Flixwagon Archive

Live mobile video service Flixwagon is announcing the launch of a blog/site widget today and a new YouTube distribution feature. The widget is named FliXee and allows you to embed a live stream of your video using the Flixwagon service. I listed Flixwagon as one of three apps that will change 2008.

The other update allows you to automatically upload the live videos to YouTube directly. This is a huge timesaver and could help videobloggers gain more traction by leveraging not just the live video but the ability to get in front of the large YouTube audience. What would be a great next step is to allow each user to select the video service they use.

What I’d like to see next is group live video. Allow me to load a panel of everyone broadcasting live from NYC or Chicago or around a topic.

Other players in the live video space include Kyte and Qik. Here is an example of what the FliXee widget would look like on a blog:

At the core of Seesmic is a threaded discussion forum using video. One person starts a thread, others follow, all using video. I’ve written about Seesmic several times before including an initial demo video.

Earlier this week Mashable installed a new plugin from Viddler that allows site visitors to comment on articles using video. In 24 hours I’ve watched about 30 video comments.

Why do I believe the combination of blog/cms is stronger than Seesmic? Because it allows the content publisher and his or her audience to interact, each in their own preferred medium. I may prefer to start in text, John wants to reply with video, Mary with audio, Rachel with text. Together we are forming a combined discussion that doesn’t force us into one medium, be it text (currently for most blogs) or video (as Seesmic does).

To make this model perfect, we need three things. Audio recording capabilities, mobile commenting and video/audio transcription. The transcription is important because if users will contribute in their preferred method, they should be able to consume in as many ways as possible. These new input and ouput options could bring real innovation to the blog space which has set relatively still for a couple of years.

And how will the live video services (Qik/Flixwagon) be able to play in this new blog realm? I believe Seesmic is working on live video as well.

Perhaps Seesmic could offer a plugin similar to what Viddler is offering to enhance their current video offering. Viddler has a variety of innovative features but lacks the YouTube buzz and take rate. If they could figure out how to bundle the video commenting plugin into a variety of blog and CMS platforms, it could help elevate and provide a strong distribution model for Viddler.

What’s your take? Are video comments the future? Do you prefer the Seesmic video threading to the traditional blog setup?

After my post about Kyte yesterday, the team asked me to swing by their booth. Let me just say that what they showed me was impressive. They showed me their 2-minute full Facebook application along with the one-minute embed option. The system works with mobile phones, webcams, and saved videos. We were able to take my mobile phone, create a video, email it to Kyte and it was online immediately in my channel. The live features work mainly with the Nokia N95 (Nokia is an investor in Kyte).

With all of the new live video services hitting the airwaves recently, I asked co-founder Daniel Graf about the differences between Kyte and Seesmic, Qik and Flixwagon. Here’s his video response:

Mobile video service Flixwagon has announced a new version of their video application. Flixwagon is a service that lets you broadcast great quality video from your mobile device live. They’ve also updated the privacy settings so that you can make sure videos aren’t shared with the wrong groups.

More importantly, they’ve integrated Twitter into Flixwagon so you can send video announcements when you are going "live" directly to your Twitter friends. Comes at a perfect time with SXSW this week and Twitter being the hot service. Flixwagon will be on-site showing off their service and I will be using one of their test phones during part of the festival. So watch out, we may just be live as we are speaking! You can also Twitter a message when you are viewing a pre-recorded video. 

Check out our conversation with the founder of Flixwagon from last month.

We review tons of products and services on CN, over 1,000 in the past year. Most are good to very good, but some just wow us when we check them out. I’d like to share three that have come across our radar in the last month that are game changers and should be very, very successful — and two of them are NY-based, the other calls Boston home.

Part of what will lead to the success is the distribution deals each one has already signed. As Marc Andreessen has said many times, distribution is the key. I am interested in your opinions on the companies listed below – leave your thoughts in the comments.

GoMobo

We took a look at GoMobo last month and also posted their demo video from the NY Tech Meetup. The basic idea with GoMobo is that you can order food from a fast-food joint or restaurant using your mobile for takeway. What this does is save you the time from standing in line. And we predicted 2008 would be the year of the time-saver apps.

Currently the service area is mainly NYC but they have expansion plans in 2008. Their distribution comes from the chains as a point of differentiation which includes Dunkin Donuts, Subway, Papa Johns, etc. Imagine punching into your phone that you want a large Milky Way hot chocolate, corn muffin and a bag of munchkins and having it ready when you arrive.

Think about the time saved from waiting on a line at lunchtime – especially for a person on an hour lunch break. GoMobo estimates the time saved by using their app is over 284 days, I don’t know how they calculated it but even if it’s just 5 minutes each trip, it can add up quickly.

And more importantly, outside of Manhattan, think about the possibilities using mobile in your car – no waiting on a drivethru lane, you just drive directly up to the pickup window at the moment you desire.

The service is free for consumers and GoMobo generates a percentage of the order price. The food establishment doesn’t care because a good percentage of this business will be incremental sales.

Aviary

Aviary is the newest of the apps that we believe will change 2008. The demo of their first app is just amazing. Aviary is a suite of tools targeting the artist community. It’s an actual competitor to Photoshop and Illustrator online. Of the 80-100 demos at the NY Tech Meetup I’ve seen in the last year, this was the first one to receive massive noise and excitement after the demo.

Sure, there are other products like Skitch which are great but appeal to more of the basic graphic needs. I haven’t seen any other product that takes the perspective of what an artist needs and moves it online. The distribution angle for Aviary is to their core group of potential users, the artists. They have tied into their core business, worth1000 to grow excitement and buzz.

The unique angle and game changer for Aviary is in how it deals with copyright and royalties. Since the application is built for artists who make a living at selling their works, it makes sense that the copyright and royalty piece be part of the application. Each piece of the final work is tagged from the source files. Maybe this will help issues like the one that blew up last year with Richter Scales usage of photos. I wouldn’t be surprised if Aviary starts receiving acquisition offers soon.

Flixwagon

Yesterday I met with Flixwagon VP Marketing Sarig Reichert and VP R&D Roy Ginat. Flixwagon is based in Israel and their goal is to make video sharing less cumbersome. If we look at the videos from the NY Tech Meetup, I shoot them, download them, compress them in Windows Movie Maker, upload them and then finally embed them into a post. Flixwagon changes that by shooting live video on your mobile device and having it appear on your blog immediately in real-time. Sarig says that they are empowering a revolution.

You get the full impact of the possibilities when Roy walked outside the coffee shop into Rockfeller Center and began shooting live video while Sarig and I watched it on the laptop. Imagine the parent who was away on business while the child was playing in a soccer championship. The parent could watch the game live from another location. The possibilities are endless.

Their distribution will come from partnerships with major brands. They hosted MTV’s Choose Or Lose special for the Super Tuesday primaries this week in which 51 live streamers were in every state in the nation sending back live video to the MTV Web site and on the TRL tv show.

Soon you will be able to ping Twitter when you are broadcasting and they are working on scheduling and an upload function to YouTube once the live version has completed.

Another company in this space is Qik. Qik has been getting major buzz recently thanks to webulebrity Robert Scoble and his use of the application. I can’t speak to the differences as my phone currently does not handle mobile video, but Sarig says both companies are creating a market and he likes what they are doing. Saris is proud of their video capture quality and the system is built to handle massive traffic.

Once video on mobile devices becomes a standard, Flixwagon is set for success. Photos are so 2005. This is where Yahoo Live should be.