A Florida-based social networking company is setting up shop on the campus of Michigan State University.Naples, Fla.-based INGage Networks says it will create about 24 jobs with its research and development center in Michigan State’s Communication Arts and Sciences building.


The university says it already has several joint projects with INGage aimed at creating and retaining jobs in the state.

The MSU Extension is in line to get a system for better two-way communication with farmers and others statewide.

INGage Networks offers social media services to private businesses, nonprofit groups and government agencies.

More than 10% of smartphone users connected to a social network in January, up almost 5 percentage points from a year ago.

By Antone Gonsalves
InformationWeek

A rising number of smartphone Web browsers are being used to access social networking sites, an indication of how the online services are extending beyond the PC.


“Social networking remains one of the most popular and fastest-growing behaviors on both the PC-based Internet and the mobile Web,” Mark Donovan, senior VP of mobile at ComScore, said in a statement. “Social media is a natural sweet spot for mobile since mobile devices are at the center of how people communicate with their circle of friends, whether by phone, text, email, or, increasingly, accessing social networking sites via a mobile browser.”ComScore measured smartphone and other mobile phone use only through the use of the devices’ browsers. The numbers do not include access by the nearly 6 million phone users who only use mobile applications.

In looking at mobile phone users as a whole, Comscore found that more than one in 10 used the device’s browser to connect to a social network, an increase of almost 5 percentage points from a year ago.

More than 25 million Facebook users accessed the site via a mobile browser, which was more than double the number of MySpace users. Facebook’s mobile phone audience has exceeded MySpace’s since February 2009, three months before Facebook surpassed MySpace as the leading social network on the Web, according to ComScore.

Twitter, which has experienced tremendous growth in both mobile and PC-based visitors, attracted 4.7 million mobile users in January.

The influence of smartphones as an access point to the Web is growing in the United States as more people buy the devices. At the end of 2009, 17% of mobile phone users had smartphones, up from 11% at the end of 2008, according to ComScore.

In January, almost one in three smartphone users accessed social networks with their mobile browsers, up more than 8 percentage points from a year ago, Web metrics firm ComScore said Wednesday. The number of cellular phone users in general connecting to Facebook through a mobile browser grew 112% from a year ago, while Twitter experienced a 347% jump.

The December 2009 data from comScore (SCOR) were released Tuesday, and the results for the social media sector are nothing short of staggering. Fifty-four percent (112 million) of the 205 million-strong U.S. internet-user population are on Facebook, with 27% (57 million) still using News Corp.’s (NWS) MySpace. But according to data from both comScore and Experian Hitwise (EXPN), the most active users were on Tagged, MyYearbook and Orkut. And Facebook users were more active than those on MySpace.

There’s no doubt that plenty is happening in the social media space, but there are some facts that just might surprise you, either because of the speed of change or the discovery of players that may not have occurred to you.



1. Growing impact of social networking on surfing habit: in the U.S., 25% of all page views came from the top social networking sites and that is up 83% from the 13.8% posted in December 2008.

2. Social media is still growing: one in 10 went to a social networking site in December 2009, up almost 100% from December 2008’s 5.8%. Compare this to the page view data and you get a sense of how sticky the social media sites are.

3. Social media sites are more vulnerable to trends: From December 2008 to December 20009, MySpace and Facebook switched spots. a year ago, 64% of visits to the top 10 social networks belonged to MySpace, with 29% going to Facebook. by December 2009, 28% went to MySpace, with 68% at Facebook.

4. Facebook’s prowess: Facebook’s market share surged 286% year-over-year, but it wound up being good for everyone, since it grew the market at the same time.

5. Market share growth was a bit rare: aside from Facebook, only Tagged gained market share, as an increasingly crowded market required players to fight a little harder for eyeballs. Tagged amped up its share by 35%.

Later today, Google is due to launch a social product that will compete with the currently popular social networks - Facebook


and Twitter. As Wall Street Journal reported, Gmail will get a new module that will stream media and status updates of online friends. This module sounds like a Gmail Labs feature which could be enabled or disabled by account holder’s choice.
However, it’s less likely to be a rival since Google itself has integrated Twitter updates in its search. Maybe Google will bring Orkut updates integration in Gmail - well, that’s just one of the many possibilities. Michael Arrington, TechCrunch CEO, noted that Google’s upcoming social product will go beyond Gmail integration.

Google has already enabled watching YouTube videos in Gmail Chat. Also, YouTube, Flickr and Picasa media previews in mail have been there since a while. Whatever the integration into Gmail would be like, there’s always a kill switch to bring the service back to normal.

If Google’s upcoming social product affects Gmail, the fear of outages and security always persists. Not to forget that this announcement follows Facebook’s homepage redesign and as we know, Google’s online rival Microsoft is one of the stake holders in Facebook. In August 2009, Yahoo had introduced social features in its mail, search and messenger service.

Ford Motor Co. (F) plans to bring social networking, Web browsing and iPod-style thumb controls into 80 percent of its models by 2015 as automakers woo consumers with communications features.A touch-command system will be available this year in the Lincoln MKX, Ford Edge and Ford Focus models, the company said. The My Ford Touch system to be unveiled at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas features thumb-wheel controls on the steering wheel, as well as an 8-inch touch screen in the dashboard, for audio, navigation and climate-control functions.

Ford is enhancing its three-year-old Sync communications offering as Kia Motors Corp. said this week that it’s introducing a similar system this year in its Sorento model. The Ford and Kia systems are both based on Microsoft Corp.(MSFT)’s in-car voice-activated communications technology.

“It is a reason now to buy a Ford,” Chief Executive Officer Alan Mulally said in an interview. “It’s a new way of working and talking with your car.”

John Wolkonowicz, an analyst at IHS Global Insight of Lexington, Massachusetts, said that “Sync is easy to sell to a person under 35. Sync is about entertainment and connectivity, which is very Gen Y.”

Ford fell 2 cents to $11.35 at 9:50 a.m. in New York Stock Exchange composite trading. Yesterday’s closing price of $11.37 was the highest since June 16, 2005.

‘Maintaining Leadership’

Derrick Kuzak, Ford’s product development chief, told reporters on Jan. 4 that “we are intent on maintaining leadership in this kind of connectivity. We saw people becoming addicted to connectivity and we saw increased use of these devices inside the car and we connected the dots.”

Sync was critical to the purchase of a Ford model for 32 percent of buyers last year, he said. The system, a $395 option on some models, is on 70 percent of the vehicles Ford sells. My Ford Touch will be standard on high-end cars and trucks, while a basic My Ford system with a smaller, non-touch screen will be on base models, said Alan Hall, a company spokesman.

Ford said it’s augmenting Sync with the ability to convert incoming texts into spoken words. It will offer drivers 15 standard text responses that can be sent with a voice command. Ford is still researching the ability to convert speech to a text message, said Jim Buczkowski, its director of electronics.

Twitter, MapQuest

The automaker also is incorporating the Twitter social network’s Open Beak application into Sync and is adding Pandora and Stitcher Internet radio and MapQuest.com’s online mapping information. Ford developed its own Web browser, which can be operated only while the car is parked, Kuzak said.

To increase applications, the Dearborn, Michigan-based automaker is letting outside software developers design new functions for Sync.

Ford, which has endorsed legislation to outlaw texting while driving, said its research indicates that hands-free communication doesn’t distract drivers.

“Most of the industry studies show that just driving and just talking is the same,” Kuzak said. “As long as the customer’s eyes are on the road, they are not compromised.”

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood testified Oct. 29 that he found Ford’s Sync system distracting when he tested it on a Taurus sedan during a visit to Dearborn.

“As much as I liked driving the Taurus and as much as I liked the Sync system where you put your BlackBerry in and it syncs all your numbers, it’s a distraction,” LaHood told a House highways subcommittee at a hearing on distracted driving.

To contact the reporter on this story: Keith Naughton in Southfield, Michigan, at Knaughton3@bloomberg.net