SEATTLE, WA, January 4, 2005 – The Chinese Outpost, one of the Web’s leading sites for introducing Mandarin Chinese to the English-speaking world, and Meta4 Networks, provider of the world’s only network of custom-branded multi-lingual online personals services, today announced the release of a custom-branded personals service for The Chinese Outpost Web site. The Chinese Outpost is one of the first U.S.-based sites to cooperate with Meta4 Networks to expand its Asia-based network of custom-branded multi-lingual online personals services.

The unique feature of Meta4 Networks’ online personals service is its focus on internationally-minded Asians and Asian-focused people from around the globe. With this custom-branded partnership, Meta4 Networks will power the Chinese Outpost Personals service using its proprietary technology. In turn, subscribers to the Chinese Outpost Personals service can easily find new friends, travel buddies, pen-pals, language tutors, dates, or potential long term partners. Users also receive personalized e-mail recommendations for potential matches, conveniently keeping them informed of new subscribers whose interests they may share.

“It is an honor to be collaborating with Meta4 Networks to provide this Personals service to our site’s visitors,” said Mark Baker, owner and operator of The Chinese Outpost. “Since The Chinese Outpost launched in 1996, its aim has been to provide an introduction and basic insight into the Chinese language and culture. With this partnership, the site takes a great step forward, making it easier for our visitors to meet and communicate directly with people in the Asian countries and cultures that interest them.”

“We’re delighted that The Chinese Outpost is joining our partnership network. This launch marks another important step into North America for the network that will further increase the diversity of our member base. Since our company has been focused on providing useful services to language learners in Asia since 1999, we are very confident that users of The Chinese Outpost will enjoy this new service to find new friends for language exchange and friendship.” said Dominic Penaloza, chief executive officer of Meta4 Networks.

Subscribers of The Chinese Outpost Personals can choose from Regular, VIP or Open Club membership. Regular membership is free, allowing subscribers to create their own profiles, search and view other members’ profiles, receive messages, and send online “smiles” to other members. VIP membership, which operates on a monthly-subscription and unlimited usage basis, allows members to initiate contact with as many other members as they choose, with paid subscriptions available in 1, 3, 6, and 12-month packages, starting from U.S. $24.95. Open Club, which makes it possible for any other member (including regular members) to write to the subscriber, is U.S. $46.95 for 3 months.

The Meta4 Networks Personals system currently boasts more than 225,000 members and provides its service in English, Traditional Chinese, Simplified Chinese and Japanese, with work on support for Korean already underway. An instant messenger feature will be launched soon as well.

Visitors to The Chinese Outpost can begin enjoying free regular membership in the Personals service by registering at http://friends.chinese-outpost.com.

About The Chinese Outpost

Since 1998, The Chinese Outpost has served as one of the West’s primary online resources for introducing Mandarin Chinese to the English-speaking world. The centerpiece of the site, an “Introduction to Mandarin Chinese” tutorial, aims to demystify the Chinese Language-in everyday language, not academese-with units focused on Pronunciation, Characters, and Grammar. Additional site resources include Newsletters, Reviews, and other tools to help site visitors in their quest to learn more about Chinese language and culture. For more information, please visit http://www.chinese-outpost.com/.

About Meta4 Networks

Meta4 Group Limited operates Meta4 Networks to help the internationally-minded people in Asia to meet new friends with common interests in a fun, easy and time-effective way. It also provides partner companies with custom-branded personals services. Meta4 Networks is the world’s only multi-lingual custom-branded online personals service. Meta4 Networks is rapidly expanding and currently partnered with 70 companies globally. For more information, please visit http://www.meta4networks.com/.