hi5 Launches Developer Platform; Becomes Founding Member of the OpenSocial Foundation

-- hi5 Platform enables third-party developers to deeply
integrate, promote and monetize their OpenSocial(TM)
applications within the world's 8th most-trafficked website

-- Applications offer hi5's 80 million registered members new
ways for social interaction and self-expression

-- hi5 Networks, Inc. will help establish the OpenSocial
Foundation
SAN FRANCISCO--(Business Wire)--
hi5, a leading international social network, today announced the
official launch of its robust application development platform. Now,
third-party developers will be able to leverage a suite of common
APIs, including those of OpenSocial, to create social applications for
members of hi5, which is ranked as the #1 social network in over 20
nations. The hi5 Platform also provides ways for developers to deeply
embed, spread and monetize their applications within hi5. With less
than 25% active user overlap with any of the other leading social
networks, hi5 presents a significant growth opportunity for
developers' applications.

"In designing our platform, we listened to what developers wanted
and focused on how we could best support the success of their
applications, while also delivering an engaging and optimal experience
for our users," says hi5 Founder and CEO, Ramu Yalamanchi. "In doing
so, we have provided a rich set of APIs that will enable developers to
rapidly create and generate revenue from interesting, fun and relevant
applications for our 80 million registered members globally."

In addition to launching its developer platform, hi5 Networks,
Inc. is also joining as a founding member of the OpenSocial
Foundation, a new non-profit organization jointly proposed by Yahoo!,
MySpace and Google last week. The foundation is being established to
ensure the neutrality and longevity of OpenSocial as an open,
community-governed specification for building social applications
across the Web. More information about the OpenSocial Foundation,
including resources for developers, is available at
http://www.opensocial.org.

"From the very beginning, hi5 has played an active role and
contributed significantly to advancing the goals and technical
specifications of OpenSocial," said Joe Kraus, director of product
management at Google and another early contributor to the OpenSocial
initiative. "I congratulate the hi5 team on the launch of its
platform, and am excited that developers now have a cumulative
potential audience across the OpenSocial community of hundreds of
millions worldwide."

hi5 Support for Developers

In total, there are now over 7,700 commercial and independent
developers from around the world who have registered to build
applications for hi5's membership. With registration, they gain access
to the hi5 Developer Console, which enables them to add, edit and
manage their hi5 applications right from their hi5 profile. Once an
application is submitted and approved, it is integrated within hi5 in
several ways, including a seamless and flexible Application Module on
user profiles, as well as a dedicated Application Canvas Page that a
developer can monetize through advertising. The hi5 Platform is also
the first OpenSocial-enabled platform to launch with numerous user
distribution channels for developers' apps, including notifications,
invites, messages, friend updates and more.

What Developers Are Saying

"It was really simple to create My Causes using the OpenSocial
APIs, and most of the development was actually done on the hi5 sandbox
since it felt the most polished," says independent developer, Fariz
Chowdhury. "I was attracted to porting my application over to hi5 due
to the sheer reach that hi5 has around the globe. It feels like the
perfect companion to an application, which is targeted to reaching and
connecting diverse users with similar beliefs."

"hi5 is taking the right approach to launching their platform. By
opening some reasonable viral channels and making the social map
available to developers and their users, hi5 is highly likely to
become one of the biggest application platforms and see widespread
user adoption," says Zynga Game Network founder and CEO, Mark Pincus.
"This is key for social games, such as Poker and Triumph, which
quickly enables users to start and play games with their friends."

"I found it very easy to include my event application, TheVerb on
hi5, and look forward to adding more for hi5 users in the future,"
says Suhail Doshi, an independent developer. "I think this launch will
be the most successful thus far, especially with their implementation
of viral APIs."

More Information

The new hi5 Platform will open the door to hundreds of new
applications and widgets being rolled out to the hi5 membership in the
coming days, weeks and months. Those interested in building
applications for hi5 will find detailed information at
http://developer.hi5.com/. To join hi5 and create a free member
profile, please visit www.hi5.com.

About hi5 Networks, Inc.

hi5 Networks, Inc. is a privately-held firm headquartered in San
Francisco, CA. Its flagship service, hi5, was launched in 2003 and is
now one of the leading social networks in the world -- ranked by
Alexa(R) as the 8th most-trafficked website globally and the #1 social
network in over 20 countries, including many in Latin America, Europe
and Asia. More than 80 million people in over 200 nations are
currently registered for hi5, which is available in 21 language
options (with more to come). Individuals use hi5 to stay connected and
share information with friends and family around the world, meet new
people, express their identity, discover linkages, and build
relationships across a lifetime of memories. For more information,
please visit www.hi5.com or www.hi5networks.com.

Google and OpenSocial are trademarks of Google Inc. Other product
and service names mentioned herein are the trademarks of their
respective owners.

PR at hi5.com
Denise Graab, 415-962-7075

Copyright Business Wire 2008