Xumii Blog For The Socially Mobile

Offers Mobile Access to IM, Social Networking Contacts with Integrated Mobile Messaging

Today at the DEMOfall 08 conference, Xumii launched the first social address book for mobile phones. With Xumii, users can socialize with any contact on any network, regardless of whether it is a social network, an instant messenger service or another mobile carrier. Xumii’s social address book combines contact information, feeds and status updates from social networks, instant messaging services and mobile contacts in a single view.  Xumii also offers integrated mobile messaging that allows users to maintain threaded conversations, share media files and create private groups. If you are at DEMO now, drop by station #61 to see a live demonstration of Xumii.

Quotes:

• “Xumii solves two major problems – mobilizing your social networks and socializing your mobile network,” said Chris Shipley, executive producer of the DEMO Conferences. “Xumii’s social address book makes social tools easily accessible and serves as an onramp to next generation mobile messaging, without the hassle of multiple applications and networks to contact friends and see what they are doing. Social networks should embrace Xumii since it maintains the affiliation of their members and increases their engagement with their community anytime, anywhere.”
• “We are excited to work with Xumii to let the imeem community extend their experience to the mobile phone.  Now more than 27 million imeem users can connect with their friends and share photos when they’re on the move,” said Sachin Rekhi, product manager, imeem Media Platform.

According to a recent eMarketer study the of mobile phone users worldwide who use their phones to access social networks is expected to rise dramatically to 18.8% or 800 million users by the year 2012.  Xumii is a free service that makes accessing and interacting with these networks easier.

Key features of Xumii include:

• Social Address Book: Access Every Contact, on Every Network - Xumii has developed a social address book that combines contacts from social networks, instant messaging services, media sharing Web sites and on phone mobile contacts into one easily accessible mobile address book. The address book gives users access to contact information, status updates, presence and news feeds for every contact on every network.  The beta version of Xumii currently supports the following networks: Facebook, MySpace, imeem, YouTube, Flickr, AIM, Google Talk, Yahoo Messenger and MSN Messenger.  Xumii will continue to aggressively expand network support throughout the year.
• Mobile Messaging: Switch From SMS to Mobile Messaging - Xumii mobile messaging lets users text and share media files in a single threaded conversation. With Xumii mobile messaging, conversations can be shared by groups of people and can happen across networks.
• Media Sharing: Share Pictures and Videos with Anyone, Easily - Photos and videos from the phone can be shared with other mobile users, or uploaded to media sharing websites and social networks. Users can also share media files from social networks and media sharing Web sites.
• Group Messaging: Message and Share Files with Groups in Private - Xumii’s social address book makes it easy to set up private groups, allowing users to have conversations with groups of contacts in private. Unlike with SMS, Xumii group members can respond to all members of the group and post a reply in a threaded conversation. Members can also share photos, fun widgets and videos within groups. Xumii groups are a very powerful way to stay in touch with close friends and immediate family.
• Message Walls:  Post Pictures and Messages for Friends - Xumii is the first to introduce a mobile version of the popular wall feature used by most social networks. Walls are a rich graphical way for users to express themselves and communicate with their contacts. Similarly, anyone on a user’s contact list can leave messages or post pictures to another user’s wall.

Availability
Xumii currently supports a wide variety of the most popular handsets. Click here to join the Xumii beta or visit  or visit m.xumii.com on your mobile phone.