blog@ziva

Zook Got Its Own Blog

sameer — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 14:41:19 +0000

(Cough, Cough - dusting the cobwebs off this one)

Zook has its own blog now at http://blog.zook.in.

This blog has had an identity crisis, and will now play host to mostly corporate communication.

Amen!

Search Mobile Downloads on Zook

sameer — Thu, 15 Mar 2007 08:47:47 +0000

Zook has added a huge number of wallpapers, graphics, games, animations, picture messages, operator logos, ringtones to its on-phone options. This is probably the first time you may actually search for what you’re looking from across multiple content providers.

The F1 season is upon us - try looking for “formula 1″ - there’s tons of wallpapers to choose from!
Or “tendulkar”.
Or get neat picture messages for “ugadi” (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ugadi) - and pass them along to your friends and family.

GPRS/WAP users get to see a thumbnail too.

Happy Zook.in! Happy Ugadi! And all the best India for the World Cup!

More Zook

sameer.shisodia — Sat, 10 Mar 2007 17:28:00 +0000

Over the last week, we have added more data and you can now find through Zook:
* Restaurants, movies, and some events for Kolkata, Hyderabad, Chennai.

* Interesting SMS Forwards - which are a rage with college-goers!

With this Zook is now useful for the mobizens of 6 cities. Very soon we’ll be adding a lot more mobile content from across providers. Time to make a splash …. ?

Zook.in is live

sameer — Thu, 01 Mar 2007 15:51:34 +0000

Zook is live.

Zook is a new mobile answer engine which helps you quickly get answers, and act on them, not just pages upon pages of links. It identifies the really clear answers upfront, or interactively narrows down to what you really meant to look for. On the move, wherever you are.

To start zook.in

* WAP : http:// zook.in
* SMS : “ZOOK ” to 3030

o [ when SMSing, remember to always start with “ZOOK … ” !!!! ]

In its first avatar, Zook gets you

Ringtones
Restaurants (Bangalore, Delhi, Mumbai - you can add blr/del/mum to ur searches for getting to a city’s info - say “ blr casino royale” )
Movies (Bangalore, Delhi, Mumbai)
Events (Bangalore, Delhi, Mumbai)

We’re adding more cities and things you can find and do.

If you like what you see, please do include your friends in groups or as friends, and spread the word about Zook. Also, please send your comments/suggestions to feedback@zook.in .

More details about what Zook can do for you below.

Happy zook.in !

Zook FAQts: Whats Zook? Zook is the new way to use your mobile phone. Let it now be your friend which helps you find a place to eat, or catch a movie, or download fun stuff for your mobile.

Its on your WAP phone at http://zook.in
You can also send an SMS - “ZOOK ” to 3030

[ BTW, You can also just use “Z” instead of ” ZOOK” ]

So, a local search engine on the phone? So?

Zook is not just a search engine. Zook makes sense of the data, and of what you asked. It analyzes the data, your interests and interprets the likely intent of your query.

You can enter your city name explicitly. In any case, Zook will assign higher relevance to matches in your city (automatically on SMS and of course, on WAP you need to be logged in).

A few examples
[ Remember : on SMS start all queries with ” ZOOK” , e.g. “zook chinese” !! ]

you : chinese blr
zook :

1:Restaurant:Chungs Chinese Corner, Indiranagar
2:Ringtone:Theme Of China Gate, Monotone
……
7: Restaurant (31+)
8: Ringtone (19+)
9: Locality: Indiranagar (5+)
10: City: Bangalore (31+)

you : 7
zook :

1:Magnolia, Koramangala, South Bangalore
2:Aromas Of China, Langford Town
….
6: Locality: Indiranagar (6+)
7: Locality: Church Street (4+)
8: Locality: Koramangala (7+)
9: Locality: South Bangalore (4+)
10: Locality: Palace Road (2+)
More

you : 6
zook :

1:Wangs Place, Indiranagar
2:Chungs Pavilion, Indiranagar
3:Wan Ley, Indiranagar
4:Gokul Kuteera, Indiranagar
5:Oregano, Indiranagar
6:Vishals, Indiranagar
7:Ramya, Indiranagar
8:Bangalore Mandarin, Double Road, Off Richmond Circle,

OR

you : thai kgla
zook :

1.Magnolia, Koramangala
2. Pan Asian Bites, Koramangala

you : 1
zook :

Restaurant: Magnolia
Cuisine: SE Asian, Chinese, Thai
Phone: +918041102222
Address: 840, 7th Cross, 15th Main, 3rd Block Koramangala Bangalore - India (Koramangala ) 560095
1. SMS “RESERVE 1 for 5″ to 3030 to book a table for 5 at Magnolia
2. SMS “ ORDER” to 3030 for a callback for delivery/takeaway orders

You can Reserve/Order through HungryBangalore.com. These are some things you can “do” now after you find something. We’re adding lots more soon.

you : guru pvr blr
zook :

Movie: Guru (Hindi)
Theatre: PVR
Timings: 12:00pm, 12:15pm, 3:50pm, 3:30pm, 6:40pm, 6:45pm, 9:50pm, 10:00pm
Address: The Forum, 3rd Floor, Nr. Madiwala Checkpost Koramangala Bangalore
560095
Phone: +918022067511

And Zook is not just local search, or cell content search. Its about your leisure, your music, your tastes, your choices, your neighbourhood, your friends….

Friends ?

Yes. Your friends give you the best references, and beyond a point can give you a way better answer than even we can. So if Zook cannot dig out the answer, it helps pass it on to your friends.

You can create groups of people you hang out with for various different things - work, bowling, golf, whatever. Your contacts and each set of people can be your ‘expert circle’ for answers and advice (and soon we’ll enrich the data for the entire community based on stuff you find out and share). You can both ASK these contacts about choices, or information, and TELL them about what you like (whether or not you found it on Zook).

you : korean kgla
zook :

No Matches Found
ASK your friends?
send “ASK “

you : ask amit, 9878709878 Is there a good Korean place in Blore ?

amit : Tell nopes theres a couple of good Japanese ones tho

You can ask more than one friend, and we’ll summarize their responses too.
You can create a group, add/remove members to a group, block other users. Please send “Zook help ” to 3030 for this.

Need WAP ?

Zook works fully featured on both WAP as well as SMS ( ZOOK/Z on 3030) !! SMS is charged at whatever your operator’s premium SMS rates are.

Next time you need to look, Zook it!

Rgds,
TeamZook @ Ziva

sameer — Thu, 01 Mar 2007 15:50:31 +0000

On the eve of a launch

sameer — Wed, 27 Dec 2006 19:50:36 +0000

I guess this is the big day- or pretty close to it! Questions, questions questions.

Why do so many websites go up, and then lag lag lag the real world ? Getting good decent information from out there is really a tough ask for an individual.
Someone said it takes a Google search 0.08 seconds to complete, and an individual 11 minutes on an average to find anything! Will we be the spark of the revolution ?
Who do we live for ? The “blogospehricals” ? Or is the user base out there a very different set for India ? Likely!
Does it matter that you have 2 million documents to choose from ? Is it more meaningful to have 20 close enough and good enough ones for a whole lotta stuff in life ? Is “precise” for a need, or for what satisfies it ?
What can the phone not get done ? Of course the answer will be a no-brainer by 2010 with 4G or WiMax being defactos and phones with real usable RAM and a decent disk. But there’s tonnes that was possible already.
Is the web the real world ?
Who answers the largest chunk of your questions ? Google ? Family ? Friends ? The newspaper ? Radio ? This is about the questions you have as you ‘live your life’, not Java
Will you really research a car or a holiday destination on your phone ?

We’re Hiring

sameer.shisodia — Wed, 06 Dec 2006 16:56:49 +0000

Ziva is the next generation of mobile data access and is trying to redefine how customers percieve and interact with search.

We’re at an exciting stage where early development has been translated to early sales within a year of existence, and we’re poised for growth both in terms of the product portfolio, as well as sales. We are also considering launching our own service around our products.

If you’re keen to explore an opportunity with a startup in one of the hottest markets in the mobile space, talk to us.

http://entrypreneur.blogspot.com/2006/08/ziva-is-hiring-redux.html

Design/Engineering

* Exciting market given India’s mobile boom
* Lots of possible directions of growth
* Combination of exploratory technologies
* Complete ownership, and participative decision making
* Java/Search/Analytics/Mobile/IR/mining

Sales/Marketing

* Opportunity for defining sales strategy, processes
* Need to reach out to more customers - bandwidth is the limiting factor
* Focus on the Indian market so fresh thinking needed
* Product management driven through customer interaction
* Both product and service-around-a-product sales and marketing needed

- Incubated at IIM’s NSRCEL
- Product installation completed at one customer site and 2 others in the process of going live

Send me mail at sameer.shisodia _ at _ zivasoftware.com