Heiko Hebig does a nice little post about some of the things I have been noticing around the topic of mobile blogging, or moblogging. Telco after telco has been coming out with services to tap into what they see going on in the blogosphere (and perhaps with an aim to also push other services such as MMS). But the moblogging services from telcos lack the insight into blogging to actually make them useful tools.
Most mobile blogging tools on the market let you send images, videos, or text to a web location... and, that's it. This captures the whole "posting" thing, pretty much, but does little to reflect the conversations that characterize blogs. Fortunately, there are other companies that have stepped up to the plate. Take, for example, the release by Intercastingcorp of Rabble, a tool encompassing moblogging, social networking, and location-based services.
Create your channel and post location-based media - your favorite places, photos or an up-to-the-minute newsworthy event. It's like putting virtual sticky notes on the world around you. Then connect with your world. Tell Rabble where you are and it will show you who is around you and the media they have created.
Services such as Rabble and Flickr (which offers moblogging of photos with tags) lead the way in creating what Visser, on Smart Mobs, calls “flash communities” and come much closer to how blogs are vehicles for conversations - for interaction and social interaction.
The mobile phone is evolving into a media production and consumption device. Hardly a “phone” anymore, it is a Personal Media Device (PMD). In a few years there will be over a billion people walking around with the equivalent of a radio station, film studio and broadcast network in their pockets, and our definition of “media” is going to change dramatically.
What can we expect from moblogging? As phones evolve, even just slightly, we should see more services popping up that allow us not just to post to our blogs, but to edit posts, view and make comments, host your location to others, share posts with grouped communities, send out trackbacks, and much more.
