Bambuser
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posted 2008-03-21 by Henrik Berggren

Tell stories with your phone

If microblogging with jaiku was last years hype at the lab, this years most maybe-revolutionary-service is called Bambuser. With the Finnish technology Movino they have provided software, along with a service, that enables you to broadcast live video, right from your mobile phone.

When the service was first launched the only function available was the videofeed but after a while, MÃ¥ns and the others added a small chat window to enable communication from viewer to viewer but also between the viewers and the one holding the camera, um, i mean the mobile phone. This layer of interaction added real value to the service and made it a lot more interesting by giving the viewer the possibility to actually influence the event or situation being broadcasted.

Some people have reacted over the poor interaction design and functionality of the site and we totally agree, it's not a pretty sight. However, MÃ¥ns explains the strategy behind the desicion to release the site to the people while still in Alpha version in an episode of What's Next. It's in Swedish so for you that doesn't understand: MÃ¥ns explains that the team still doesn't really know what Bambuser is going to turn into. He says that releasing the site early is a way to let the users of the service take part in the development and turn it into a service that they really want and need. It might be a good strategy, but as mentioned, it doesn't seem come entirely without problems.

For me, Bambuser stands for something new and exciting, the possibility to start a broadcast from anywhere, with only your mobile phone is extremely cool. Although the quality could be much better and the framrate could be the double, as Björn Falkevik says: "if only the story get's told, you are there".

To give the team some (hopefully useful) feedback then. Me, David & Emil did a broadcast with three cameras, i.e. three angles, today and we immediatly felt that we miss the function of combining several streams into one channel where the viewers can easily change between the different angles. This would be great for sport events and concerts.

Also, please give us a better chat window with timed comments. Watching an archived stream that contains interaction with the viewers is really messy right now since all the viewers comments drop in at the beginning of the stream. This makes following an old conversation between the broadcaster and the viewers close to impossible.

I can't help remembering the 90's with MTV's The Real World when watching and talking to people while they hang around in their homes and offices but my feelings remain, Bambuser (or Qik, or Seesmic) will change things. And yeah, i can't wait until Steve Jobs next keynote!

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