Askem likely to be Windows Phone's next social app
Microsoft Ventures said Tuesday that it has invested in Askem, a social quiz app that so far has existed just for the iOS ecosystem.
Unlike other decision making apps like Jelly, Seesaw and Polar, Askem goes after the toughest issue with social decision makinggetting actionable answers from the wall of noise, Rahul Sood, general manager for Microsoft Ventures, said in a blog post. The app is fun, addictive and has a huge potential to scale.
A closeup of the Askem app.
Well, perhaps. Askem works by allowing you to upload a picture as well as a question, with several possible answers. Users then choose one of your answers, with a percentage of the total votes determining the winner. The app integrates with Facebook, Pinterest, Tumblr, Instagram and Twitter, and includes a beta version of an embeddale plugin allowing an app-like experience onWordPress, Joomla! and Drupal.
Oh, and Jelly and Polar dont run on Windows Phone, so theres that. (Seesaw is a Windows Phone 7 app.)
Microsoft is positioning this as a fun way to interact with friends, as well as a (gulp) way for advertisers and brands to solicit feedback from customers and shoppers. Microsofts Windows Phone app woes have been well documented, and the upcoming release of Windows Phone 8.1 and its SDK have begun provoking leaks that include Universal Apps that can run on Windows Phone and Windows 8.1, both.
Unfortunately, the top three reviews that show up on AskemsiOS app pageare uniformly negative. I was thinking oh what a great way to get ideas on outfits and stuff then it took a year to sign up, like 50 trys uploading a question, and then I had to go through a bunch of stuff for people to see my question, a user with the odd name of I dislike your taste in tea wrote. And there are some weird questions you dont want to answer. So now Im thinking actually no.
Which, presumably means that Microsoft both will be bringing this app to Windows Phoneand solving this helpful list of issues in time for the launch.
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Askem likely to be Windows Phone's next social app