Publishing Platform for Digital Comics Launched by Finnish Startup Epuuk
Easy-to-use publishing format guards copyrights, Aims to change the market for digital comics
Epuuk, a supplier of digital comics for mobile devices and browsers, has launched its service in Finland and is set to expand to other geographies. The service guards copyrights and brings a new model of distribution for digital content. Epuuk is currently in the public beta phase and features content mostly in Finnish. The current selection varies from well-known international titles to Finnish indie comics, with more comics in the English language to come.
“Digital music became wide-spread on pirates’ terms, and damages done by illegal distribution have proven difficult to fix”, said Jarmo Kylmämaa, Managing Director of Epuuk. “Like record collections before, book collections are now going through a phase of digitalization and book publishers must move quickly to keep the development on track from the start. Our aim is to create a digital platform that serves the interests of readers, comic artists and publishers alike.”
Epuuk features both individual comic strips and whole comic albums. Comics bought from the service are saved in the user’s own digital comic shelf, where they can be read anytime and anywhere with a mobile device or web browser. Epuuk comics are kept undamaged, in order, and safe - even if users change their computers or lose their phones.
Epuuk is used with an app suited for most mobile phones or with any web browser by logging into the service. Users can also save one offline copy of their comics to be read on a mobile device. The content format used in Epuuk can be read with various devices, but is best suited for newish mobile phones equipped with large screens. The content does not require large amounts of memory or capacity, unlike PDF or JPG files for example. In the future, Epuuk’s content will also be made available on wireless reading devices.
“Our distribution channel guards copyrights, boosts the utilization of digital publishing rights, and offers a new publishing channel for indie comic artists”, explained Lauri Gorski, Business Development Director of Epuuk. “The web helps artists find their audience and serve the long tail that make publishing profitable also for niches titles. With Epuuk, artists and publishers have the means to distribute their content in a controlled way and collect small payments without excessive processing costs.”
Adapting content into Epuuk’s distribution format is a light and fast process. Epuuk’s affordable pricing and easy-to-use technology reduce comic artists’ need to offer free samples of work. The service lowers artists’ thresholds for bringing works onto the market and offers a way to test demand before printing an album on paper, as readers can be reached anywhere in the world online. [NetProfile Tech News]
eServGlobal’s FlexiContent To Boost Operator Revenue During World Cup
eServGlobal Limited, a provider of smarter transaction management solutions in Charging, Payment, Retention and Network Services, has announced that its FlexiContent Services will be available through over a dozen operators during the 2010 soccer world cup in South Africa.
Commencing June 11, the world cup is expected to attract the attention of over 1 billion mobile subscribers, many wanting the all important ‘live scores’ on their mobile phone. FlexiContent allows operators to quickly capitalize on subscriber needs during popular events by providing the much sought-after information and entertainment tools.
Launched earlier this year at the Cup of African Nations with 12 regional Orange Group affiliates, eServGlobal’s FlexiContent allows operators to generate new revenue during major events. It is a carrier-grade service that uses a rapid application development environment allowing operators to offer innovative content and two way message-based services without any set-up costs. Operators can use sporting competitions, TV shows and other current events to encourage subscriber usage of premium SMS services.
FlexiContent includes Games & Information Services, allowing subscribers to use Premium SMS to access match progress reports and results in REALTIME. FlexiContent also includes a variety of games, such as Instant Win, Predict & Win and Credit Goal, where subscribers play for airtime or financial rewards. Revenue is created through customers’ Premium SMS transactions.
FlexiContent also includes the Closed User Group Chat tool, where subscribers can SMS chat with selected friends about the competition and upcoming games. Once someone is added to the group they can invite other subscribers, encouraging increased ARPU (average revenue per user) through friendly competition.
Due to the platform's capability during previous events (revenue creation, network entertainment and customer stimulation), twelve service providers have selected to offer FlexiContent services during this year’s world cup.
Craig Halliday, COO, eServGlobal, said “We are extremely pleased with FlexiContent’s early popularity and look forward to delivering our new MMS service, where subscribers can ask to see the winning goal after the game, immediately after the first match on June 11.”/ Newswire
Nokia's 2Q Market Share Up, Content Business Growing
By Sue Marek
Helsinki-based Nokia surprised analysts this morning with better-than-expected second-quarter earnings. Although the company's profit was down ($1.75 billion compared to $4.49 billion a year earlier) most of that difference was because the 2007 results included $2.98 billion gain from the formation of Nokia Siemens Networks.
On the good news front, Nokia said that its global market share for handsets is at 40 percent, up from 38 percent a year ago. In addition, the company upgraded its forecast for the global handset market saying that mobile device volumes could grow more than its previous estimate of 10 percent in 2008.
In the U.S. market, where Nokia has been weak, the firm saw significant improvement thanks to two handsets, one that is offered by T-Mobile USA and another by AT&T. Nokia executives expect this to improve even more as the company has had its first CDMA handset approved by Verizon Wireless for use on its network.
On the services front, Nokia says that with the additional support of Sony BMG Entertainment for Nokia Comes With Music service, the company now has three of the top music labels signed on for its service giving it access to 80 percent of the music catalog. The Nokia Music Store is now available in 10 markets and the company expects to have 14 stores open by year-end. In addition, N-Gage mobile games service, which became available during the quarter, has had more than 406,000 downloads. [FierceMobileContent]
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