Nokia Lifeblog.
When Lifeblog was first released in July last year, many people pointed out that despite the reference, it wasn’t quite a blogging tool. That changed pretty rapidly with the announcement of a Six Apart partnership that allowed publishing directly to the Typepad online weblogging service. With that, it became very apparent that the Lifeblog team always intended blog integration, and Nokia has since included the ATOM document format, meaning we’ll see other blog services join the fold soon.
Lifeblog is more than a blogging tool, and according to Christian Lindolm, Director of Multimedia Applications, Nokia Ventures Organization, it’s “a multimedia diary where time is the spine”. Christian points to three mega-trends that have contributed to the birth of Lifeblog, the digitalisation of memories, the increase in content due to digital media, and the evolution of the ubiquity of the camera. All converging neatly into the application. If you’re interested in remembering events, or sharing memories, then at some point you’ll use your camerphones features to take a snap shot or send text, photos or videos to family or friends, and if you do, what better way to have it stored via Lifeblog automatically.
I’ve had Lifeblog installed on my 7610 since it launched last year, and it’s been busily storing messages, photos and video without my interaction. It doesn’t need to be open to work, only requiring launching when you want to view its records. It’s quite an experience to look back on the conversations and images it’s stored, many I’d forgotten. With the PC application you can store the data for longer term prosperity, allowing you to free memory on the phone. Both applications provide a “horizontal-scroll navigation”, that displays everything in a timeline, making the view incredibly intuitive. You can add notes, tags, and create your favourite selections that’ll sync to the phone and PC.
Lifeblog, now at version 1.5, is available for download working on the Nokia 6260, Nokia 6630, Nokia 6670, and Nokia 7610 imaging phones (and soon on the new Nokia 6680, Nokia 6681 and Nokia 6682 according to Cognections Lifeblog) and a Windows PC. As a free trial the version will store 200 messages, images, and video clips, the full license costing 29.95 Euros. In my podcast with Christian, he can’t say what, but hints that we’ll see some other fantastic developments with the software, and with him heading the team, there is a great chance the application will become more groundbreaking.
If you’ve got one of the supported phone, give it a try.
For more on what Christian Lindholm had to say, have a listen to The second “Gadget Show” podcast.