Mobile apps for a virtualized world

Bangalore: As the mobile phone continues to rule as the most ubiquitous device in everyday life, consumers will live their lives in a virtual mobile world, thanks to feature-rich applications.

For instance, Qik, a Silicon Valley-based video-streaming company founded by Indians, developed an application that allows consumers to capture 'life moments' in 90 second videos on the mobile phone, reports Deccan Chronicle. The application allowed users to capture the Iran War footage live on their phones, much before the media could access those zones, giving rise to a whole new wave of citizen journalism and immense possibilities in media syndication for Qik.

eyeSight an Israel based firm has developed an application that uses the camera in a mobile phone as an input mechanism to capture human gestures. If a user wants to listen to music on his mobile phone, all he has to do is dock it in his car and use hand gestures to start playing music, stop, rewind or fast forward without pressing buttons on the keypad to do so.

Closer home, a mobile application developed by a Forum Nokia Developer in India, gained instant popularity among Indians in the Middle East. "A youngster wrote an application that allowed users to read a Malayalam newspaper on standard Nokia devices, making it accessible to a huge number of NRIs in Dubai," says Purnima Kochikar, Vice Presicent, Forum Nokia and Developer Community.

Stating that the innovations happening in India can make it tomorrow's Silicon Valley, Purnima said: "India has the largest and most vibrant pool of qualified developers in the world - we have 180,000 Forum Nokia Developers, who must focus on developing applications not just for India but for Indians globally. For instance, the Diwali applications they developed for Indian users became relevant for NRIs globally."

Nokia has announced a series of new initiatives to assist Indian application developers tap global revenue generating opportunities and also announced the funding for four multi-screen infotainment applications, developed by Indians under the Open Screen Project Fund. These applications will provide the latest news, sports, and Bollywood updates in audio and visual formats and will be available for consumers throughout the world through Ovi Store, which is Nokia's one-stop-shop for applications, games, podcasts, music, and videos.