Portals offer cricket blogs, live WC-07

New Delhi, Mar 18 (UNI) With the World Cup underway in the Carribbean, companies are cashing in on the bonanza with special blogs and services for fans in the cricket-savvy nation.

Leading search engine Google India has kicked off a Cricket World Cup campaign, which will help users write, share, debate and enjoy the matches through an integrated platform of Google products like Google Desktop, personalised homepage, Blogger and Orkut through a special landing page www.google.co.in/cricket.

Fans across India can access regular updates, post individual comments and analysis and express their love for the game on the cricket website.

Mr Sundaraman K, Head of Sales, Google India says, ''Cricket is one of the key passions of users in India and this campaign is designed to bring people across communities together, offering them a unique cricket experience across different Google platforms.'' Google has also teamed up with renowned cricketer and commentator, Krishnamachari Srikkanth, who will host an expert blog 'Cricket Zone with Krish Srikkanth' www.worldcupwithkrish.blogspot.com.

Google is also hosting a blogging cricket contest, entries for which can be submitted at www.google.co.in/cricket/contest.

It will also have a fully equipped Blogger vehicle that will visit, Bhopal, Ahmedabad and Hyderabad, educating people on the use of internet and blogging for self-expression.

This educational road show will begin tomorrow from Chandigarh.

Reliance World, chain of retail outlets for products and services of the Reliance ADAG, has tied up with online video network CricTV to offer broadband video experience to its customers.

As the exclusive broadband partner of CricTV (a web-video offering from the US-based PayPod Inc) in India, Reliance World will enable the ccustomers to upload videos and video blogs free of cost from any of the Reliance World outlet across 104 cities in the country.

''The association not only augurs well to set the right tempo for the World Cup but also enables us to offer a unique cricketing experience to our millions of customers by leveraging the power of video,'' Reliance World Chief Exceutive Officer Sarup Chowdhary says.

Microsoft's search engine MSN India is also providing full coverage of the World Cup 2007 on its very own personal cricket channel www.msncricket.com.

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