Zing.vn

Infobox Website
name = Zing
url = [http://www.zing.vn/ ZING.VN]



commercial = Yes
type = Web portal
registration = Optional
launch date = January 9th
owner = VinaGame
author = VinaGame

Zing is an infotainment portal managed and operated by VinaGame. Zing is accessible at [http://www.zing.vn zing.vn] and comprises a wide range of highly integrated services such as news portal, online music, social networking, search, IM chat software, movies, karaoke platform, video and photo upload, and much more. The portal was officially inaugurated on January 9, 2008, after two months of closed beta.

Zing.vn’s traffic has increased dramatically since its introduction to the public. According to Alexa’s figures as of September 16, it is currently ranked No. 4 in Vietnam, trailing only to Google, Yahoo, and [http://vnexpress.net Vnexpress.net] .

=Main components=

Zing News

Zing News not only compiles news from other media sources but hosts exclusive interviews with Vietnamese celebrities also. It covers many aspects ranging from current happenings, sports, show-biz life, to game reviews and funny corner.

Zing MP3

Since the release of the open beta on August 1st 2008, Zing MP3, empowered by spidering technology, has attracted a great deal of traffic and attention from Vietnamese internet users. The site does not archive a fixed song database, yet it automatically finds music upon search demands. When a user type a search on the engine for a song, robots roams the internet for the song and show him/her all the relevant results linked directly to other music sites. Zing MP3 has recently had some important updates such as playlist building function, songs on demand, music uploading, blog embedding function, etc.

Zing MP3 evolves many types of music from Pop, Rock, R&B to in-game and Karaoke beats. The operations of the site are streamlined in accordance with current events and public holidays.

Yobanbe

Yobanbe is among a few social networking born in Vietnam in 2007. The site has attracted a number of bloggers including those who originally used Yahoo! 360°.

At Yobanbe, users can create their own profiles, compose blogs, upload photos, create clubs or join in existing clubs, even organize online celebration for some events. Yobanbe makes available a vast network of friends so that people can keep informed of each other as well as make new friends. The site is said to be quite similar to other famous social networking like Facebook (US) or QZone (China).

Zing Mail

Released in August 2008, this email service offers some outstanding conveniences:
*Sending/Receiving big attachments very quickly (up to 30MB/9 seconds)
*Many themes available for user customization.
*Letter paper.
*Greeting cards.
*Periodical auto-saving.
*Security sign-in (by means of verification codes).

Zing Star

Zing Star is a karaoke site which was released in 2008. Like MySpace's Ksolo, it enables users to sing their favorite songs via a microphone attached to PC. The site also hosts off-line karaoke singing contest for its community.

Zing Search

This search engine came into beta testing on May 27, 2008. It features filtering of pornography-related queries and searching by fields (web, games, etc).

Zing Photo

The site contains user-uploaded photos of varied topics. It is also linked to blog entries which contain nice looking pics.

Zing Play

Zing Play is a game portal consisting of web-board, downloadable, and flash games. Recent updates include MMO downloadable games like pools and some card games which require signing in to Client to play.

Zing Video

The site features the same model as YouTube with videos uploaded by the community.

Zing Forum

The forum make available numerous topics and threads. It is said that the forum is more focus on teenagers, especially young gamers and internet users.

Zing Chat

Zing Chat is a chatting software specially designed for Vietnamese users. Zing Chat included all functions of other conventional chat programs such as: messaging, voice-chat, webcam, etc. Zing Chat also supports sending and receiving huge files with no limitation.

Key features:
* Group: allowing people to create their own community based on lifestyles or hobbies… No condition, no fee. With a little bit patience, you can develop and run a group of friends.
* File sending: putting no limit to the size of the files you want to send.
* Integrated with other chat system: with Zing Chat, you can chat with friends who are using MSN, Yahoo.
* Fun emoticons: more funny emoticons are offered. Zing Chat also allows you to create your own emoticons and send to your friends.
* Offline file sending: supporting users to send files to offline friends. They will be received when recipients go online and sign in Zing Chat.

Zing Movie

Zing Movie makes available its movie archive to Zing Chat users. In order to watch or download films users are required to sign in Zing Chat and downloads are done from the interface of this chatting program. The site contains a lot of information about film ratings, directors, film summaries.

Zing Movie also allows users to give comments and feedback to the movies they watch. Films in the archive can be searched by movie names, actors/actresses, countries of origins, directors, etc. Zing Movie is currently in beta testing.

=Single sign-on=All the services offered by the portal are currently accessible and utilizable thanks to a single sign-on system. Registration IDs to any game or service of VinaGame, called VinaGame Passport, can be used to access other afflicated services.

=Marketing=In order to help promote Zing.vn, VinaGame has invested quite heavily in marketing events. Most recently ones were ‘Zing Angel on Street’ and ‘Zing wealth for New Year’.

‘Zing Angel on Street’ was a parade on some main streets in Ho Chi Minh City of pretty Vietnamese promotion girls called Zing Angels early December 2007. The event aimed at introducing Zing Chat to Vietnamese intenet users, especially the youth. The girls not only help attract attention of the people but also go online to chat with new users of Zing Chat and offer technical support. Accompanying them wall the way were the mascots of Zing Chat, the Chit and the Chat Mouse.

‘Zing wealth for New Year’ was a promotional event lasting from January 8th to February 15th, 2008. According to the public media, VinaGame invested 100 million dong for this event alone.

=References=
* [http://www.thanhniennews.com/education/?catid=4&newsid=33540 An article on thanhnien about Zing Chat]
* [http://www.zing.vn/zing/aboutZingE.aspx Zing introduction]
* [http://www.pcworld.com.vn/pcworld/pconline.asp?t=pcolarticle&arid=8531 Zing Angels]
* [http://www.muctim.com.vn/Vietnam/Van-hoa-Nghe-thuat/Giai-tri/2007/11-1/15306/ An interview of Muctim with Zing Project Manager]
* [http://www.tuoitre.com.vn/Tianyon/Index.aspx?ChannelID=16&ArticleID=238019 Zing introduction on Tuoitre Online]
* [http://www.hoahoctro.vn/NHIPSONG/8994.hht An article on Zing Chat on Hoahoctro.com.vn]
* [http://vietbao.vn/Vi-tinh-Vien-thong/Zingvn-chinh-thuc-ra-mat/40238019/217/ Zing.vn official release]
* [http://www.tuoitre.com.vn/Tianyon/Index.aspx?ArticleID=274222&ChannelID=67 VinaGame released Zing Mail]
* [http://http://www.xahoithongtin.com.vn/home/252/15341/chen-nhac-tu-zing-mp3-vao-blog-hoac-forum.html Embed Zing MP3 songs onto your Blog]

=External links=
* [http://www.vinagame.com.vn VinaGame Company]
* [http://www.zing.vn Zing News Home Page]
* [http://mp3.zing.vn Zing MP3 Home Page]
* [http://chat.zing.vn Zing Chat]
* [http://mail.zing.vn Zing Mail]
* [http://yobanbe.zing.vn Yobanbe Social networking]
* [http://movie.zing.vn Zing Movie] Movie]
* [http://star.zing.vn Zing Star]
* [http://city.zing.vn Zing City]
* [http://search.zing.vn Zing Search]
* [http://play.zing.vn Zing Play]
* [http://photo.zing.vn Zing Photo]
* [http://video.zing.vn Zing Video]
* [http://directory.zing.vn Zing Directory]