The Download Blog

Got a few minutes to kill? Sure, you could flip through your tunes, but when the same songs get old, and when you tire of your headphones winding from your ears like some extraterrestrial umbilical cord, check out the worlds of communication, learning, and game-playing applications to discover beyond the beats. Or, dare we say, while listening to them. Check out your burgeoning options for cell phone entertainment in the slide show.

This article was updated at 1:21 p.m. PDT to correct information on video quality.

Generation Y (and Z) are in for a big treat. As social-networking services like MySpace.com, Facebook, and Twitter have exploded as the definitive way to keep in touch, mobile content companies have begun to offer up some sophisticated ways to capture that energy and broadcast photos, videos, audio, and text from mass market phones.

I've been impressed with what I've seen from JuiceCaster, a mobile-media broadcasting app that's available as a WAP site from any Internet-enabled cell phone, and very soon, as a Java app offered through T-Mobile. Juice Wireless' CEO Nick Desai gave me access to JuiceCaster 6.0, the app's latest evolution, and chatted about the app's previously unannounced T-Mobile release.

(Credit: Juice Wireless)

Brand new features
Though the JuiceCaster WAP site is accessible from any mobile phone via m.juicecaster.com, the downloadable client is unsurprisingly prettier, faster, and more robust.

Actionable items are varied with this rich multimedia app, but they boil down to three essentials--watching someone else's media, posting your own, and interacting with others through comments, invitations, and chat. Let me laud JuiceCaster here for its broad definition of "others," which takes in JuiceCaster users and non-users, and which, like Twitter, allows users to subscribe to other users' feeds.

The app's well-plotted interface makes it easy to create media on the spot or tag, title, and publish media that's already on the phone. The output can be posted as public, messaged privately, or set as your JuiceCaster profile picture.

New to JuiceCaster 6.0 is the choice to set media as your Facebook status. Clicking that option after taking a photo cues friends reading their Facebook activity feed to check out your profile and see the photo. Of course, any photo you upload will also show up in the regular activity feed, but assuming you've added JuiceCaster's Mobile Status application for Facebook, friends will now be doubly reminded.

JuiceCaster's integration with the social networks doesn't stop there. Mobile Video is another Facebook application to showcase your mobile video uploads to your Facebook profile. For MySpace, Blogger, Friendster, and others, there's an embed code for pasting a similar widget. Another new, nicely integrated feature auto-updates Twitter with links to your media. A follower that clicks a link will be taken to a stylish player on JuiceCaster.com. Unlike the Facebook status update, which users selectively activate, Twitter updating works in the background after setting up account permissions in the "Manage Connections" section on JuiceCaster.com.

Friends can see your photos and videos online.

(Credit: CNET Networks)

The downloadable client also comes equipped with five equally attractive skin colors and a backup mechanism for e-mailing or texting media to contacts. The latter is much more primitive than the default auto-updating, but it's a safety net nonetheless.

JuiceCaster's T-Mobile launch
Over the next few weeks, JuiceCaster 6.0 will be rolling out on between 12 and 14 T-Mobile handsets, including Nokia, Sony Ericcson, and Motorola models (like the Razr). Subscribers who agree to the $3 per month charge can sign up from the T-Zones catalog.

Is JuiceCaster worth $36 a year plus data charges? It is if you have an unlimited data plan and a penchant for broadcasting your life online, and it's exponentially more worth it the more high-end your phone.

I spent a lot of time with JuiceCaster on a Motorola Razr and enjoyed flawless performance, though the Razr's image quality was admittedly rough in photos and video. I'm not sure I'd want to continually broadcast poor photos I have to reshoot multiple times to frame correctly, but the immediate video feature is a huge plus, and is available so long as the phone's native camera supports video. Besides, if I had that Nokia N95 I won, image quality would be a different story.

Fence-sitters can always try JuiceCaster from its WAP site before making a subscription decision. Not all social networking features will be available, but the core media-sharing actions will give users a chance to see if their activity level warrants $3 a month for a significant publishing convenience.

LightPole doesn't think of itself as a search hub, an RSS reader, a mobile apps platform, or a maps source, even though the mobile app, publicly released on Tuesday, is all these things rolled into one.

LightPole's interface is a bit like Viigo's, but instead of hosting various news channels, LightPole (mostly) hosts channels for interactive services, targeting people on the move who are looking for activities around them.

People seeking a nearby hot spot, for example, would open the channel for Hotspotr, which sniffs out W-iFi cafes and other Internet gateways. MappyHour acts similarly for happy hour joints, and Zvents offers listings of local happenings. Perennial favorites Yelp and Yahoo Local are in here, too. LightPole will search your neighborhhood based on your city or postal code, or by using GPS--whether integrated with the phone or as an external device.

Though dealing with divergent channels, LightPole serves up a unified experience, providing both a map view and list view for each search result. People can exert a measure of control over each view, but largely remain passengers. There's the ability to page through options, sort results, share points of interest with a friend, and switch services--from MappyHour to Yelp, for instance--but you'll find no directions engine here. If you follow LightPole's intentions, you'll stick to the adjacent neighborhood and be proficient enough a map-reader to get around.

Saving a point of interest as a favorite leads to the best feature: the catalog of special spots that is your own personalized channel. On LightPole's channel list, it's called My Places. Here you'll find favorites from all partner services gathered in one spot. Best yet, My Places is the only channel that doesn't include an advertising link up top. The location-based advertising model is common for this type of discovery service aggregator, and, as LightPole CEO Doug Klein confirmed, is an ideal framework for serving call-to-action coupons and ads that help businesses attract patrons by proposing a deal.

With its first public release after a year in quiet beta, LightPole's free app looks promising. While not swimming in features, LightPole is fairly easy to use on any Java-enabled phone and delivers reliably predictable results.

With an emphasis on helping content publishers get in front of users, LightPole should also be able to line up more popular partner services. This, along with giving users a degree more control in programming and deleting relevant channels, is crucial as LightPole expands its partner base. While Yelp and Yahoo Local are big wins, other partnerships such as one with The Bathroom Diaries will fall short in shepherding critical mass.

Download LightPole over the air by signing up on www.lightpole.net.

LightPole's navigational secrets
To zoom in while in map mode, press the center key and jog or scroll the center control to the left. Jog it to the right to zoom out. To reset your location, which is represented on a map by a red balloon, pressing the star key (*) will let the balloon follow your navigation to anywhere else on the map. Press the center key again to make the location your new nerve center.

If the spare contents of your wallet dictate your dining destination, you'll want to know of this reprieve. Cellfire (hands-on review), offers coupon deals with more than 10,000 local U.S. restaurants and services, and chains. With custom-built applications for BlackBerry, Windows Mobile, Symbian, the RAZR, and Nokia phones, Cellfire has rounded the smartphone bases. A WAP site--www.cellfire.com--that works with iPhone and other Internet-enabled devices brings the app home.

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