We Are Social Asia Tuesday Tuneup #151

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Tencent to distribute HBO movies and dramas online in China
Time Warner Inc’s HBO has inked a deal with internet giant Tencent to distribute its TV dramas and movies through the Chinese online video site. This partnership could see HBO expanding its audience through Tencent‘s massive social networks user base, as well as combating the rampant piracy issues in China.

India was the fastest growing smartphone market in APAC in Q3
India observed exceptional smartphone growth in Asia-Pacific, with a quarter-on-quarter increase of close to 27% in Q3 of 2014m reported the International Data Corporation (IDC). The countries smartphone shipments stood at 23.3m units, recording a year-on-year growth of 82% compared to Q3 2013. This is a new high in smartphone shipments in the quarter and has been attributed to festive demand.

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Messaging app Line removes 15 games from its lineup
In its second clean up in six months, Japanese messaging Line has once again purged its game offerings, this time removing 15 titles – about half of the titles on its games platform. This move was made to “focus its resources on titles that are enjoying greater growth in order to further propel the service as a global gaming platform.”

Line tries to break into the US market with chat stickers
In a bid to popularise its messaging app in the United States, Line has launched a sticker-designing contest for artists. According to Line, the U.S.-focused contest has brought in more than 10,000 sticker submissions and 500 million votes since it was launched in late September. There are currently more than 25 million registered Line users are in the U.S., but it is not known how many are active.

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Twitter adds Offer button
Twitter is bumping up its e-commerce offering with the launch of ‘Twitter Offers’. A set of partners can now tweet messages containing an offer, which users can claim in store by registering their credit or debit card. All this in time for the festive season – it’s a Christmas miracle!

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Twitter tests in-tweet analytics
Twitter has started an experiment with in-tweet analytics, in which some users are seeing a ‘view analytics details’ button on the mobile app. Clicking the button allows you to, well, view the analytics details of the tweet, including impressions, total engagements and engagement rate.

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Samsung sponsors rugby highlights on Twitter
Samsung mobile is sponsoring rugby video content on Twitter, through the Sky Sports Rugby account. It’s a nice example of a brand taking a normal online behaviour (in this case sharing video clips in near-real time) and embracing it, rather than trying to shut it down.

We Are Social and Bulmers start ‘yarn-bombing’
Bulmers and We Are Social are joining up to make winter a little warmer, by knitting Twitter handles in yarn to create ‘tree cosies’ for Bulmers’ apple trees. The cider brand is asking its community to respond to a set of competition questions, with a few lucky winners getting their Twitter handle yarned up.

The ASA bans Oreo YouTube ads
The UK’s Advertising Standards Agency has banned a set of YouTube videos for Oreo, because they did not adequately point out that they were adverts. If you’re desperate to feast your eyes on an ‘Oreo Lick Race’, though, fear not! We’ve got one embedded below.