Russia's Mail.Ru Invades the U.S. with My.com
We don’t typically cover a lot of Russian companies, but then again, it’s not every day that a major company from that country makes headlines here. Mail.Ru, which I guess you could consider a Russian take on Yahoo, is officially joining the mobile social/gaming party in the U.S. under the My.com brand. When visiting the site, you’ll find options for all the my-branded apps, including myMail, myGames and myChat.
MyMail, oddly enough, is not a Web-based email service built on the My.com name. It is instead a mobile app available for both iOS and Android, selling itself as “one app to manage all your email accounts” — which, to be honest, is something the default mail apps on both iOS and Android already do.
MyChat is also a mobile app for iOS and Android and has no Web-based client. The company calls the app “conversation centric” — I guess a lot of chat apps don’t focus on conversations? — and includes features like photo and video sharing as well as voice and video calling.
Finally, myGames is a collection of free-to-play mobile games for iOS and Android. The company claims that Jungle Heat is actually one of the Top 25 bestselling Android games, having been downloaded almost 1.5 million times. There are a couple of other games in the lineup as well, including Poker Arena and Lucky Fields, which is sort of like a portable version of FarmVille.
It seems that Mail.Ru has really gone all in on mobile, and it’s tough to fault the company for doing so when you look at how fast that area is growing. But a lot of what feeds that growth are the apps and services that already exist on the desktop and on the Web. I can’t say for certain that Gmail would be as popular on the smartphone if it didn’t gain such a stronghold in the Web browser, and Facebook wouldn’t be where it is today without its Web experience. PC sales may be in a decline but they haven’t vanished, and personally, I’ll continue to prefer apps that are cross platform on the Web/desktop and mobile over those that simply opt to go mobile-only. I can’t see myself using these My.com apps anytime soon for that reason.
What about you? If you get a chance to check them out, let us know what you think.