FunMail Starts Beta Test of Animated Instant Messaging on NTT DoCoMo I-mode.Business Editors/Technology Writes TOKYO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan. 12, 2001 FunMail, Inc. today announced the start of Beta testing (programming) beta testing - Testing a pre-release (potentially unreliable) version of a piece of software by making it available to selected users. This term derives from early 1960s terminology for product cycle checkpoints, first used at IBM but later standard throughout the of wireless animated Instant Messaging Exchanging text messages in real time between two or more people logged into a particular instant messaging (IM) service. Instant messaging is more interactive than e-mail because messages are sent immediately, whereas e-mail messages can be queued up in a mail server for seconds or on the NTT DoCoMo (NTT Mobile Communications Network, Inc., Japan) Founded in 1991, NTT DoCoMo is a spinoff of Japan's NTT (Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation) which provides wireless services, including cellular, paging, satellite and maritime and in-flight telephone services. i-mode system. The Beta test A test of new or revised hardware or software that is performed by users at their facilities under normal operating conditions. Beta testing follows alpha testing. Vendors of packaged software often offer their customers the opportunity of beta testing new releases or versions, and the of FunMail is a fully operational Japanese language version available for general public use from i-mode phones within Japan. FunMail is the wireless industry's first true multimedia messaging product. FunMail for Japan allows i-mode phone users to send full color, animated messages simply by entering a few Japanese characters. FunMail uses the unique, patent pending, language independent text-to-animation technology developed by FunMail, Inc. during a lengthy product development and testing process. Japanese FunMail users can enter their own text or they can select from a variety of animated messages using a menu command. In addition, Japanese FunMail is the first i-mode service to offer a unique new capability to NTT DoCoMo subscribers: FunMail animated messages can be sent from one i-mode phone to any other i-mode phone in Japan or to any desktop computer anywhere in the world. Similarly, a desktop user anywhere in the world can send a FunMail to an i-mode subscriber in Japan. FunMail will available on J-Phone and KDDI services shortly. FunMail brings revolutionary new features to messaging from and between cell phones. Each animated Instant Message is generated dynamically on-the-fly based on the unique text entered by the user. The resulting animated message is scalable. It automatically adapts itself to the screen size and sound capability of the recipient. Cell phones receive animations scaled for low power and small screen size. Desktop computers automatically receive larger, richer animations with an accompanying sound track. The meaning and character choice of the animation remains the same over multiple platforms. "We feel that everyone will get a great kick out of this," said Akio Kogane, CEO (1) (Chief Executive Officer) The highest individual in command of an organization. Typically the president of the company, the CEO reports to the Chairman of the Board. of FunMail Japan. "Wireless FunMail is being enthusiastically embraced by all those who see it." Adam Lavine, CEO of FunMail in America, said, "We are now working to finalize the service. The alpha testing went very smoothly and we kept to our timelines, and expect the beta period to be just as smooth, with the final release coming shortly." I-mode subscribers in Japan who wish to participate in the beta test should email imodebeta@funmail.com to obtain the URL URL in full Uniform Resource Locator Address of a resource on the Internet. The resource can be any type of file stored on a server, such as a Web page, a text file, a graphics file, or an application program. and be placed on the beta list. About FunMail Japan and FunMail, Inc. FunMail, Inc. was founded in May 1999 by Adam Lavine, Dennis Chen and a team of digital animation software industry veterans. FunMail Japan was officially launched in October 2000 with funding from FunMail, Inc. and Mobile Internet Capital (MIC). MIC is an investment fund created by NTT DoCoMo, Sony, NEC (NEC Corporation, Tokyo, www.nec.com, www.necus.com) An electronics conglomerate known in the U.S. for its monitors. In Japan, it had the lion's share of the PC market until the late 1990s (see PC 98). NEC was founded in Tokyo in 1899 as Nippon Electric Company, Ltd. , IBJ IBJ Industrial Bank of Japan, Ltd. IBJ Illinois Business Journal IBJ International Brotherhood of Jones , Panasonic, JVC JVC Victor Company of Japan (or Japan's Victor Company) JVC Jewelers Vigilance Committee JVC Jesuit Volunteer Corps JVC Jet Vane Control (directs VLS-launched missiles) JVC Jonker-Volgenant-Castanon , Mitsubishi and other major Japanese corporations. For an online demonstration of animated IM, see www.funmail.com. For more information in the USA contact Adam Lavine at (925) 455 1200 or by email (or FunMail) at adam@funmail.com, in Japan contact akio@funmail.com. |
|
Printer friendly
Cite/link
Email
Feedback
Reader Opinion