By Kwaak Je-yup
At a Wednesday press conference by Kakao no one put it better than Norm Lo who called KakaoTalk “best in its class.”
It may have been a compliment from the managing director of Research in Motion (RIM) Korea, but after Kakao’s CEO Lee Jae-bum followed Lo’s remark by unveiling a new feature that is decidedly underwhelming, the phrase took on a new meaning: the messenger is still locked up as a big fish in a small pond.
Dubbed “Plus Friend,” the added function is essentially a copy of features provided by the likes of Twitter and Facebook; it is unclear why users, here or abroad, would be prompted to switch from those larger, more versatile platforms.
“I cautiously claim that we are ahead in the mobile platform sphere,” said Lee when a reporter asked about the upcoming app from Apple, iMessage, which would allow iPhone users to send and receive text messages for free.
He said moving these capabilities to the mobile world, “where the offline and the online meet,” put them at an advantage.
If Apple or other similar messengers decide to embed similar capabilities to its app in the future, however, Kakao currently has no answer outside Korea, where its virtual monopoly has held off competition until now.
Plus Friend is like a Twitter account, which users can add and from which they can receive status updates in real time.
What makes it unattractive is that only corporate entities ― not individual users ― are eligible to become Plus Friends, which degrades the space into a constant stream of advertisements instead of a dynamic sphere for interaction.
Content providers are not exactly winners either, as no users are obligated to add Plus Friends.
“People can add or block Plus Friends like others on your chat list,” said Lee. “One Plus Friend is going to be shown as a suggestion…on a random basis.”
Lee said the details of the partnership contract could not be disclosed but said there were no paid advertisements.
Currently, there are 21 options for Plus Friends, which include Lotte Department Store, Auction, CJ E&M, Ticket Monster.
Perhaps driven by the desire to present a possible profit model for investors, Kakao rushed through its latest evolution ― with little to showcase.
With its urge to sound bells and whistles unchecked, the company may meet a similar fate to dwindling local No. 1 online community Cyworld, whose basket of features was far more sophisticated than the early versions of Facebook, but its complex web of localization failed to attract users abroad.
The excitement generated by the partnership with Korea’s top talent management agency SM Entertainment, announced Monday, lost its luster at the press conference, too.
It was disclosed that the agency would offer exclusive content and news, when users add its artists as Plus Friends. SM already provides them when Facebook account holder subscribes to, or “Like” their “fanpages.”
While Kakao’s public relations trumpeted spreading hallyu, or the wave of Korean pop culture, through its platform’s worldwide expansion, Girls’ Generation, SM’s most popular act with an impending U.S. album release, is excluded from the line-up, due to “contractual obligations to another company,” according to Lee.
The CEO later announced an update to KakaoLink, a feature that has thus far allowed sharing mobile Web content between messenger contacts.
The new 2.0 version expands the horizon and gives a better indication of where the company can go in the future. It opens its doors to other applications, like Facebook did a few years ago.
Playing games against one another or listening to songs simultaneously over KaTalk chats are leaps ahead of competitors.
Having a single platform across iOS, Android, Blackberry and possibly Windows Phone, moreover, will make it an attractive one-stop shop for developers.
Consequently the time for them to focus on signing more users abroad than proving how it can earn money is now.