Hot on the heels of its competitor Qik, mobile video service Flixwagon has released an application for the iPhone 3G that allows users to stream live video from their cell phones. Qik released a similar application for the iPhone 3G yesterday. Unfortunately, like the Qik app, this will only work on jailbroken (hacked) iPhones, which severely limits the potential user base.
Here are the instructions if you’d like to install it:
-On Cydia, make sure you refresh all ‘Sources’ under the ‘Changes’ tab, and then Install Flixwagon from “Sections/Multimedia”.
-On installer 4: make sure you refresh ‘Sources’, and then install Flixwagon via “Categories/Multimedia”. The app is also available via Community resources like iSpazio.
Apple’s ban on applications using the iPhone’s camera is just one of the seemingly arbitrary restrictions the company is placing on developers. What makes the restriction especially annoying is the fact that the camera is actually designed to capture video. Some users speculate that the lack of a sanctioned video app may be because of Apple’s concerns with the iPhone’s already lackluster battery life, while others believe that the phone’s developers don’t have it very high on their priority list.
Update: A developer I’ve spoken to says that the camera buffer is simply a part of the phone developers are not given access to yet, but that this likely has more to do with creating a sandboxed environment than Apple explicitly forbidding video apps.
Either way, the fact that Apple is rejecting applications that have significant demand and no malicious qualities has frustrated users and developers alike. Apple’s lack of communication and hazy Terms of Service may cause the App Store to stagnate, as developers become wary of creating something truly innovative only to have it rejected.
Notably absent from the race to get streaming video to the iPhone is Kyte, a direct competitor to Qik and Flixwagon. Kyte may be trying to avoid any disagreements with Apple, as it already it has an Apple approved application available in the App Store (which can only handle images, not video).
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Nice! Gotta love competition.
I wonder what will happen when non-sanctioned apps start directly competing with Apple-approved apps. The iPhone is in desperate need of an always-on IM-client. How’s AOL going to feel about the AIM app when something better comes along and disregards Apple’s restrictions?
Also, I wish the music-streaming apps like Last.fm and Pandora would get on the jailbreak bandwagon. Is is so wrong to want to listen to music and browse the web at the same time? When something else does come along and starts sucking away their user-base, what will they do to respond?
Sorry, QIK already beat you to it and using them now.
Wish I didn’t have another 12 months left on my Blackberry…
are they baking ads? I would like to see who is trying to monetize this types of apps beyong the one time fee.
Renato, Qik is 100% free for our users. No fees!
good news for hacked iphone. it is also a huge market to compete the original iphone. and also help original iphone apps develop
It seems a bit unreasonable that Apple would ban certain kind of apps from being developed for something that the iPhone is capable of doing. Whatever the reason, they should certainly rethink their position. It doesn’t seem very intelligent on Apple’s part to not give users what they want or allow developers to come up with truly useful apps. Unless of course there’s something we don’t know behind this. Makes one wonder.
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Flixwagon is one of the leading consumer facing startup to come out of Israel’s silicon wadi recently.
For more news about Israeli startups visit siliconwadi.mixx.com
Cool, It seems like Flixwagon has a higher video Frame-Rate (12fps according to the app). In the 1gen iPhone version of Qik, I couldn’t get more then ~6 fps. The new Qik version doesn’t specify the fps, but it seems like it is still around the 6.
That’s because they’re using an inferior resolution. They don’t even offer resolution as high as Qik’s default res, while with Qik, you can reduce the resolution if you prefer higher FPS to good picture clarity.