Update: this site might be of a security risk, the site marketing personnel refused to provide us with his full  name or send us more details related  to security.

They finally responded and here is the update:

Update 2:

We got this response from Dushare marketing team:

How do you close the connection?
1. The connection is closed as soon as the second peer refreshes his page after recieving file or closing the browser page.

if the link is there in the cloud? how would we know that the user PC is not wide open to you guys or anyone?

He is not open, we have implemented a 128-bit encryption algorith on the transferred packets.

Another thing, the link can only be picked by one peer, no one else can coonect to it. You can also password-protect your files. And ones the sender leaves our page or doesn’t send another thing. All connections are closed.

Let me explain in details:

1. You pick a file, it gets prepped up and url is produced for you to send it to your friend/other peer.
2. The file link is clicked on directly, http://www.dushare.com#45130 or can be retrieved by entering the code “45130″ in the “claim” part.
3. upto to the point the url is produced, no security risk or any ports or sockets are sockets are exposed.
4. When the other peer, click on the url link and connect to you. The data packets are encrypted using a 128-bit AES encryption. This encryption is required for any tampering of data  by a middle man other than the receiving
peer.
5.We expose no ports or sockets. Once the other peer picks up the file, no one else can pick up the file and url link is useless. You can even password-protect your files.

The above explains the security part.

As for the connection,

You(sender) identify yourself with an id on the main server with your IP, then when the other peers picks the file, he has an ID, and IP, The actual data packets are transferred directly between ID 234 to ID 434 securely.

We have no control and we cannot intercept the file transfer as its transferred directly from peer 1 to peer2. Even in the case, the data is tampered by a man in the middle. It is encrypted using a 128-bit AES encryption.

I hope that clarifies your security concerns.

Another addition, The url link cannot be picked by more than 1 peer. You can also password protect your files.

Update 3:

From dushare team: “With p2p technology you don’t have access of anytype to the peers pc. It’s simply sending and recieving data packets and decoding them.”

There are different ways to share files with peers, coworkers and friends using tools such as torrents and ex- Google MENA Marketing Manager Nagi Salloum‘s Loomn.it

Dushare brings the concept of P2P (peer 2 peer) to the web and for free, no registration,  just hit upload any file of any-size and then share the key with your friend, he/she can join the link to chat with you while getting the file.

Dushare claims that it does not see your files or chat logs as they rely on secure direct transferee connection between the 2 peers. Dushare also offers the option to protect your files with a password.

Dushare is a product of DuLeaf FZE a United Arab Emirates’s Dubai Silicon Oasis based company. We do not know what is the startup model but we have replied to their coverage request and will let you know if they answer.

On the file sharing front, Infinite USB Memory Drive (IUM) also from Dubai provides unlimited file transfer between devices using WIFI.

Sukar a private shopping club that offers on a weekly bases from well known brands at discount rates up to 70% has started offering delivery to Jordan, Egypt and Lebanon. It was available before only in UAE. Sukar was launched end of last April.

Jabbar group is the majority owner of Sukar, the other e-commerce company that Jabbar owns is Souq.com like ebay but for  the Arab world ( an auction site) has announced partnership with Mobily a Mobile operator in Saudi Arabia. Now Mobily users can use Mobily loyalty program points called “Neqatai” and redeem them in buying goods on the auction site.. Souq.com is available in Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and UAE.

Jabbar’s e-commerce quest did not stop in 2 companies, as the growing success of Dubai Based group buying startup GoNabit has led Jabbar to announce its own copycat called cobbone.

GoNabit managed to get the backing of Bayt ( a leading Middle East e-jobs site) as a majority share holder. Both Bayt and Jabbar share the same investor, NewYork based Tiger Global Management.

Update: Kzalek was on private beta, the download link has expired, sorry for late update it was  a miss communication with its founder.

Last month, I nagged and was wondering why the current Twitter AIR based Desktop apps such as TweetDeck and Seesmic do not support Arabic text on Mac or Linux? But now I can breathe the sigh of relief. ( Arabic is written from right to left. Arabic letters are connected to each other unlike the Latin words).

Few hours ago, Kzalek, founded by Mustafa Farghay from Egypt, launched in beta. Kzalek did not only solve the problem for Mac and Linux users but has a complete Arabic Interface for both platforms, Windows and any platform that can run by Adobe AIR.

Whats more wonderful, I think that this app has the best Arabic right-to-left (RTL) support. Usually on the other Twitter desktop apps, when you tweet something in Arabic and add some English word(s) to your tweet, the tweet text gets scrambled as the English letters go South. But with Kzalek app, the tweet stays clean and organized. The same way you would write an Arabic document in MS Word when you add some English text to it. ( Even though I am currently a Mac user, I did not see any other office suite that is better than MS office).

Currently Kzalek, offers many Twitter basic functions with some more new features:

1. Complete Arabic UI.

2. You can see the tweeted pics in thumb view.

3. You can see the original Tweeted long URL without having to leave the app. Since Kzalek uses the popular Untiny service from Saleh Al Zaid from KSA. (LINK)

4. You can tweet pics and shorten urls directly from the app using bit.ly, Twitpic and yfrog APIs.

6. Kazlek can translate tweets into Arabic. It uses google language API (Although Google translation is funny in most occasions).

7. Favorite tweets get replies and DMs and you can reply, Retweet and DM.

8. Search feature.

As a twitter user with multi Twitter accounts, and since the app is still in beta,it does not meet my current needs. Although it might help me manage my ArabCrunch Arabic Edition on Twitter.

Mustafa Farghay told ArabCrunch about his future plans to add more features that would make Kazlek even more useful to any level of Twitter users. These features will include adding multi accounts, sending DMS to many users, friendship methods (add, block…etc), support for Twitter native users lists, Twitter trends, audio embedding, saved search Farsi interface and increased performance to make the app consumes less RAM. Although Mustafa assured us that currently Kzalek consumes less RAM than any other AIR clients. He also added that he might offer SMS support for replies and DMS in many Arab countries.

As for the web, Arabic Twitter is available via ArTwitter.

I told Mustafa about the most popular video sharing service on Twitter, TwitVid which is cofounded by Mohammad Al Adham from Jordan and Adil Lalani from Pakistan, and he said that he never knew about them but he will start reading their API to see if he can add TwitVid to the list of twitter services supported by him.

I also asked Mustafa if he is willing to support Twitter’s regional clone from Jordan, WatWet, but it turned out that he hasn’t heard about them either. He added that he will read their API and consider the idea.

With this Launch, Twitter will become even more popular in the Arab world, especially as AC broke Twitter talks to strike SMS deals with major operators in the Arab region. In addition, Twitter did another recent SMS deal in India. Not so good of a news for WatWet!

Thanks to God, after a long wait, with an excuse or no excuse and in compliance with the popular demand, your blog AC announces today the launch of “ArabCrunch Arabic Edition which will be the first Arabic blog that focus on tech startups, entrepreneurship, social media and mobile news and views and is based on citizen journalism. Citizen Journalism is a concept that allows anyone in the public to contribute and share information and be a media reporter.

AC Arabic will publish stories in Arabic about Arab and International companies and technology startups. In addition, it tracks recent technology developments and trends. The new Arabic blog aims to help ignite entrepreneurship and creative thinking in the Arab world. It also provides the average Arabic Internet and mobile with useful tips and blog posts.
The main two differences between AC English and AC Arabic are:

1- Besides Arab startups, there will be more focus on International startups and companies, so Arab readers would learn from them, start thinking more outside the box and launch International unique products and services. It will also carry posts that cater to the average Arab Internet user with tips and useful apps or mobiles to use or buy.

2- It is citizen journalism which means any member of the public can participate with nice blog posts if they meet AC’s editorial standards.

This launch is just the beginning of serious initiatives from ArabCrunch to support startups and help accelerate innovation in the region.

Thanks to everyone who made this launch possible (especially Feedoor.com the main sponsor of AC).
Here is the press release in English (Arabic press release here.) feel free to use in your blog or website. :

First Arabic Tech Entrepreneurs and Citizen Journalism Based Blog is Launched

Amman, Jordan, 13, October 2009- ArabCrunch http://arabcrunch.com (AC), the leading English professional blog and events network that focuses on Arab tech startups, announced today the launch of “ArabCrunch Arabic Edition”.

AC’s Arabic edition will be the first Arabic blog that focus on tech startups, entrepreneurship, social media and mobile news and views which is based on “citizen journalism”. Citizen Journalism is a concept that allows anyone in the public to contribute and share information and be a media reporter.

The site, which is located at http://www.arabcrunch.com/ar, publishes stories in Arabic about Arab and International companies and technology startups. In addition, it tracks recent technology developments and trends. The new Arabic blog aims to help ignite entrepreneurship and creative thinking in the Arab world. It also provides the average Arabic Internet and mobile with useful tips and blog posts.
By offering the public a chance to submit new posts, which need to be approved by an editor before getting it published, “ArabCrunch Arabic Edition” is another step closer to solve the scarcity of Arabic content on the Internet. As many studies have suggested that the Arabic content stands at around less than 1% of all languages online.
According to Mr. Gaith Saqer, founder and editor of ArabCrunch,” For the past year and a half, ArabCrunch the English version (http://arabcrunch.com) has been focusing on Arab tech startups and tech news related to the Arab region, aiming to help Arabs excel and innovate and help the Arab startups to be more visible.”
Mr. Saqer added “Since many Arabs do not speak English well and many others prefer to read in Arabic, ArabCrunch Arabic Edition www.arabcrunch.com/ar aims to be their new online home to read the latest stories about startups not just from the Arab world, as was the case of the English version, but worldwide. The main goal is to help Arabic readers to learn from the experiences of foreign entrepreneurs and startups and encourage them to think outside the box and start new unique startups with a global scope.”
“ArabCurnch Arabic Edition” will publish a mixture of short news, tips, features and analysis. It will use a mixture of in-house as well as citizen-based content. The site which was under stealth testing for the past few months has already attracted many contributors from Saudi Arabia, Algeria, USA and Australia.

ArabCrunch http://arabcrunch.com was featured by many international and regional news organizations such as Reuters, Los Angeles Times, and Star, Addustour and the National and the top 10 blogs worldwide for its exclusive content, breaking news and the activities and events.
ArabCrunch Arabic Edition can be accessed from http://arabcrunch.com/ar

—- End—-
About ArabCrunch:
ArabCrunch http://arabcrunch.com is a network of professional tech blogs and events geared with a mission to help accelerate entrepreneurship and innovation in the Arab world. ArabCrunch started in 2008 with its English edition ArabCrunch.com now it also includes: ArabCrunch Arabic Edition and ARABCRUNCH DEMO.

ArabCrunch English http://arabcrunch.com: is the ultimate online English source for Arab tech startups, companies, social media and mobile in the Arab world.

ARABCRUNCH DEMO: http://events.arabcrunch.com/demo9
In its effort to drive innovation and help create an ecosystem to support entrepreneurship and startups in the Arab world, ArabCrunch organized in February 2009 the first ARABCRUNCH DEMO 09, The Launchpad Event for Emerging Technologies in the Arab World, the regular event offered unfunded Arab startups free chance to demo in front of Investors, tech enthusiast and the media. The first version of the event was organized in partnership with Queen Rania Center for Entrepreneurship (QRCE) and was held in Amman, Jordan, the home of many hot tech startups and companies in the Arab world such as Maktoob which was recently acquired by Yahoo for an estimated 200 Million US Dollars. ARABCRUNCH DEMO next edition will take place early next year.

ArabCrunch Arabic Edition http://arabcrunch.com/ar :
In October 2009, ArabCrunch launched “ArabCrunch Arabic Edition” the first Arabic blog that focus on tech startups, entrepreneurship, social media and mobile news and views and that is based on “citizen journalism”.

Around a week ago, my friend explained to me how cool friendfeed is, and explained to me how its founders are open to its users and engaged with them. That raised my respect to friendfeed and I started using it more often than just linking my Twitter account to it.

You probably heard the news that Facebook has just acquired friendfeed and you might know that Facebook has been copying friendfeed with many of its features (here is a good post from Webware that tackles the issue. )

But unlike friendfeed facebook has a reputation of being a dictator, forcing its well on its users with insane Terms of Service (TOS) , breaching their privacy and censoring freespeech. With 220 + millions members, facebook seems carless if few thousands left the site because it changed its TOS or prohibited some of its members from expressing their free speech right.
What will be the fate of this acquisition? It is highly expected that firendfeed will merge with facebook thus there will be no more friendfeed.

That opinion seems to be shared with devote friendfeed users as around 50% of comments on the official FriendFeed announcement  view the deal as negative. While many others were even commenting  against it on friendfeed blog or congratulated the founders with varied amounts of skepticism. Some other users even started deleting their freindfeed profiles such as April Russo .

I personally congratulate friendfeed founders on this acquisition, but I ask Facebook to respect its users, the way freindfeed did and respect their rights to freespeech.

Yahoo rolled out a preview of its new homepage in U.S. 10 days ago and said will start rolling out to other market this month. Thought it seems the new homepage has already arrived to the Arab world. I spotted the page today on my PC, then asked my friends in Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Algeria to confirm, they all confirmed getting the new homepage preview some saying they had it for a week, others since the past few days, but one friend in Egypt said he did not spot it yet!. (if you live in the Arab world with no access to it, please let us know via a comment.)

Yahoo’s newpage is essentially a simplified mixture of a startpage like Netvibes and iGoogle.  It brings together external Web site with Yahoo!’s own websites and channel in a single destination across both PC and mobile screens. (Yahoo’s Mobile homepage is up and running on my mobile- more shots on Flickr here.)

New features of the Yahoo! homepage include:

• My Favorites: People can choose from a dashboard of more than 65 apps to add directly to their homepage, including different email providers (AOL(R), Gmail(R), Yahoo! Mail), Yaho’s selected content sites (Barron’s(R), NPR(R), omg!, USA Today), popular social networking sites (Facebook(R) and MySpace(R)), and others.
• App Maker where you can add any website url, and Yahoo fetches its update automatically, it is not clear whether Yahoo looks for the site’s feed and add itself or if it is using another technical method, and there is no editing or a way to delete the added apps.

• PC to Mobile Sync Whatever new apps you add on your computer stay with you when you are mobile.

• Social Updates integration with Facebook and MySpace.

Yahoo’s  new homepage is big step by Yahoo, but it would not be appealing to the web savvy users because they can get it all done in a better way on startpages like Netvibes and iGoogle or RSS readers like Google Reader.

However for the average person like my mom, this redesign makes it easier for them to keep track of their favorite sites without opening too many Tabs.
Yahoo has around 500 million visits per month, in the Arab world its webmail and instant messenger seems to be the most popular among users in the region.
Yahoo search is dead with Bing, Did Yahoo dig its grave?

Do you remember back in the 90s when we all started web browsing, Yahoo’s homepage was just a directory listing that later turned on into a portal. Taking the users focus off the search functionality into different Yahoo’s network channels specially its news channel. This had implications on the branding of Yahoo, after a while people did not look at it as a search engine. In contrast Google maintained its homepage with a simple search bar thus reinforcing its brand name as a search engine, in which the term Googleit equals search it.
Google built its business and success off Yahoo’s lack of vision: Yahoo outsourced its search to Google – a startup back then- with a small tag (powered by Google) which essentially drove people away from Yahoo to Google.
Then Google came with Adwords and figured how to monetize search engine traffic big-time with contextual ads, a multibillion business that allowed Google to control most of advertising online. (market cap: yahoo $19.99 Billion Google $140 billion, net income: 830,000 Google $4.343 Billion- Source: WolframAlpha.)

Both Yahoo and Microsoft realized the importance of search and contextual ads, Microsoft tried it with its Live brand and failed, while Yahoo did its own search and failed essentially for two reasons:

1. Yahoo’s brand was not positioned as a search engine, because its homepage is full of content and ads from other Yahoo’s channels.
2. Yahoo’s  search technology did not at least meet Google’s search algorithm.

Unlike Yahoo, Microsoft learned its lessons, it figured out how to make its search smart by buying two innovative search startups: Powerset and Farecast , added its own code to them and Launched its search engine under a new name “Bing“ with $100 million USD in advertising money. Bing’s homepage is essentially what google’s homepage, a streamed line search bar, the focus is on the search bar, but with some eye catching images probably to make a difference than the very simple white background of Google.

Trying to catch up with Google, Yahoo tried to position itself as technology company like Google, but with its new CEO, Carol Bartz, decided a new strategy and focus on content, so it would be the best in Finance the best in cars, the best in images, etc. And now it killed it search engine forever with this Bing deal with Microsoft and probably its other open search innovation SearchMonkey and BOSS . Which will mean a repeat of its history with Google , but this time driving traffic not just to Bing but other MSN properties that competes with Yahoo’s new focused products.
Yahoo does not need to be bought by Microsoft nor it needs to let Bing power its search, Yahoo needs an intrepreneurial culture, it needs to offer intensive to its thousand of smart employees to come up with new Ideas that have potential to be game changers like Google’s Wave or Google Gmail. From a basic web app built on PHP to sophisticated apps built on C++. Not to mention to take the companies they acquire into the next level, instead of killing them or freeze them with nothing new like mybloglog.

Going back to the brand implications of Yahoo’s new homepage: as brand specialists say a brand is defined by the customers experience, I think Yahoo’s new homepage is trying to rebrand Yahoo as a startpage for the web.

User generated locations directory for places in Dubai, Places.ae, which ArabCrunch reviewed last year here, has launched recently a new service that allows you to send an email and get requested information right to your email inbox, a concept that is similar to what an IVR system can do but via email.

This service is useful and saves time, since you do not have to open a new browser tab write places.ae in the address bar and then enter your search query. If your email is open all the time just hit “compose mail” enter ask@places.ae and in the subject line you set your search query, for example “pizza in Jumeira”. You don’t have to put something in the body of the email, since it will be ignored anyway.

You will receive an answer a few moments after you send the email, giving you the 10 closest places to the requested location. It also sends you little Google maps in the email. Under testing it took less than 1 minute to get the reply.

It will be cool too if places.ae can release a gmail gadget.

Social Networking and video portal site d1g.com, which allows users to share, discuss, and distribute rich online content, has tapped into the knowledge and expertise of online data mining and data strategist, Dr. Usama Fayyad, appintement is a big win for D1g.com. 

Dr. Usama Fayyad served as Yahoo!’s Chief Data Officer and Executive Vice President of Research & Strategic Data Solution.  Dr. Fayyad was responsible for Yahoo!’s overall data strategy, architecting Yahoos data policies and systems, prioritizing data investments, and managing Yahoos data process infrastructure which processed and mined over 25 Terabytes of data per day resulting from Yahoo!’s over 500 million users globally.   

Dr. Fayyad was also responsible for the advanced technology arm of Yahoo! in Yahoo! Research — the group that is driving innovation in social systems is Search Technology, in Microeconomics and in monetization technologies. He was also responsible for user targeting and grew ad targeting at Yahoo! by 20-fold from when his company was acquired by Yahoo! in 2004 till he left Yahoo! in later 2008. 

Dr. Fayyad invested into d1g.com, and has become the company’s new Executive Chairman. But the amount of investment has not been disclosed.  With d1g.com growing regional audience of more than 3 million unique monthly visitors viewing more than 20 million monthly pages and an excess of 15 million online monthly videos — making it the leading video streaming site in the Middle East, Dr. Fayyad’s entry into the company provides great value in helping scale the company’s infrastructure to accommodate the increased users’ activity and to grow the business to the next level   

“Arab audiences are really thirsty for new-generation rich content and social media represented by the Web 2.0 offerings of d1g.com. I am very excited about d1g.com.  I have been informally advising the firm since its early days, and I am very bullish about their potential to grow and provide some of the most dynamic experiences for their audiences and marketers alike.” said Dr. Fayyad.  “Since my departure from Yahoo! in the autumn of 2008, I have been evaluating various investment opportunities in the regional online space, and I was very impressed with the skills, expertise and dedication of the company’s leadership.” added Dr. Fayyad.  

Dr. Fayyad will play a particularly crucial role in helping the d1g.com management team better monetize the company’s inventory through more targeted ad offerings that allows marketers to dynamically generate ads that target various audience criteria such as geography, demography, and browsing behaviour. He will also help expand the offering to our rapidly growing user base across the entire Arabic speaking world. 

“We are very excited to have Dr. Fayyad on board.  His hands-on approach to the company and the team has already proved to be of enormous value to the business.”  said Majied Qasem, d1g.com Co-founder, “Dr. Fayyad will be instrumental in helping us capture a larger share of the rapidly growing on-line advertising market as all companies realize the effectiveness and value of this new medium, especially in reaching the youth and high-value audiences across the Middle East, including especially the GCC and North Africa.” 

Rudain Kawar, d1g.com Co-founder and primary investor so far added “I am looking forward to working with Dr. Fayyad.  His involvement will put d1g.com in the forefront of online innovation and provide globally and regionally relevant insights into the industry.”  

2 days ago Facebook announced on the homepage (once logged in) that face book in English UK is available. The drop down menu offered an array of  international languages including Arabic as beta.

Before Arabic was only available in the facebook’s translation app. Now it is an option for any user to add it without installing the app.

The interface is now completely in Arabic, and was translated by facebook users themselves. Where translated content could be voted by users in order to verify its accuracy.

 This move will take any language advantage of any Arabic social network. like Maktoob’s As7ab and Jeeran.

By far, millions of Arabs use facebook everyday, even those who do not know English well, I’ve seen guys with little English skills use facebook, even though they do not understand everything yet they managed to use its main tasks. Now all they have to do is go to account>>setting>> and chose Arabic as the language. Note that there are many Arabs who know English well and would feel more comfortable reading and writing in Arabic more than any other language. 

My take is short this event was inspired by TechCrunch 50 and DEMO events and Mashable meetups, it is bringing a mix of both of them to the Arab World. Bellow is the press release pleas repost in your blog/website, and do not forget to embed the badges found here  in your blog too, to spread the word about this event and the great Arab startups who took the challenge .

ArabCrunch and DART Offering a Platform for Arab Startups to Launch at ArabCrunch DEMO 09 Event

AMMAN, Jordan – (9, Feb, 2009) – Arab Innovation is hardly spotted, but with ArabCrunch DEMO event it will be subjected to change. The event will give Arab startups the chance to present their newly developed products and launch it, in order to get good outreach to target customers and gain access to both investors and media.

 ArabCrunch- a blog dedicated to profiling Arab originated startups and established companies, and DART- the student entrepreneurship society at Princess Sumaya University for Technology (PSUT) one of the major programs at the of Queen Rania Center for Entrepreneurship (QRCE) are organizing the 1st ArabCrunch DEMO, which is a regular event that is planned to be the Arab world’s launchpad for emerging technologies. This event will take place on the 23rd of February in Amman, Jordan at the Princess Sumaya University for Technology and will include keynote speaking remarks form top regional and world class technology and e-marketing experts. It will be followed by a networking reception to ignite new relationships that can help the attendance in their business and to further deepen knowledge sharing. 

The event is organized as an effort to bring enthusiasm to newly launched companies and products, find great Arab innovation, spot technology trends, and learn from the experiences of emerging startups, current corporate players and from the expertise of world class keynote speakers. 

Gaith Saqer the founder and editor of ArabCrunch summarized the importance of the demo event “Unlike their western counter parts, Arab tech entrepreneurs and startups face many difficulties, such as lack of funding and marketing support. We are creating a platform to help them overcome those difficulties. The platform will allow the early-stage, and mostly unfunded innovative companies to take center stage and demo in front of fellow entrepreneurs, CEOs, venture capitalists, IT professionals, IT students, media, advertising agencies, and early tech adapters.” He added. “We chose these startups based purely on their innovation, without regard to their own financial resources. We try to help those startups thrive and succeed, as for the established ones, we help them gain further market momentum.” 

Saqer Concluded “We are able to organize this event because of the generous support of the following companies: e-Marketing MENA as a platinum sponsor, Maktoob as a gold sponsor, Ikbis as a bronze sponsor and great support from our media partners: Mashable, Addustour Newspaper, The Star Newspaper and CenterNetworks.”

This unique event will give the chance to five Arab originated startups to present their products and services. The presenters from Jordan are: Ishki, a Web 2.0 portal that aims to be the first Arab complaints platform, and MailPacks which is an auto responder system. The other three presenters from Egypt are: Adhere from Citex Software, which is an open-source mobile advertising platform, in addition to weNear from eSpace, a location-based framework that connects people’s Interest. And Al-Khawarizmy; which developed new Arabic search algorithms and solutions.  

Several discussions will be held after technology and business experts had presented their products. There also will be keynote speakers from the region and the world speaking at the event, to share their know-how and expertise in managing and running great innovative world-class companies, thus help spark vigorous discussions and debates during the event. The Keynote speakers are: from USA: Sumaya Kazi, Senior Social Media Manager at Sun Microsystems and founder of The CulturalConnect, she is an internationally recognized innovator, leader, speaker and award-winning entrepreneur. From UAE: Khaled Jabasini, the Founder and CEO of E-Marketing MENA, the leading digital Media consultancy in the Middle East and North Africa, with the largest digital reach in the Arab speaking world, serving more than 600 million monthly impressions and over 29 million unique users, and Lebanon: Herve Cuviliez, the Managing Director of KuvCapital the leading Pan-Arab and European seed investment venture capital firm with investment in both regions. 

Highlighting the main reason behind organizing the event, Mohammad M. Khawaja, Deputy Director of QRCE said on behalf of DART “we partnered with ArabCrunch, one of the leading blogs for Arab tech startups to further build a wider regional ecosystem to help spread entrepreneurial spirit and innovation across the Arab world, and help Arab startups innovate the next generation of products and services and succeed in presenting them to the market”

DART is the student entrepreneurship society developed by QRCE. It focuses on promoting the entrepreneurial spirit amongst PSUT students as a style of life, and have an ambitious expansion plan to establish DART societies in all other Jordanian universities. While QRCE is a regional player in entrepreneurship development and technology commercialization, with a mission of supporting socioeconomic growth by providing an array of programs and services that support startups and SMEs at different stages. 

ArabCrunch is a professional blog, that is dedicated to profiling and reviewing Arab originated technology startups and existing Internet and Mobile companies, and their products and services, especially in Web 2.0 and Mobile 2.0. The blog is currently in English, an Arabic version is intended to be released soon. In addition to more ambitious projects aimed at helping create a technology revolution in the Arab world.

The event will take place at Friendship auditorium Princess Sumaya University of Technology (PSUT) Amman, Jordan. Attendance will be free of charge, with previous preapproval. Registration can be done online by visiting the event’s website: http://events.arabcrunch.com/demo9/

While I was about to go sleep Saturday, I witnessed unusual traffic on AC, at a closer look most traffic was coming from Slashdot. ArabCrunch was experiencing Slashdot Effect, or has been Slashdotted.

I remember knowing about Slashdot since the late 90s, back then I remember most of Slashdot visitors used to be very anti-Microsoft. I also remember about 8 years ago the site used to run Anti Bill Gates and anti-MS ads.

Slashdot started according to their website on in September of 97. Today the site serves millions of pages to hundreds of thousands of readers.   

Slashdot is the web destination that pioneered community generated content, now it’s owned by SourceForge the popular holder of media and e-commerce web sites that connect millions of “influential technology professionals and enthusiast”s each day .

All the content on Slashdot is user generated and revolves around technology issues such as Apple, Games, Linux, and Mobile. Posts get to the homepage after editorial approval, which what sparked Digg founder Kevin Rose to start Digg, as a technology web destination that features content submitted by users, and instead of having an editor, the crowd votes and decide what goes to the front page. Later Digg evolved into all content type Web 2.0 hub, from tech to politics and lifestyle and from text to pics and videos. Today Digg is visited by over 22 million visitors, if your website gets Dugg, you will experience the Digg Effect which is much larger than Slashdot Effect, meaning millions will converge to your website. (Please keep digging all AC posts ans slahdotting them )

The post that was SlashDotted was “Aljazeera Labs Beta Launched Crowdsourced Mapping Mashup For The War On Gaza” Thanks to Aljazeera for innovating the “Mapping the War on Gaza”  which is a helpful tool in a crises time. The article on SlashDot that linked to AC was” Gaza Debate Goes Virtual.”

Because of that post was Slashdoted we managed to forward nice traffic to Aljazeera Gaza map Mashaup site. Which works inline with ArabCrunch mission: help Arab tech entrepreneurs and innovators evolve and get noticed at a regional and a global scale.

Thank you Aljazeera Labs, Arab startups and innovators who help AC succeed, without you, we cannot be here without you, and with AC, we will try our best to make you reach new heights. And thanks to AC readers for their encouragement, and for providing us with great tips we would not know about. (Please keep tipping us)

Next week by the well of God, we have new things to launch at AC, in which we will only share initially with our close friends, stay tuned.

Access to the Web via TV is gaining momentum, as a number of access devices with Web capabilities are gaining global household adoption with tens of millions of units being sold every year. These devices range from Set-Top Boxes like DreamBox, video gaming consoles such as Xbox, Playstation and WII, and new LCD TVs with Web and Bluetooth capabilities are being shipped, such as the new Sony Bravia.

Capitalizing on the growing TV to Web connectivity OpenCraft an Egyptian open-source software & outsourcing company is planning to launch a Web TV 2.0 code named (FooTV), though still under development, OpenCraft founders demonstrated FooTV demo to me in their office while I was visiting Egypt, but authorized me to disclose little information about it on AC.

FooTV will bring TV experience to the world of online videos, a conversion of the Web and the TV, with Web 2.0 features. FooTV will be also tailored to the TV handset. According to Abdel Karim co-founder of OpenCraft.

OpenCraft is building FooTV based on their past experience in developing Set-Top Boxes. In 2007 they won and completed a contract from Intel to build a media center appliance (Intel HelioCreek STB) using Intel hardware for the Arab regional market. The appliance is a home entertainment center with Web browsing, DVD, PC capabilities and Music player, it was not commercialized by Intel but only for R&D purposes!( Something I do not understand why Intel did not commercialize it!)

In (Intel HelioCreek STB) project, OpenCraft used current open-source software to cut down development time, they used and customized MythTV an open-source media center, customized and trimmed-down Ubuntu Linux distribution to support the appliance, and Arabaized MythTV theme among other things that include using C++ and Qt.

One of the other interesting projects OpenCraft did, was the American University in Cairo migration to Google Apps, using Django, Python, jQuery, MySQL, Apache, Linux, and Google Data API to build the Google Apps self-service migration wizard, which is an easy to use self-service wizard-style portal to facilitate migration of various IT services such as email and contacts to the Google Apps platform. The resulting code base has been released under an open-source license.
OpenCraft was founded in 2004 as an open-source software firm that specializes in Web 2.0 information architecture and system integration using PHP, Python, SugarCRM and Drupal along with providing custom software development. The Company is backed by Hermes-TDF an Egyptian venture capital firm. The cofounders are Rady Fahmy as CEO, Abdel-Karim Mardini as software delivery manager, and Karim Ratib as Tech. Director. The company has 25 employees and is based in Dukki, Cairo, Egypt.

As the crisis continues in Gaza, Aljazeera Labs is continuing their innovation. This time they recently beta launched crowdsource mapping mashup “Mapping the War on Gaza” service, in collaboration with Ushahidi who  have successfully used their platform to crowdsource information during recent crisis in Kenya and South Africa.

The platform allows people around the world to submit news related to Gaza to the service as it happens, via the web, twitter or mobile, which in turn after some fact checking gets displayed on the interactive map along a time line.

“Mapping the War on Gaza” displays incidents on a map that are Mashedup with Microsoft Virtual Earth, you can click the dots on the  map to view the reports.  Incidents can be filtered into many categories such as Twitter Reports, Deaths, Israeli Ground Forces, Civilians, Air Strikes, Palestinian Causalities, Rocket Attacks, etc.  For example a recent report says “Death toll in Gaza rises to 763 after  50 more bodies were discovered”, as one the Israeli casualties a recent report says “Israeli Army says three Israeli soldiers were killed in attacks in the Gaza Strip”.

On any report, users can help verify if the report is credible or not by voting it up or down. Moreover users can comment and discuses each report and view additional reports and related mainstream News of Incident.

Reporting an incident to “Mapping the War on Gaza” via Text Message (SMS) in Palestine using the Jawwal network, you can send a text message(starting with the word GAZA) to the number: 37191. Anywhere else in the world, you can send a text message (starting with the word GAZA) to the number: +45609910303 or via Twitter by replying to the service official twitter account.  If you have Video or Images of breaking news events, you can submit the content via the YourViews (Aljzeera English version of Sharek)  or via the email to: yourviews@aljazeera.net

There are other services on the web the caters to the war on Gaza one of them is Aljazeera new area widget that you can add to your blog or website. The widget displays recent Palestinian and Israeli casualties. Though ArabCrunch could not verify if this is a service form Aljazeera. The other one I was notified of is Support Gaza which displays graphical images and vidoes of the recent casualties in Gaza, if you came across a new website that utilizes web 2.0 for the war on Gaza please mention them in your comment.

Aljazeera Labs, has recently launched a number of Web 2.0 and Mobile 2.0 tools and application that goes from crowdsourcing into delivering both Aljazeera English and Arabic news anywhere @ anytime.

The newly launched services include a Podcast, where you can subscribe to Al Jazeera podcasts and have your favorite Al Jazeera programmes delivered straight to you. “Listening Post” is the first podcast available in English, and there are around 5 Arabic podcast shows such as the popular show “AlItijah Al Makas”.

On the Mobile side, Al Jazeera Network have partnered with Sony Ericsson, where several Sony Ericsson handheld devices on the market today in the MENA region will have an Al Jazeera RSS feed already installed.  While Al Jazeera Arabic and English Mobile websites will be released very soon in beta versions. According to the Aljazeera Labs website: “The first stage of development has been completed and we are currently in the final stages of internal testing.”

On the IM side Al Jazeera Labs has beta launched IM Bot where you can get breaking news sent to your email or IM client. Currently it works with gtalk.

Some of the relatively older services Aljazeera labs has launched were mentioned by ArabCrunch here, which include an iPhone App, Facebook app, YouTube Channels, and Twitter channels for Arabic and English content.  The most recent Twitter additions are:
*Al Jazeera’s Breaking News channel on Twitter.
* Twitter Channels  to interact directly with Aljazeera English presenters and shows.

Internet users are increasingly creating their own online experiences by uploading videos to websites like YouTube and Vimeo, authoring blogs on Blogger, micro-blogging on Twitter, and creating their personalized online profile on Facebook and MySpace. Bayt.com the #1 job site in the Middle East is capitalizing on those talented, creative individuals who are expressing themselves through the internet in numbers and with a level of skill and creativity like never before, and that this creative group is not limited to “professionals.” Talented amateurs make up a significant portion of online creators – and the more than 2,750,000 registered users on Bayt.com – and these users want to play an active role in shaping their online experience. When discussing video content as a core part of their user experience, Bayt.com decided to diverge from the creative agency route for its video production. Instead, Bayt.com has just launched a Video Contest titled “I can draw Video Contest” asking Bayt.com’s users to create engaging, artistic videos that bring the words of Bayt.com to life.

“We spoke to several local and global agencies about producing a suite a videos for Bayt.com, including an introduction to our role in the recruitment process and how-to videos, but the solution was right in front of us all along,” said Dan Stuart, Head of Strategic Initiatives at Bayt.com. “With over 2,750,000 users – many of whom tell us they want to play a larger role in shaping the user experience of Bayt.com – this was a chance to tap into their interests and creative abilities, and to continue the innovative spirit we have been pursuing through events like our Virtual Job Fairs to help our users find jobs in Dubai and jobs in the Middle East–North Africa region.”

“People often use the term Web 2.0, but the essence of Web 2.0 is to empower users to be authors who are building their online experience. Guided by this principle, we’ve already had great success with innovative approaches to crowd-sourcing content for our website,” Stuart said. “Ultimately, we learned from these experiences and decided to bring this particular contest in-house so that we could incorporate user-generated submissions into the very core of Bayt.com – both now and in the future.

”The “I can draw” Video Contest runs from January 5th to March 6th, 2009. Users can visit the contest microsite. Bayt has provided two video scripts on the microsite (here and here). Users create a video for one of these scripts using an original visual concept. The winning video concept will receive the contract to create more than three trilingual videos for Bayt.com. Also, both the winning designer and design will be promoted on Bayt.com, in all contest-related PR, and promoted on the contest Microsite.

“For us, this contest is only the beginning,” said Stuart. “We have an ambitious plan to continue innovating across all areas of Bayt.com in 2009 – including our core goal to match talent with opportunity. In all cases, we are driven by our mission to empower users with the tools and information to build their lifestyle of choice. We hope the “I can draw Contest” is another example of this empowerment.

We at ArabCrunch hope more companies in the Arab world understand Web 2.0 and Crowd-Source more and more of their services, where they can unleash talent and gain great services at lower rates than traditional means.

Last week, search engine Onkosh distributed prizes to the winners of the Soduko competition held during Ramadan on www.onkosh.com.

Sudoko Winners:
Soduko relies on logical mathematical analysis and has recently gained popularity amongst young and old. Ten thousand three hundred and fifty-one players (10,351) from 90 countries, 20 of which were Arab countries, took part in the competition with first place going to Bassem Ibrahim who won a Nintendo Wii game console. The second prize went to Taha Alaa who won a Sony Cybershot digital camera while Rana Mustapha came in third place winning an LCD monitor.

Participants in the competition had to solve 81,924 soduko puzzles at the rate of 26 puzzles per participant. The puzzles were divided into three levels of complexity to accommodate all players.  The first level attracted many participants solving 54,901 soduko puzzles while players in the second level solved 14,196 puzzles and players in the third and most advanced level solved 12,827 puzzles. Winners received their prizes at the company’s headquarters in the presence of the technical team responsible for the development of Onkosh.com.

Onkush Competition:

Launched at GITEX 2007, Onkosh.com provides a host of search capabilities to Arab users who can search for sites, photos, forums, files and blogs as well as news services available on the website. In its Arabic search product, Onkush competes with Araby from Maktoob, Ayna.com Google, Yahoo and (MSN) Live.com.

Onkosh.com also was one of the first to invent transliteration of Arabic Language, that allows users to search in Arabic by writing Arabic words using Latin Alphabet without having to install Arabic support on the device. In this front Onkush competes with Yamli, though it does not have an editor, an API facebook application and iGoogle Gadget like Yamli. A quick test between the 2 services reveled that Yamli is more accurate and faster, take “waladu” for example and test them in both sites.

The other Arabic transliteration product which launch caused allot of criticism is Ta3reeb from Google, I have reviewed Ta3reeb here.

Onkush is Orascom Telecom subsidiary. A telecom, mobile, ISP, web hosting and online media and emarketing giant in the Arab world. Where they have a number of online properties including MSN Arabia in partnership with Microsoft, which is the Middle East version of MSN. Which makes you wonder why Onkush is not integrated with msn Arabia search?

UPDATE: see Editor’s note bellow.

I have received from Delphine Eddé the founder of Wikeez an email answering my questions and giving more insight into Wikeez:

Who are we ?
An online community for fans !
As you said it  in your article we’re a social entertainment site, it defines it very well !

Wether your are fan of a movie, an actor, a football club … you can share your passion on Wikeez  with other fans and find all the latest information you need

Wikeez is a platform that will allow crowd sourcing via blogs, discussions and comments from members. We want to focus more on quick and personal post , not only text but also videos and photos.
Every member can discuss with other, create its own group of fan, vote, comment, create a blog or add post from an existing blog, and even add a celebrity/ movie/tv shows … if he finds enough fans to support him !  etc
Wikeez will give the user every feature and functionality to help him be an even more active fan.

Wikeez is an arab world dedicated web site : today we feel there are not enough sites focusing on arabic stars or football players for example, and we don’t want to be in a content dominated by Hollywood stories.

It is by default in arabic, with an English version available.

The business model is based on advertising revenues only.

Our difference:
It is close to digg in regards to the voting system for contents, and the possibility for blogger to highlight their contents.
It is close to facebook in the creation of groups.
It is unique as it is linked to users passions centered around (on) movies, celebrities, tv shows, music and football (more sports will be added later)

Our target
Middle Eastern Young Adults, 20-35 years old

The Launch
Our launch strategy is in 2 steps

First: use social media to diffuse the information for the alpha and béta versions. We had 235 friends in facebook in less than one week, and 70 in Flickr …
We are planning to launch the Alpha version in 3 weeks, it will be on invitation only – and of course you’ll be one of the first to get one!!

Second: Go to general public when we have a full web site (full in terms of content, (whether) from journalists or members). There will be media promotion.
The general public launch is planned for January.

The Founders
Delphine Eddé ,33 years old (female).
Work experience: in France for 11 years in advertising, web strategy (DDB) and online media (CondéNet) .

We are today 5 in our team, planning to be 8 in 2 weeks and around 12 in two months.

Editor’s note:

The most famous Arab Sports destinations are Kooora and Maktoob’s Sport4Ever ( aL Rihad Lil Abad)

Kooora (which means a ball and Arabic) has the most comprehensive sports information, locally regional and Internationally, TV schedule, and a forum with 4810 members, and it is ranked 255 on Alexa, making it the most visited sports website in the Arab world. Koora’s content is produced in house.

While Sport4Ever has less visitors but it has web 2.0 features where users can upload and share videos and photos related to sports and commenting on different content, plus posting sport news and features (citizen journalism for sports), while editors do add most of the content they chose which of the users content goes to the front page. Sport4Ever has also a forum but with 509 members only (even though it emerged from being a popular Arabic sports forum and then was acquired by maktoob and changed to today’s shape). It has more things than Kooora such as: Dream teams, Casual games for different types of sports, and SMS subscription.

Though Kooora is more famous because it was one of being the first in the market, and the depth and comprehension of its sports content but the site design is not old fashioned.

So there are an established competitors in the sports category who miss Wikeez in a number of features: Aggregation, voting, groups, and social networking, but who in turn offer timely news and other features that Wikeez does not have yet.

Though the concept of users building a fan group, where the celebrity that gets the most traction, is unique way in determining the most famous celebrity, mine would be Zain Eden Zedan .

As for TV shows and movies I do not know any such service if you know please let us know in your comment.

It would be rather interesting see how Wikeez actually will work out, I Think for TV shows that silly Turkish show Muhand and Noor will be in top.

Wikeez a Lebanon based new social entertainment web site has received USD $250,000 from Kuv Capital, the funding will be used for development and attracting market adoption.

Wikeez allow people to publish and exchange on their favorite subjects centered on entertainment topics (TV shows, movies, celebrities, music and sports).

In wikeez people can have a blog, socialize via social networking tools, and blog owners who write posts centered on TV shows, movies, celebrities, music or sport can submit their content where Wikeez will help them promote their stories.

Wikeez has not been launched yet, but English version is due to launch soon and Arabic version too.

I have not tested Wikeez yet, as I am waiting for an invitation from them, thus I have little info about their services. (waiting for an answer to my email from Wikazz team,) Though the site looks like a mixture of social/median. dwwen, HydePark plus facebook but for entertainment.

Kuv Capital funder of Wikeez,  is a growth consulting and early stage investment firm in Internet and Mobile sectors. It specializes in Funding, M&A, alliances, and consulting. With offices in Paris, Beirut and Dubai, Kuv Capital investments are focused in Europe, Middle East and Africa.

Kuv Capital is led by a French serial entrepreneur Hervé Cuviliez a technology investor since 1999 who co-founded his first webagency in France (CreaHTM) In 1996 with Ivan Petrovic.

Kuv Capital other recent investments are:

MyID.  which is trying to answer a simple question, how can we provide our users with a digital ID. 

Cashstore which is a shopping engine with a cashback reward system. Available in French Cashstore.fr and Spanish Cashstore.es 

Muslim.com the Muslims social network which was launched late 2006, is planning to launch a  virtual world like SecondLife  but for Muslims.

Unlike second life TechCrunchUK reports that this idea will be more tailored to the Muslim world. The service which will be launched in 4-6 weeks will allow things such as Muslim women to ware hijab, and go to prayers room. Thus it will be allowed  in the IP-blocks of countries like United Arab Emirates (UAE) which currently blocks a access to virtual worlds and online games that the authorities consider unsuitable or offensive to Muslim culture.

I think the service will be useful to all Muslims not just to Muslims in the west as Mike Butcher editor of TechCrunch UK & Ireland suggested. Because they will be able to hang out there and discuss many topics of interest, in an environment that is tailored to them.

I would recommend Muxlim to invite prominent Ulamma (scholars) to start Droos 3elem or 7alakas ( Islamic teaching circles), using the virtual world, which is already been done using traditional chat applications such as PalTalk , but it would be more interesting to have them in the virtual world, as many Muslims will be able to attend and interact with the 7alaka anywhere they are taken that the 3olama will be KSA or USA for example.

Those 7alakas can be also for non Muslims who have interest to learn Islam, d’soing this will be a great service for Muslims, and will spread Islamic knowledge all over.

Muxlim.com originally offers social networking for Muslims all over the world, with features such as: Custom profiles, blogs, video & photo sharing, messaging, forums, polls, files, Quran, TV, and facebook integration.

The business model for the virtual world it will be similar to SecondLife’s business model: With VIP accounts, virtual gifts, virtual furniture/clothes, themes/styles (expect them to have Islamic feelings), profile applications, advertising, branded communities and physical merchandise like t-shirts.
As SecondLife has attracted real life businesses to open shops in it, and has build an ecosystem around it, Muxlims I believe will do the same.

Recently Muxlim won the World Summit Awards (WSA) Finland nomination, WAS is a global initiative to select and promote the world’s best e-Content and innovative ICT applications. Muxlim win was in the “e-Inclusion & Participation” category,  which gives the company the opportunity to compete in the WSA 2009 with some of the world’s best e-Content and innovative ICT applications.

Muxlim  was founded in Finland by UAE raised Mohamed El-Fatatry and Pietari Päivänen in December 2006, the site 1.5m unique monthly visitors and is backed by Finnish and Swedish money, specifically Swedish VC Rite Internet Ventures.

If you live in Denmark you can meet Muxlim CEO Mohamed El-Fatatry who will be speaking at one of Europe’s hottest events for advocating innovative companies, concepts and technologies on: SIME Copenhagen, on Thursday 6th November at the royal Danish theater.

# Muxlim and TechCrunch UK

Watwet the micro blogging & social networking Arabian clone of Twitter has launched a new design today with some new features. ( I have reviewed watwet in the past here)

What is new:

The new design is very nice, sleek and straightforward, I personally like it. And it seems other wawaters did. The new design also comes with a number of pre-built themes.

Huda a watwet users even demanded more:

can we have a dynamic design that changes automatically according to time of day, in the morning and at nite (night)? nice font btw (by the way.)

.

Now Mobily’s customers (the second Saudi mobile operator) can send and receive SMS updates, as well it has been the case for Jordan’s Mobile operator Zain’s customer. But if using any other mobile operator in Jordan KSA or anywhere worldwide you can only now send SMS updates.

Other new features include:  a Badge similar to Twitter’s badge which allows you to embed your wawets updates to your blog or any website, be it your updates or your friends, also a new Facebook app and statistics which list all the user activity stats, such as: number of watwets, friendship request , ..etc.

Public  timeline has been added with latest, featured, and channels: which now has Play FM ( A customer to  Ahmad Humeid’s  other company, he is the CEO of iToot Corp the owner of Wawet and Ikbis) and  Shopping guide. But both at the moment are not functioning. Though this shows that Wawet is introducing social media to businesses so they use it as a marketing tool,  thus watwet will in turn make money.

What is missing:

Wawet’s -as I said before- main differentiation to twitter is its 2 way MMS service and its Arabic interface. Also as I said before Watwet might have benefited from Twitter ending out-bound SMS services to Arabia and most of the world. But anyways Twitter with around 2 million users has not gone main stream in USA yet, let alone in the Arab world!

Though since Watwet 2 way SMS service is limited to Zain’s customers in Jordan, and now Mobily in KSA, there is no real value for users like me in using the service. Plus there is no desktop app that can let me receive and send updates like Twhirl does with Twitter, identica and seesmic. It is really annoying to keep hitting refresh to see latest friends updates or to get my email spammed with tens of updates per day.

Actually by looking at watwet’s timeline it tells you that usage rates seems to be very low with few updates from only few users per day.

I have sent a watwet to Ahmad Humeid with few questions but he did not answer.

UPDATE BELLOW:

Here at ArabCurnch we are big fans of TechCrunch, it is a must read for anyone involved with the internet industry specially web 2.0 ( Disclosure ArabCrunch is not affiliated with TechCrunch it is just we both have cool names  )

I love this new design it is more streamlined and cuts the clutter. And now I will be able to navigate through TC network more easily. thought I will be  waiting for TC’s implementation of new search using Yahoo BOSS Custom, in which Mark Hendrickson says “it will lets you search by keyword across our entire network of blogs, plus CrunchBase.” because the old search simply did not work.

My suggestion to TC is if they can add more hot company list widget on the sidebar, hot companies can be based on mentions on TC, Techmeme, and using AideRSS API.

Here is the old and new designs

Here is the first  design since 2005 until may 2006.

Where Michael Arrington founder of TechCrunch commented in TC redesigns:

I love that old one too. Fred Oliveira from webreakstuff.com did it. we still use it on mobilecrunch and techcrunch france. but when we went to 125×125 ad units, and added a 300 px ad unit (an industry standard) we had to change to a different layout. it’s also nice to change things around every once in awhile too.

You can read the  Mark Hendrickson post on TC regarding the redesign here.

UPDATE:

One thing About TC new design I did not pay attention to: I DO NOT LIKE TO CLICK HERE TO (READ MORE)- THE Whole STORY, The complete post SHOULD BE AT THE FRONT PAGE, COME ON THIS IS A BLOG, I WOULD ONLY CLICK ON THE STORY URL if I wana read comments or add my own. So Please TC get this to where it was.

E-commerce has not taken off in the Arab world mainly for two major factors: There is no merchant service that allows Arab-based e-commerce merchants to accept and process payments, and shoppers in the region are hesitant to trust any and reveal their financial information to any online shop, especially if it is not well known.

In the US this problems has been solved many years before with PayPal (owned By eBay) and most recently Google Checkout .

Paypal services are available in around 15 countries that allow its members to send receive, or withdraw money online to a local or U.S. bank account or a card.

In most Arab countries PayPal allows users to send money only, but UAE is the only Arab Country that PayPal offers send, receive, or withdraw money online to a U.S. bank account or a card.
Google Checkout on the other hand is only available to U.S. and U.K. merchants. For payments Checkout supports many countries, for example in the Arab world: Jordan, UAE, Saudi, Morocco, are supported. Yemen, Egypt and Sudan are not ( I did not check the whole list to see which other Arab countries that are not supported).

When sending money PayPal and Checkout solve the trust and security issues, by not sharing your financial information with the merchants. Another benefits of both: They help you track your online spending, and you do not have to enter your billing information each and every time you shop online.
It’s free to sign up for a PayPal account and Google Checkout to send payments. But unlike Google Checkout, with PayPal you can send money to friends and family if you are from the qualified country (Both offer more services to know more checkout their websites.) But for merchant accounts both PayPal and Google Checkout charge a transactional fee.

There are currently two solutions available for Arab based e-commerce merchants to process payments:

1- Register the company in USA or any other country that PayPal and Checkout merchants’ services are available, setup a bank account in that county, open a PayPal or Checkout Merchant account and go with the integration process.

2- Use a third-party payment processing solution that handle the online transaction and charge fees for payment processing. But that is not fully integrated with the e-commerce web site. Examples: 2Checkout and ShareIt.

Groosh@t a stealth Jordanian startup, would be the third and best option for merchants and buyers a like in the Arab world.

Groosh@t would be the real online payment solution that will fill the online payment and payment processing gap in the Arab world and make it easier and more secure for all parties.

Groosh plural of (Grsh) the Arabic pennies, will enable anyone to use it to pay and to get paid.

Some of the ways to use Groosh@t:
• Pay for online purchases.
• Accept credit cards.
• Send and request money worldwide.
• Track your online spending.

When Groosh@t is fully launched, the service will allow anyone to pay in any way they prefer, including through credit cards, bank accounts, buyer credit or account balances, without sharing financial information just like PayPal and Checkout.

According to Groosh@t it will make online payments possible across different locations, currencies, and languages. I suspect they will have currency conversion service similar what is found on PayPal and Checkout, but I think Groosh@t will have Arab and other major international currencies.

To pay for online shopping you can use Visa, MasterCard and American Express with Groosh@t. Thus solving the other e-commerce problem in the region: Trust and security, because when you make a Groosh@t payment with your debit or credit card, your card details are not revealed.
According to Groosh@t:

Also, you’ll get Groosh@t’s exclusive fraud prevention and security tools.

We will wait and see how these tools will work.

While PayPal and Checkout are Free to signup and send payments, the cost of paying through Groosh@t is 5% Transactional fees.

As member of the Groosh@t Network you start the cycle by filling up your online pockets with Groosh@t by buying 1 or many of the Groosh@t Packages (5,10,20,50 Groosh@t which will be available through online purchase)

5 Grsh@ :
Costs 5.27 USD , online purchasing power of 5.00 USD.

10 Grsh@:
Costs 10.53 USD, online purchasing power of 10.00 USD.

20 Grsh@ :
Costs 21.06 USD, online purchasing power of 20.00 USD.

50 Grsh@ :
Costs 52.64 USD, online purchasing power of 50.00 USD.

Once you’re online pockets are filled with Groosh@t you can start shopping around the Groosh@t supported merchants.

I do not have information if Groosh@t will charge merchants to accept payments, but that model should be used, and for sending payments it should be free, other services i recommend offering for buyers to add the shipping info to the Groosh@t buyers account, so they do not need to fill them up every time a purchase is made, and the ability to track delivery progress from GrooSh@t.

Over all I will wait and see how Groosh@t service will look like exactly when it is full launched. But I can say their Services are really needed in the region and would be an enabler for e-commerce in the Arab world.

Now Groosh@t has a competitive advantage over PayPal and Google Checkout in the Arab world, in terms of localizing the online payment service. But when they enter the Arab market that advantage will diminish. Though Groosh@t can keep being competitive in this case if it achieves a critical mass of sellers and buyers in the region before the they enter the market. while keeping their charging fees close to PayPal and Checkout.

As of Today Groosh@t has been qualified for the Second Face of (QRNEC ) Queen Rania National Entrepreneurship Competition ( Which I reviewed before here), and since it is an online business it will be automatically qualified for Google Online Business Plan Competition part of QRNEC. But will Groosh@t be treated justly by the Google Competition, since it competes with Google Checkout? We’ll wait and see.

Groosh@t is a service from @Your Service Group a Jordanian Based company.

You know UPS, DHL, ARAMEX, well meet Darrb which means “way” in Arabic. It is a crowd based shipping online community, or shipping 2.0  which was beta launched recently.

Unlike conventional shippers who have paid staff to deliver items, and charge a predefined charge. Darrb shippers can be any one (including you !) who is welling and can deliver items in exchange for payments. While people who wants to ship items, can get better rates compared to DHL and others, through a reserve auction based marketplace, where members who wants to deliver items (Darrbers) can bed price and delivery time.

The user who asked for a delivery can sort the bids based on time (delivery duration) or cost. At the end of the auction, the user could choose the Darrber (deliverers) who best fits his requirement.

Becoming a Darrber is an easy process, you fill up a profile: About you, choosing your delivery method, Aeroplane, car, motorcycle, public transportation and/or others, and which areas you can deliver the items to.

Sending an item is also an easy process: you fill up info such as: weight, quantity, dimensions, description. Then you define from where and when the item is sent from and to where and when it is to be delivered. You also decide when the bid ends and your expected charge.

As for payment methods Darrb does not provide one, it is to be decided by the delivery parties, where the payment can be any method from paypal to barter.

The item page shows  details the delivery requester has entered, also he/she and Darrbers can post questions and answers, privately or publicly. Besides that Darrbers can post their beds (I described above.)

To insure trust with Darrbers, senders are able to rank the service of the deliverers (Darrbers) and leave comments on their profiles once the deal is done. This ranking system will allow the public to see how other people, that have used the service of a specific Darrber, found the quality, price and speed of the delivery. If a Darrber is proven to delinquent or misbehave, Darrb.com has the right to immediately suspend the Darrber’s account and stop dealing with him.

Darrb platform is free for both people who add delivery orders and Darrbers. But it is planning to charge  membership fees for Darbbers.

Darrb recently added Statistics and some miner design issues:

Statistics:

Now Darrbers can know how much money they can make if they delivered all the items available! This is an indicator that helps Darrbers know how much money is available to run for.

Some other changes are like showing the number of new items available instead of items delivered.

We thought Darrbers want to know what is new to deliver, not what was delivered.

According to Darrb:

One of our main roles main roles is to help reduce the unemployment rates worldwide.

And this is true, people can do it on part-time bases to earn an extra cash delivering items. For example you can use your car, public transportation, bicycle or any other method to deliver items, or may be you it happened you are going to the same location that an item needs to be delivered to, where If done, you can at least cover your gas/transport cost.

Some other people might even make it as a living. For example in major US cities, you find people cruising the city with bicycles to deliver couriers; they are self employed or work with a small courier company. To them Darrb would be the market place to find customers. And it would be an opportunity for others to start a business out of it, just like many others who started their businesses solely auctioning at eBay.
Now here is some of my tips to improve Darrb:

1-    Chian Darrbers (multi Darrabs) for one delivery:
Currently the system allows one Darrber to deliver the item if he is qualified by the item submitter. But in many cases there would be a Darrber who can deliver the item halfway or partway, at which point another Darrber can collect the item from that location and deliver the item to the final destination or to another Darrber who can advance the item further along the chain. This would be the case in big cities, or across cities or even across countries. And to make it happen it requires coordination between the Darrbers who can deliver items from point A to B to C,.. etc. until the final point.

SMS and GPS:
SMS: For serious Darrbers, it would be great for them to get SMS notifications of recent matches to the locations they can deliver to, at the same time be able to accept/bed on them. This also helps item submitter to get Darrbers bed in real time. (Integration is Twitter is an option.)
GPS: You know when using UPS you can track your shipment online, it would be beneficial for the item submitter to track his/her item in real time, and Darrb do not need to develop their own Mobile GPS platform, they can use existing platforms such as WeNear or Brightkite and Yahoo’s FireEagle through their APIs.
Knowing the Darrber Location would also help other Darrbers coordinate in a (Chain Darrbers) situation I described before.

Integrating with existing e-commerce sites:
You know currently in e-commerce the delivery option is even free or charged via traditional delivery. In the latter case it would be an added value to have an option to use Darrb platform to deliver the purchased item/s, This requires Darrber to publish an API where other e-commerce sites can use to do the integration.
Existing e-commerce sites Darrb can use: Souq El Arab (tag), Souq.com, Amazon, eBay and other small and big e-commerce players. And by doing so, it would a win-win for both. For Darrb it would be a great viral marketing, and an added value for its users. For the e-commerce company it would give the option to their customer to get cheaper delivery rates, and once Darrb goes mainstream it would be even faster than traditional delivery companies.

Finally Darrb should reach those self employed bicycle couriers in USA, for example they can Google them. Or even try to make new once through finding the most active movers, and that could be done by targeting them with an Ad on BrightKite, or any other LBS (I do not know if Brightkite started to deliver ads yet, but Darrb team can contact them, and if you guys needs an invite to Brightkite privet beta just ask me : ) )
Will shipping 2.0 like Darrb.com go main stream and be a killer to big players such as UPS, DHL, Aramex? I’ll leave that to your comments.

#Darrb is a UAE based company .

StumbleUpon the social media web site was reported on a blog post being blocked by the largest ISP and telecom company in UAE, Etisalat

.

The blog post is found here. StumbleUpon that has currnelty 5,483,186  members is owned by eBay, is a user generated reviewing and rating of websites, where people can share them with their friends and all other members. It is a great way to discover websites based on anyone’s interests, where Stumbling (finding) website can be filtered to certain tags. Stumbling and other features can be accessed through StumbleUpon browser toolbar and its web site. You can find my StumbleUpon profile here While the StumbleUpon is blocked to Etisalat customers, those connecting through rival operator du are still able to access the site. The site joins other social networking services which are banned by Etisalat, including micro-blogging service Twitter, social networking site Orkut owned by google, and photo sharing site Flickr owned by Yahoo! Sites can be blocked in the UAE for ‘inconsistent with the religious, cultural, political and moral values of the United Arab Emirates’, according to Telecom Regulation Authority (TRA) rules. These rules can be enforced if a deal between Etisalat and StumbleUpon is made, where StumbleUpon would not show content violating to TRA rules to any UAE resident. Etisalat is an Arabic word that means communications.

On a rare move among one of the Arab leaders or maybe any of the world’s leaders, King Abdullah II of Jordan, commented on local Jordanian blog Black Iris  and Addusstor Jordan’s daily newspaper web site.
On the blog the king was commenting on a post about his latest interview  with Petra ( Jordan’s Government news agency ) where he dismissed rumors about the future of  Jordan.

Here is the King’s comment on Black Iris:

Thank you all for your feedback and comments. I am very happy and proud to see so many responsible citizens engaging in this dialogue. People must not be afraid to express their opinions without using aliases. We are a country of freedom, tolerance, diversity and openness, and everyone has the right to express their thoughts – no matter what they are – in an atmosphere of respect, so long as they are not personally offending others, attempting character assassination or undermining the nation’s interest. Your comments only indicate how deeply you care about Jordan and its future and I am happy that we are partners in the development process.

I welcome this move by the King, and would love if he starts reading ArabCrunch and post comments on it because ArabCrunch champions Jordanain and Arab startups, and we aim to help transfer Jordan and the Arab world into the knowledge based economy, in line with his vision

We would like to see similar moves by other Arab and world leaders.

Embracing the internet and specially web 2.0  is one of the ways to reach grace root communities. This practice has been heavily used in the US presidential elections to promote the candidates and raise funds for their campaigns. For example some of the candidates setup Myspace and facebook profiles, twitter and digg accounts. But these tools were managed by the staff members of the candidate, while King Abullah comment is made by him.

Any one knows if George Bush has any real published comment on the internet? please comment .

After about 2 month of testing ArabCrunch in Alpha version using blogger, we finally moved to beta and being hosted using the self hosted wordpress.

The beta launch came kinda late because I was busy with my life, and trying to sort out things. Now I will dedicate more time to ArabCrunch, and update it regularly with more great stories about Arab originating web 2.0 and mobile 2.0 startups and established companies.

The beta launch uses a nice custom theme, which provides many new features such as categories, tag cloud, and sponsoring. We also added pages, such as (submit startup) and (submit news) pages, where we allow startups and companies to notify ArabCrunch about their product(s)/service(s) and news using forms. While others can share with us tips of an inside news they have.

These new features are common in any professional blog, so it was necessary for ArabCrunch to have them in order to grow, and because blogger does not offer the same great features wordpress offers.

Under beta launch we will still have some bugs to fix, so bear with us. and stay tuned for our the full launch which is coming soon.

We have a list of features to add to our blog, and as time passes we will add them gradually.

If you are an Arab originated startup or an established company in the areas we cover, we would like you to notify us about what you do and what is new with, so we can profile and review you here, providing you with advice and help spread the word about you.

I thank every one who contacted me and giving their feedback. I also would like every one to help spread the word about ArabCrunch which in turn will help Arab originated startups to excel and grow. You can do so by doing the following:

1- If you are a blogger or a news reporter please write a story about ArabCrunch.
2- Email all your friends telling them about ArabCrunch.
3- Link ArabCrunch to your blog or websites.
4- Follow us on twitter here.
5- If you are using twitter, wawet, Brightkite, or any other microblogging platform, please do repost our posts.
6- Join ArabCrunch Group in facebookand linkedin and invite all your friends.
7- Social Media: Submit and vote posts from ArabCrunch on facebook, digg, reddit, stumbleupon, mixx or any of your favorite social media website.
8- Subscribe to our RSS feed here.
9-  Add ArabCrunch to Technorati.
10-Tell every one you know about ArabCrunch .
11-Use any other innovative way to spread the word.

We also urge our readers to post comments to our posts, to create a conversation where every one can benefit from.

Finally, many thanks to Feedoor.com and its founder Mahomoud who made this release possible. And I thank them for being ArabCrunch first sponsors. We wrote about feedoor here. I ask everyone to open their feeds with feedoor, whether it is a blog posts or comments feed, social activity feed , or any other feed.

About feedoor:

Feedoor is the ultimate feed service where you can add many items, create and merge many feeds from outer sources with different feed formats (RSS,ATOM,RDF) in one single feed, you can also customize the look and the feel of your feed the way you want.