50 verses criticizing the attacks against Palestinians and encouraging the resistance of the Palestinian people.
Folowen, A New Social Media Search Tool (Private Beta Invites)
Mohamed Marwen Meddah | May 31, 2009 – 9:54 am | Comments
folowen is a new social media search tool that just went live in private beta and enables users to search for the social profiles of different people and organizations on several social media sites, returning all found profiles in one search result.
The aim is to make it simpler for anyone to find and follow a person or organization’s social activities online, be it a Facebook profile, page or group; a Twitter account; a LinkedIn profile; a YouTube channel …etc.
Currently, folowen uses Google AJAX Search API to find user profiles on 19 different social media sites including three Arab ones: Questler, Ikbis and Watwet.
Search is only the first piece in the bigger puzzle that folowen wants to build, and this ongoing private beta is concentrated on perfecting that to make sure that users are getting the right results for their searches. Once out of private beta, the search will be open to anyone without any need to sign up for the service.
Signed up users also have the possibility of having their search history saved automatically so that they can go back to them and view their results at any time.
The next step after search will be to enable signed up users to link up folowen into some of the supported social services to be able to follow/connect right from folowen without having to go to that service. This obviously will only be available for services that have APIs that are open and allow this.
folowen doesn’t aim to be another social network now, or a social activity aggregator, just a facilitator to help people find and connect to each other over several platforms.
folowen is founded by the same team Jordan-based team that was behind Questler: Razan Khatib, Alma Khasawnih and Hassan Shahin.
If you’re interested in getting an invite to play around with folowen, just drop a little comment below and I’ll send you one as soon as possible.
TasmeemME: An Online Networking Service For Creative Talents In The Middle East
Mohamed Marwen Meddah | May 25, 2009 – 11:32 am | Comments
TasmeemME, Tasmeem Middle East, is a new service that was launched in its beta version from Jordan, and which its creators describe as the first online networking site for creative talents across the region.
TasmeemME recognizes the link between social connections and finding the right job (if you’re an individual) or the right person for a job (if you’re a company), even more so when it comes to creative talent that is mainly available for freelance work.
The site caters to the creative niche by putting together a service that allows creative people to build their profiles, showcase their portfolios, connect with one another and sell their services; and provides clients with the possibility to post their projects and search for the best talents to work on them.
The service being in beta, it might still need some tweaks and fixes here and there, but overall it’s in pretty good shape. Still, there are a number of important features that are still under work to be added soon; among them are the following:
- Bidding on projects: Clients will be able to post their projects with certain specifications for interested users to bid on; and then they’ll be able to choose after comparing talent portfolios and proposals.
- Marketplace: Users will be able to post some of their work; such as logos, templates, photos and more; as ready-to-buy products for set prices.
- An online payment system will be introduced to make the whole issue of payments more straightforward and secure.
- A rating system through which clients get to rate the talent’s work, and vice versa.
The site, which is available in English only, was founded by Noor El-Fadl, Tamam Mango and Khaled Abu Gharbieh, and developed by Indemaj Technology.
Jordanian Government To Launch Two Venture Capital Funds
Mohamed Marwen Meddah | May 21, 2009 – 4:45 pm | Comments
The Government of Jordan, represented by Jordan Enterprise Development Corporation (JEDCO), has launched a Call for Proposals to pre-select one or two fund managers to provide services in relation to the establishment and management of the up-coming Early Stage and Capital for Growth funds in Jordan.
The Funds are part of the Jordan Enterprise Venture Capital Programme 2009 aiming at developing the emerging venture capital service industry in Jordan and at improving access to equity and quasi-equity financing for SMEs in Jordan.
The Funds will have minimum sizes of EUR5M/US$6.9M (Early Stage) and EUR20M/US$27.5M (Capital for Growth), of which 60% and 35% respectively have been committed in-principle by anchor investors.
The Funds will be managed by the private sector with the anchor investors being treated on a pari passu basis with private sector investors, in terms of risks and rewards. Selection of Fund Manager(s) will be determined on a competitive basis.
Bidding for the management of these funds is open to Venture Capital fund management companies, consortia, new management teams or promoters in a position to demonstrate their ability to:
- Formulate investment strategies matching the Funds’ investment policies;
- Mobilise a management team with relevant track-record;
- Raise additional funds from private and institutional investors;
- Source deals and actively manage the portfolio to create value.
The guidelines for submitting applications are available under the Venture Capital section on the JEDCO website: http://www.jedco.gov.jo.
The final closing date for receipt of proposals is on 15 June 2009 at 15:00 hrs. GMT + 3.
This is a great move by the Jordanian government to try to help build and enrich a professional VC industry in the country. A move worth following closely, and we’ll make sure to keep an eye on it and bring you any updates and news on how things develop.
Watwet’s New Version With Twitter Link, Channels And Better Language Support
Mohamed Marwen Meddah | May 20, 2009 – 9:14 am | Comments
Watwet, the Arab social networking and micro-blogging platform, has released a new version of their web application code named ‘Suzie’, and with it come a bunch of really interesting new features.
With the recent migration to the Rails 2.2 framework, they’ve worked on better language support on Watwet, which translates into better handling of Arabic in this version, but also opens the door for other languages like French, Farsi, Turkish and Swahili, that are in their future plans.
Something interesting they’ve also gone and opened up is the possibility for anyone to create a channel of their own, without having to go through the Watwet team like they used to in the past.
It should be interesting to see how many people and businesses start using this feature; and when/if we’ll start seeing the concept of sponsored channels.
Complementing this move, the public timeline of Watwet now also shows the watwets coming from channels too, along with the watwets coming from the users.
Another good move with this version is the possibility to link a Watwet account to a Twitter account, in a way that anything posted to Watwet gets automatically posted to Twitter and vice versa. A simple settings page available under ‘Twitter Link’ turns this on for the user.
This makes it easier and more efficient for people who mainly use one of the services, but also want to try out the other, or who want to streamline their status and lifestreaming activities across both platforms.
I expect more focus will be put on the integration with Twitter in the future to try and lure more Twitter users to play around with Watwet, growing their user base and activity level through it to make the service even more interesting to use.
Other than these mentioned points, they’ve also worked on some design and layout tweaks for the interface, as well as on browser compatibility issues.
Some really exciting moves in this release by Watwet, paving the way for some pretty interesting possibilities in the future and for some other features they seem to have hidden up their sleeves.
