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Chaitime launches new campaign

Nitish S Rele

Chaitime.com, a South Asian online community, is serving up a new campaign 'It's All About You'.

The campaign took off in late July with a traveling "wall", which will visit 10 US cities to gather opinions from south Asians. Also a part of the campaign is the Favorite Newswalla Contest, which will highlight newsstand personalities in New York City. 'It's All About You' ends August 20 while the Favorite Newswalla Contest a day later.

"Chaitime.com has always believed in touching the consumer and reaching out at a grassroots level," said Neeta Parikh, president of chaitime's North American region. "We believe in building a community and have strived to provide that... The wall campaign is just one more effort in reinforcing that."

Parikh says chaitime.com wants south Asians to have an outlet to express their views.

"We felt that this would be a fun and insightful campaign to take around the country. It allows us, as a community, to reach out to others and listen to what they have to offer.

The campaign will tour Houston, Los Angeles, Edison, Toronto, San Francisco, Chicago, New York City, Atlanta, Philadelphia and Washington, DC. Chaitime.com teams will encourage people to speak their minds through the "wall". The online community will then put up all the information, comments and photos from each wall on its web site for users.

The Favorite Newswalla Contest will look at 10 newsstand workers/owners in New York City. Profiles/photos of the top newswallas will be featured on chaitime's News Channel. Members can vote their favorite newswalla; one lucky newswalla will receive a $ 500 gift certificate and the honor of being the best at what they do.

Also, a randomly selected chaitime member who voted for the winning newswalla will win a $ 500 shopping spree on the online community's newly-launched bazaar.

Chaitime.com was the first to web cast the Bollywood Awards and the first web company to offer college students an internship called 'The Summer of Chai'.

"The internship was a resounding success," said Parikh.

"We brought six students together from around the country, put them in a house. These six students have created a new following for Chaitime.com. We have loyal users that log on everyday to find out what is happening in the lives of these six students. They are a mirror to the experience of growing up south Asian in this country today and provide a tremendous outlet for other Chaitime users in the same demographic to connect to."

Established in May 1999, www.chaitime.com offers the south Asian community culture-specific channels like arts and culture, astrology, Bollywood, careers, college life, cricket, music, news, relationships and weddings. Also featured are services like free e-mail, chat, discussion groups, community calendars and community homepages.

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