Link to YouTube video for iPhones.

]]> http://www.bleam.me/bleams-twitter-integration-conferences-concerts/feed/ 6 http://www.bleam.me/bleam-13-released-twitter-facebook-integration/ http://www.bleam.me/bleam-13-released-twitter-facebook-integration/#comments Sun, 09 May 2010 21:58:07 +0000 Bo http://www.bleam.me/?p=379 Bleam 1.3 now has Twitter and Facebook integration so you can share any Bleam to Twitter and to your Facebook wall. Bleam also supports Twitter Search which makes it perfect for conferences and concerts. You can enter the hashtag for an event, i.e. #Phish, and Bleam will download the Tweets with that hashtag and enable you to post tweets with that hashtag if you like as well. So Bleam enables instant local chat and sharing of photos and contacts with the people around you and integration with Twitter and Facebook.

The full list of new features is below:

• Integration with you Facebook account so you can post to your wall
• Integration with your Twitter account so you can post Bleams to Twitter
• Can use Twitter search operators to have Tweets downloaded into Bleam
• Ability to edit contact information before you send it to others
• Supports transferring of larger files
• Various networking and performance improvements

Screen caps of new Twitter and Facebook integration

To quote from Patently Apple’s post:

“During private or public events (e.g., concert, tradeshows, business meetings, weddings, rallies), a typical individual may have many brief contacts with individuals for which they would like to have further correspondence post event. With conventional social network websites, the individual would have to collect personal information from the contacts, manually create a social network on the social network website and invite the contacts to join. Some of the contacts, however, may not be registered with the social network website, and will have to register before joining the social network.”

Bleam already provides much of this functionality. If you want to have the core capabilities of iGroups, you can use Bleam now. Bleam already allows you to IM, send public and private text messages, and share photos, contacts and files, through an instant local Bluetooth/ WiFi network with other Bleamers on iPhones or iPod touches.

Apple is adding other features including encryption for messages and providing a virtual GPS capability for devices that don’t have GPS capabilities. This is by no means an extensive list of all of the features of Apple’s iGroups technology. Click here to see the patent.

We also found it interesting that Apple uses the rock concert use case in their patent. This is exactly why we made Bleam. One of our team members was at a Phish concert on the east coast and could not get connectivity to get the set list for the concert or Twitter posts from fellow concert goers. When he came back, we decided to solve the problem by creating Bleam.

Apple proposes that iGroups would be useful for tradeshows, business meetings, weddings and rallies.  We agree and would add conferences, classrooms and sporting events. We’ve been hearing about use cases for Bleam, in this very same context as Apple’s iGroups, from people using our app.  Bleamers are on the cutting edge of mobile phone technology.

Here are some more informative blog post regarding iGroups:

• Apple patent to bring social networking to the iPhone?
• iGroups: Apple’s New iPhone Social App in Development
• Apple’s iGroups Patent Would Instantly Connect You With Nearby iPhone Humans

“Bleam is more than just a photo sharing app. It’s like a multifunctional communication app with photos as a bonus option to its wide variety of communication capabilities.. It doesn’t matter if you are in a Bluetooth or WiFi area because Bleam uses both to connect to other “Bleamers” in the area. You become a virtual hotspot no matter where you are. You can send messages and photos with Bleam and even use the app to discover people around you who are using it as well.”

We especially appreciate that Almost Organized noted that Bleam is a “multifunctional communications app”.  In fact the most recent release of Bleam, Version 1.2, just released February 24th, enables sharing of virtually any type of file between iPhones or iPod touches which does indeed make Bleam a “multifunctional communications app”.

Almost Organized is the blog of KeepandShare.com which is a provider of secure file storage and file sharing including the ability to share files, calendars and photos for free.  We are thankful for this consideration and proud to be listed among the Top 20 iPhone photo sharing apps.

Anyway, here are the things that I think do differentiate the iPad:
- You can use it while standing.
- You can get close to it. Makes it great for personal tv watching
- You can pass it around
- You can draw on it.
- I suspect it will be a shared device.

This last concept is the one I am most intrigued with. It really is something new. Nobody shares a phone, and most people don’t share their laptop or desktop computer. Video games (like PS3 and Wii) are shared but they are
stationary.

Unfortunately, I cannot think of any apps yet that take advantage of these differences. If anybody reading this has ideas or can point out other differences, please comment.

• Ability to email archives of Bleams to save conversations and contacts
• Multiple user profiles for different occasions/settings
• Improved networking among groups

The archives are emailed as a zip file which has all the text, thumbnails of the pictures and the contacts.  When you open the archive in a browser and click on a contact, it enables you to directly add or export it as a vcf file.

We temporarily lowered the price of Bleam to $.99 for the She’s Geeky unconference which ends Sunday.  Then we will raise the price again to $1.99 – so get it now.

Bottom line is that with Bleam you can share your clipboard with other Bleamers.