Source: Hueiyen News Service
Imphal, December 30, 2009:
E-Pao! (www.e-pao.net), the popular web-portal from Manipur completes 10 years of service on 31st December 2009.The first installment of the website was launched on 31st December 1999 on a free webserver.
Within the next three months, the domain e-pao.net was registered.
Two more domains have been registered since then.
www.e-paolive.net caters to high volume traffic of the videos (Ooba) and songs (radio).
www.e-pao.org caters to the newer projects of E-Pao! such as "chakhum" (recipes of Manipur), "e-Ming" (baby names database), "e-Rang" (Film world of Manipur) All sites are hosted on servers and with services located at the USA.
Other services available to users of E-Pao! are: eFrenz (a social networking site), chat, Panorama (where one can watch 360 degrees of a popular site/spot in Manipur), Yellow Pages (listing of business contact addresses and numbers in Imphal), Yellout (a platform for the budding musicians from Manipur), Mayek Tamba (a place to learn the Eyek in an interactive way) and Books (Books from Manipur made accessible in the e-format).
The site also has sections on India and World news: Editorials from leading Imphal News dailies; Opinions of users ranging from topic such as Terrorism, Politics and Discrimination; features by known and unknown writers, Interviews and Profiles of Manipuri personalities; articles focusing on women, jobs, education and media; articles on ancient and modern Manipur and its travails.
According to the webmaster of the site, the top three countries from where the highest viewerships are drawn are: India, UK and USA.
The site receives hits from several other countries around the globe.
According to the website traffic information company, Alexa, www.e-pao.net is ranked 61,995 in the world and 4140 in India.
(All information are as on 28 Dec 09). Started out to let the world know about Manipur, the site has carried on to create a definitive e-platform for the Manipuris.
E-Pao! can boasts of a treasure trove of information and gems consisting of original poems, songs, articles along with the daily news and opinions.
With news archives dated back to 2000, E-Pao! is considered to be a archiver of Manipur news and events on the internet.
English News items are courtesy of the two Imphal dailies - 'The Sangai Express' and the 'Hueiyen Lanpao'.
The Mayek news are courtesy Hueiyen Lanpao.
Other newspapers that had earlier extended their news content to this site were: 'Imphal Free Press' and 'Yakairol'.
E-Pao! has also supported educational events such as: TAPRO Handloom Show, MITEX, MASTEC Science Meet, Linux Manipur IT Talent, etc.
It has also reported on such important events of Manipur such as: Elections, Santosh trophy, Sharmila's fast, etc.
E-Pao! also supports the state's indigenous script and does its bit by not only spreading awareness about it by webcasting news, poems and articles but also by encouraging others to learn the script in an interactive way on the site.
A brief time travel of the site: Webcast of Meitei Mayek articles started in 2002.Job postings were started in 2003 with Manipuris informing e-pao.net as a way of informing others of the various job opportunities available at their company through e-pao.
E-Pao! Yellout! was launched in 2005.E-Pao! Radio was started in 2006. Toolbar for firefox was added in 2007.Baby Names listing started in 2007.It's, however, re-launched as an application in 2008 and rechristened as e-Ming.
Ooba was started in 2007 in a simple format.
The application was revamped in 2008. Mayek/Eyek news from Huieyen Lanpao along with it's English news contents added to e-pao in 2008. Sangai Express has been providing news contents to E-Pao! Since 2000. eRang was launched in 2008.RSS feed and social bookmarking was added in 2008. Meitei Mayek tamba is started in 2009. Books sub-site is also started in 2009. On its 10th anniversary, the 'Team E-Pao!' thanks all its contributors and users and wishes all a very good and peaceful year ahead.
Representative Contact: Gandhi Gnet Cyber, Thangal Bazar, Imphal.