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For Rully Panjaitan, Mig33 is much more than just an online chat service. Through it, he has found friends, social communities, employment — and even his wife-to-be.

With over 500 friends and a new job as the Indonesian coordinator for the company, Rully, 33, now stays on Mig33 most of the time, whether he’s at home, at work or out and about.

“When I’m working, I just change my status to busy,” he said.

Mig33 is a mobile social networking service that integrates Facebook, Google Talk, MSN and Yahoo Messenger into a single program as well as its own chat service. Established in 2005, it is now backed by Silicon Valley firms such as Accel Partners and Redpoint Ventures, as well as Indonesian telecom entrepreneur Sugiyono Wiyono Sugialam.

What keeps users, or “Migers,” addicted to the service is the race to increase their user level — the more time a user spend on Mig33, the higher their level. A higher level enables users to access more advanced functions, like creating their own chat rooms and banning spammers. It is also seen as a mark of prestige by other users.

Kiki Rizki, the Jakarta-based country manager for the company, said that is one of the main things that sets Mig33 apart from other social networking sites.

“Here, someone becomes popular not because they are a celebrity, but because of the time they invest in Mig33,” Kiki said.

Many Mig33 users invest not only time, but also money in their online status.

Virtual gifts — colorful cartoon images that can be sent to friends — can be bought through the site for around Rp 500 to Rp 25,000 (5 cents to $2.95). The gifts are used to express moods or emotions, with some even tailored for local holidays and celebrations, such as Independence Day.

And those gimmicky icons are big business. While the average Mig33 user spends around $2.40 per month on virtual gifts and avatar features, the average Indonesian users spend up to $3 every month. With around 27 million registered users in Indonesia, that’s a potential profit of $81 million per month.

“When I receive a gift, I would feel embarrassed not to send one in return,” Rully said. Hardcore users like him can spend more than $35 a month on virtual gifts — he said a friend once spent over $100 in one month.

Indonesia is now Mig33’s largest market, accounting for over half of the service’s 47 million total users in 200 countries, with India and Bangladesh coming in at second and third place, respectively.

“The incredible thing about Indonesian users is that they organize a lot of activities, from simple gatherings to fund-raising drives, without even needing us to encourage them,” Kiki said.

One Yogyakarta-based Mig33 community initiated a charity drive to help victims of the Mount Merapi volcano disaster last year.

Kiki said the communities built within Mig33’s chat rooms provide a sense of belonging for users, both online and in real life.

Bandung-based user Tresna Galih, 22, recently organized a gathering for local Migers that he said attracted thousands of participants. At the gathering, the Migers were able to meet each other face-to-face and entertain one another with songs, dances and traditional music performances.

“We wanted to change the perception that online chat rooms are simply a waste of time and money,” Tresna said.

Since users spend hours chatting and getting to know each other, Migers are encouraged to bring their online interactions into the real world, Kiki said.

And the communities are not limited to only those who can afford their own desktop computers or laptops. The majority of Indonesian users access the service on their mobiles, with most of them using older generation, non-smartphone types, such as Nokia models with black and white screens.

Kiki said Indonesia is known as a “mobile first” market, where handphones are often the first point of access to the Internet for many due to poor infrastructure or a lack of access to services. Markets like these are Mig33’s biggest target audience.

The company is now in the process of courting smartphone users, with an updated Android version for the Samsung Galaxy launched in Singapore in April.

Meanwhile, the Jakarta branch is looking to expand their social media management team.

“We may consider using celebrities to endorse our product,” Kiki said.

So will the presence of celebrities upset the social order of Mig33’s user-level system?

Tresna said he has yet to see a national celebrity on Mig33, but there are plenty of local celebrities, such as popular Bandung musicians, already affecting social interactions among users.

“There is jealousy, because Migers usually gain popularity because of their user level, not their occupation,” he said.

He added that one of the purposes of organizing a social gathering was to encourage users not to worry about their online status in real life.

As for Rully, he plans to marry the girl he met in a Mig33 chat room over two years ago by the end of this year.

“In the past, chat rooms were just about making friends,” he said. “But Mig33 is different.”