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Seattle Start-Up RIPL Corp. Teams With University of Washington Students to Deliver Next Generation Social Networking

Posted on: Monday, 20 November 2006, 09:00 CST

Heralding a new consumer-led revolution in social networking and online advertising, RIPL Corp. today announced the beta release of its suite of next-generation user-generated content services designed from the ground up to engage consumers and satisfy marketers. Delivering a deeply personalized and dynamic experience, RIPL makes it easier and safer for young adults to exchange ideas, interests, pictures, and music on impulse with only the people they care about. Twelve months in the making by industry professionals formerly with Classmates.com, MSN, AltaVista, Flycast, Real Networks, and Ziff-Davis, working alongside a team of UW student interns, RIPL's new approach is changing the way people interact online.

"Although consumers are flocking to social networking sites, they are quickly discovering that user-generated content like photos, music, videos, and blogs can be cumbersome to manage, that security and privacy are being taken for granted, and that it's not always easy to stay connected with the people and content they care about," said Bill Messing, RIPL's chief executive officer. "Young adults who use networking services deserve more and advertisers trying to reach this highly coveted market deserve more. RIPL is dedicated to satisfying both customer sets and helping find the common ground between them."

It's Safe, Easy, and Personal for Members

With the help of UW students, RIPL is being shaped organically by a growing team of everyday users who serve as the primary voice in the development of new features.

"I'm tired of worrying about my privacy, fending off creepy solicitors, and wading through thousands of irrelevant ads," said Shade Solon, a MySpace and Facebook user and University of Washington senior majoring in psychology and cultural anthropology. "Social networking sites are so key to staying connected with my friends and family, and even future employers. With RIPL, I get to control who sees what content on my profile, it only shows me the ads I'm interested in and in many cases lets me pick them, and I can intuitively design and customize my profile page without being an expert in HTML."

Following extensive research with more than a thousand first generation social network users, as well as UW college students, RIPL sets out to leapfrog current offerings in multiple dimensions:

 --  RIPL members can easily post and maintain multiple views of profile     automatically, and exchange content with family and friends, without     lifting a finger. --  RIPL maintains a protected, invitation-only environment where members     have complete control over who sees what content and who they want to be     connected with. --  RIPL offers the highest levels of personalization based on the     preferences of its members by streaming the information they care about     directly to their desktops. This insures that no one misses anything that     matters to them, whether in the RIPL network or on the Web at large.      

Welcomed, Personalized, and Targeted Ads for Marketers

RIPL incorporates a wide variety of advertising innovations from the outset. With a patent-pending combination of user-selected advertising, keyword-based targeting, behavioral targeting, and object-oriented brand advertising, RIPL uniquely matches the interests and preferences of consumers with the brands that matter to them. For example, RIPL members can select many of the advertisers they wish to incorporate into their personal profile pages. This delivers marketers unprecedented opportunities to engage one-to-one with today's young adults, and their peers, to increase brand awareness, sales, and profits through social networking.

"Consumers under 30 now spend more time on the PC than they do watching TV. However, the media mix is only just beginning to catch up with this trend -- representing billions of dollars in pent-up demand for new Internet inventory," said Jeff Lehman, RIPL's chief revenue officer. "Both advertisers and analysts cite the shortage of quality inventory on the Internet as the primary reason for this lag, which is especially true across today's social networking sites. RIPL is addressing these underlying needs to help advertisers engage young adults on their own turf without jeopardizing their brands."

Availability

RIPL is currently in its controlled beta release. In this first phase, members must have an active University of Washington email address to register. UW students who are interested in joining RIPL can ask their friends for invitations, or visit www.ripl.com to request an invitation. RIPL will expand availability to a wider audience in Q1, 07.

 Media Contacts: Deanna Leung RIPL 206-915-0512 Contact via http://www.marketwire.com/mw/emailprcntct?id=8295B089F869D46C  Michele Mehl Buzz Builders 425-205-9444 Contact via http://www.marketwire.com/mw/emailprcntct?id=D9CCC3C816162C77  

SOURCE: RIPL Corp.

Source: MARKET WIRE

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