Twitter to be available on phones without Internet, courtesy U2opia Mobile
The move is supposed to help Twitter expand its base in areas with low Internet penetration.
Twitter reportedly is working with Singapore-based mobile solutions provider U2opia Mobile to provide access to the micro-blogging website on mobile phones without Internet.
According to U2opia Mobile Chief Executive and Co-founder Sumesh Menon, users will need to dial a code to access feed of trending topics on Twitter. U2opia will be using Unstructured Supplementary Service Data telecom protocol to provide the feed, which will be text-based only.
“USSD as a vehicle for Twitter is almost hand in glove because Twitter has by design a character limit, it’s a very text-driven social network,” Menon told Reuters.
Highlighting low penetration of Internet in emerging markets, the U2opia official said the company will provide localised Twitter feed, depending on the location of a user.
“So somebody in Paraguay would definitely get content that would be very very localized to that market vis a vis somebody sitting in Mumbai or Bangalore,” he said, adding 8 out of 10 users in emerging markets don’t use Internet on their phone.
“For a lot of end users in the emerging markets, it’s going to be their first Twitter experience,” Menon added.
It’s notable Facebook had entered into a similar tie up with the mobile solutions provider. Back in 2011, Bharti Airtel was offering unlimited offline Facebook access at a daily charge of Re.1. The access, however, was restricted to text-based content such as status messages, messages, adding friend and notifications.
Source: Reuters India