Hi everybody, I just wanted to let you know that last week CounterPath expanded it’s Bria offering on the iPad.  I’ve been using this since the summer and it’s brilliant.  I’m able to make calls via my iPad when my phone doesn’t have any service but my iPad is picking up wifi.  In this new version of Bria CounterPath included video calling.  It may not sound like much but video chat without a computer is a big step.  If you have an iPad and use VOIP like Phone.com I suggest spending the money, yes it’s a paid app and I did pay for it.  It’s well worth the money.

By the way, this is a great way for small businesses to use Phone.com without having to buy a desktop phone, just run your inbound and outbound calls through Bria.

Pepcom also known as Mobile Focus was held Monday before CES opened.  It was the biggest I’ve ever seen it and I was a bit overwhelmed by the magnitude of it.  It was like a little trade show unto itself.  Anyways, I was able to snag Vlingo’s CEO Dave Grannan for a quick video.  Come to find out they’re making Vlingo for TV’s.  And what I heard blew me away.  I can’t write most of it just yet but Vlingo is doing well, very well.

I was also able to chat with Vimeo’s crack web developer Joe Schmitt who showed off their new video editor for the iPad.  I can’t tell you how excited I am about this and it might just make it possible for me to bring only my iPad to trade shows now.  Take a look at what Joe had to say.

Here’s a quick unedited unboxing of the BlackBerry Bold 9900 by AT&T.  It’s rough, I didn’t get a chance to edit it but enjoy my Spielberg level video.

I have to say, I know a lot of people are down on BlackBerry these days but this is a great device.  It’s slick, responsive and incredible to look at.  The battery lasts for at least 2 days and the keyboard is a pleasure to use.  I’m truly suprised at the level of responsiveness of the touchscreen as well.  If you’re traveling internationally I highly suggest using a BlackBerry to keep your data consumption down to a minimum.

My only single gripe at this point is that Google and BB have not yet been able to get the read/unread status of your email in order.  No matter what I do I can’t get the bloody email to sync its status.

Anyways, if you’re considering getting a BlackBerry I recommend this one.  Go get it.

Josh Brooks “The Boss” at Postcard On The Run talks about his app that takes the pictures on your phone and turns them into physical postcards and mails them for you.  I’ve been infatuated with this idea for years and think it’s absolutely ingenious.  I have so many family members that can’t, won’t or don’t use the web and emailing them pictures is useless (if they even have an email address).  So Postcard On The Run fills the huge gap.  They have an app for Android and iOS devices (iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch) that will take your pictures and turn them into a postcard, allow you to write a note by typing or with your finger, to make it more personal.  You can also include a map of where the picture was taken.

Josh also has some other amazing features that I can’t talk about yet but will be built in soon that will make it an even better app.  I’m so impressed and want to wish Josh the best of luck.

Strolling around Mobile World Congress back in February, yes I’m very late posting, I stopped by the Visa booth to see what they had going on in the way of NFC (Near Field Communication).  I was offered a private briefing with with Bill Gajda the head of mobile banking for Visa, I jumped at the chance to say the least.

I asked Bill to talk to me about anything he wanted, not just the normal fluff.  So we started chatting about some of Visa’s current goings on and a little about the future.  Bill envisions a world where our phones work as our credit cards, no surprise there, right.  But he went on to explain the level of security and procedures that they’re planning on using and they currently use.  For example when you plan on paying for a product and you have to activate the application on your phone, not just touch it to the pay terminal.  Once the app is active you still have to press a button to authorize the transaction and then the app goes dark.  Meaning it can’t be used for another transaction until activated again.  This all means that someone can’t just bump into you while you’re walking in the airport and skim your credit card information off your card.  And yes this has happened to me twice now.

I can currently go to Chase Bank and get a credit card from them that has an NFC chip in it.  But according to Bill in the near future you will (hopefully) be able to get a phone that has an NFC radio/chip built in and be able to download the Chase (for example) app.  I imagine we might start off with a white labeled Visa app, we’ll just have to wait and see.

I’m personally very excited about this technology and hope we can start using it soon.  I just don’t know how fast it will catch on because of the lack of support by companies with the point of sale machines.  They will have to get all new machines in many cases and this is quite costly.  On the other hand if Visa wanted to front the money and come out looking like a forward thinking company it might just be able to pull this all off and become the leader in NFC for credit card transactions.

UPDATE: Oddly enough Visa has stopped supporting their mobile app as of September 23rd.

Tuesday was a rough day in our family but it made me recognize a need for a service that may or may not exist. I don’t want to go into details but we’re very glad that my father in law is home safe and we’re grateful to a very thoughtful gas station attendant and Anaheim Police Officer.

Here’s what I NEED, a way to find someone in this case my father in law at a moments notice. He almost always takes his cell phone with him when he leaves the house. But he doesn’t have an iPhone with Find My iPhone he has a dumb phone, where is the equivalent app for dumb phones?  Maybe a basic Java app with no mobile interface except to download and activate.  Everything else would be online, or even better for me a mobile app that I could use on my iPhone.

There are thumb drive size fobs that have a GPS built in but I haven’t seen an app for a dumb phone.  I know this isn’t an isolated incident and could easily happen again.  I also know this happens every day in every country, an elderly parent goes out and scares the bejesus (sp) out of the rest of the family when they can’t find them and they don’t answer their cell phone.

I would pay big money for something that would allow my wife to look on her iPhone and within a few seconds know where her father is and be able to tell her Mom and relieve the family of the stress of not knowing.  I’d even like the dumb phone app to start when the phone turns on and have it run like an OS application so it never shuts off.

I need this ASAP.  I could probably find someone who’d fund it if you can build it.  Just a ultra basic app that will allow me to  find where the phone is but the key is it must work on dumb phones, like my father in laws Nokia 6555.  There are all kinds of other features to build into it like SMSing the location to others, making the phone beep to find it in the couch cushions or display a message on the screen asking anyone who finds it to call a number.  But for right now I just want to see where the phone is on a map.

Hours before I was flying home from Israel recently Dvir Reznik had just flown back to Israel from Amsterdam I believe and I was anxious to meet up with him.  He is the head of marketing at Onavo, it’s one of the most likely companies I see succeeding in the next 12 months.

Onavo is solving a huge problem for people with smart phones, data consumption.  There are limits on almost every plan you can get here in the US and Onavo compresses the data that’s being used, so 100mb may only consume 40-60mb over your phone.  Don’t ask me how they do it, I would have to turn you over to the Mossad if you found out.  But in all seriousness you should watch this video on your computer while you’re downloading Onavo on your iPhone, 3G iPad or Android device.  It has kept me from going over my allotment of data every month since I’ve installed it.  Keep in mind this is great for when your traveling to keep your roaming bill down as well as when you’re at home and don’t want overages.

Back in the early summer somewhere near the beggining of June I was in San Diego for the Uplinq conference put on by Qualcomm.  I was introduced to Craig Braun and thought the company he works for Shorthand Mobile has something very interesting going on.  They are brining data usage to people that may not usually be able to afford it utilizing sms in a very unique manner.  Watch the video and I think you’ll understand.

Samuel Keret the VP of Biz Dev at Waze (one of my personal favorite companies in the mobile space) gives us a few minutes.  Thank you to Ewan MacLeod of Mobile Industry Review for letting me film during his interview.

Waze has been doing some amazing things for a while now and from the inside stuff that I hear about them, it’s only getting better.  My source, not Samuel, was going over some numbers and it’s darn impressive.

I got to meet Francois Quereuil from Aspera at CES and he explained to me his company allows the streaming and transfer of video up to 100 times faster then it standard speeds. So if it usually takes 100 minutes to download a video it should only take 1 minute using Aspera. Check out his video and tell me what you think.