Mobile Content Russia

i-Free has redesigned the social utility, Vshkole.ru, and created its mobile version, which comes with a unique GPS capability.

Launched in February 2010, Vshkole.ru (www.vshkole.ru) came as a natural segue to the TV series, School, on Channel One. The social utility is for the fans of the series and for all those who want to know what school life is like for modern schoolchildren.

i-Free, a premier Russian developer of mobile social utilities, came up with some ideas on how to improve the web portal to make it more attractive and user-friendly. In i-Free’s vision, this would be accompanied by the utility’s mobile version with geo-blogging services.

i-Free’s ideas are now a reality thanks to its partnership with Red Square, the studio that produces School.

“Social utilities are vastly popular with young people, but the Internet is not yet easily available everywhere in Russia,” said Red Square CEO Andrei Kurpatov. “The utility’s mobile version will help small town kids communicate, and the geo-blogging capability will add excitement to their communication.”

The website was also redesigned, and the new-look Vshkole.ru is easier and more fun to use. The new features include a dating service and a User Space.

The mobile version has the same functionality as its web-based counterpart. Users can communicate by phone, make friends, track down schoolmates, save, view and comment on photos and videos, blog and microblog, meet new people and download new episodes of School.

What makes the mobile version special is its geo-blogging capability. The user can specify his/her location, and it will immediately appear on a map, which other users can see. At the same time, the utility will offer the user a list of other users who happen to be in or around the same area, and a list of nearby places to hang out and have fun, like movie theaters, discos, restaurants, clubs, etc.

The mobile interface, which is easy and completely fool-proof, was designed to fit all the modern cell phone models on the market in Russia and the CIS. The mobile version can import contact lists and personal info from the major web-based social utilities.

The mobile version of Vshkole.ru was developed on the i-Social technology platform, invented by i-Free specially for mobile social utilities. i-Social currently supports mobile social utilities for MTS, Tele2, the Far-East-based mobile operator NTC, as well as i-Free’s own mobile social utility Tusim! and its community network Jamango, which lists over 10 million users worldwide.

i-Social provides networking tools for users from different social utilities to communicate with each other. This leads to a quick audience growth, while expanding users’ opportunities to make new friends.

The utility’s geo-positioning functionality uses a number of technology solutions: integration with operator-side LBS systems, manual input and location tracking with Google or Yandex API maps, or a GPS receiver, if there is one built into the phone (only applies to iPhone).

“We are glad that our experience and competence have helped make Vshkole.ru even better,” said Denis Belousov, who manages the project for i-Free, commenting on the launch of the mobile version and new-look website of Vshkole.ru. “Speaking of the mobile version, there’s nothing like it on Russian mobile Internet, or anywhere else for that matter, so the users can’t fail to appreciate the novelty and excitement.”