Online
Communities Flock to Instant Rendezvous
Popular Web sites are leveraging the power of interactive
Communications solutions to create and grow their online communities
SAN
FRANCISCO -- January 25, 2000 — multimate.net today
announced that three additional Web sites -- The Black World Today (www.tbwt.com),
i/us (www.i-us.com), and Pubzine (www.pubzine.com)
-- are now using Instant Rendezvous to create and build their online
communities. A
comprehensive Internet communications service, Instant Rendezvous (IR)
2.0 builds online communities by allowing Web sites and their visitors
to communicate via instant messaging, chat-on-page, group chat, and
buddy lists. multimate.net
has worked with these three Web sites to create customized Instant
Rendezvous clients to add features specific to their sites and extend
their brand.
"Leading-edge Web sites,
such as these, are creating online communities to stand out from the
crowd, attract new users and maintain their existing audience,"
said Bob Morgan, director of business development for multimate.net.
"Instant Rendezvous provides these Web sites with the latest
tools and technologies for establishing online communities."
Instant Rendezvous builds
communities by allowing Web surfers to communicate live with other IR
users surfing the same page through instant messaging, chat-on-page,
group chat, and buddy lists. Working
with multimate.net, Web sites can extend their company brand by
developing a customized version of the IR client with a "skin"
featuring the look and feel of their logo and Web site.
The new service also allows Web sites to proactively reach out to
their constituents by broadcasting messages to users of their co-branded
client.
 The
Black World Today
The Black World Today
(http://www.tbwt.com) is the premier destination site for African-Americans worldwide. The
site offers informational and entertainment services including news,
sports, commentaries, audio content, job listings, music, weather and
shopping. The site is read and listened to in over 70 countries and
receives approximately 2 million page views each month.
The
Black World Today fosters interactivity and community involvement among
its users through text and audio chat, bulletin boards, letters to the
editors and public opinion polls. Instant
Rendezvous is an integral part of TBWT's community-building effort. As part of its community building efforts, TBWT also works
with Commtouch to provide its users with a customized and branded
Web-based email system. Instant
Rendezvous works seamlessly with Commtouch's email system to notify
TBWT's users of their emails via the customized IR client.
"The
Black World Today has always had a community-building focus," said
Don Rojas, founder and CEO of The Black World Today.
"Instant Rendezvous gives us a powerful tool for further
establishing our online community, and will form the basis of
communications between everyone in the Black World Today
community."
Pubzine
 A subsidiary of Sony Corporation, Pubzine is a free online Japanese
community with over 300,000 registered members. Pubzine offers their members a collection of thousands of
newsletters on many different subjects.
Pubzine’s customized client (left) demonstrates another of
Instant Rendezvous' strengths - International Character Support.
IR supports Japanese, Chinese and other international characters.
“Pubzine
is proud to introduce Instant Rendezvous to the Japanese market,” said
Norito Yoshida, webmaster for Pubzine.
“By working with multimate.net to create a Pubzine client for
Instant Rendezvous, we are able to augment our vast newsletter content
by offering our users the ability to contact each other in real-time and
share their opinions.”
i/us
 i/us
is the #1 independent worldwide destination for graphic software
enthusiasts. i/us has built
the most comprehensive community-driven graphics software resource
online, hosting more than 80 discussion forums moderated by 60 technical
specialists. The site also provides extensive directories for a variety
of graphics-related services, such as free listings for graphic design
firms. And the i/us Graphics Network makes it easy for hundreds of
participating graphics users to contact others in real time using a
Web-based messaging service. The site also hosts 16 content areas
maintained by independent graphics and publishing experts, providing
regularly updated tips, tutorials and industry commentary.
"At i/us, we are excited to
work with Instant Rendezvous because of the company's focus on building
communities," said Arlen Bartsch, president of i/us.
"Instant Rendezvous allows us to rise above the current
state of online chat and instant messaging and create a productive forum
for our community of graphic software professionals."
These new partners are
highlighted in the Current Partner section of the multimate.net Web site
(http://www.multimate.net/partners/partners.cgi).
Visitors to the site can view all IR-enabled communities, and
select the communities and IR skins that meet their needs.
The
Instant Rendezvous client is a small (~500Kb) download available
immediately for free at the multimate.net Web site (www.getIR.com).
IR is also available from popular software downloads sites such
as www.download.com
and ZDNet's Software Library (www.zdnet.com/swlib/).
Companies interested in developing a co-branded Instant
Rendezvous client should contact multimate.net at (212) 924-9662 or partner@multimate.net.
About
multimate.net
Founded in January 1999,
multimate.net’s mission is to provide Web sites with community
building tools and services. The company's first product, Instant
Rendezvous, provides a platform for allowing Web surfers to communicate
with a Web site and each other using a Web page as a common point of
interest.
Privately funded, multimate.net
has offices in New York and San Francisco with a research &
development office in Israel. For
more information, please visit www.getIR.com.
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multimate.net
and Instant Rendezvous are trademarks of multimate.net, Inc. |