This friend-tracking software is still in alpha, but addresses a problem I’ve had.

I was with a group recently - we were attending the NYPD graduation at Madison Square Garden in New York City.  The place was a madhouse, and we got split up a few times.  We were separated on the order of a block or so at one point.  It’s times like these when it would be excellent to be able to look at your phone and know the location of everyone in your party.

Here are my needs if this is going to become something very useful and not just a social networking toy:

1. Battery Life - my phone gets about 8 hours as it stands now.  What will this do to it?  Constant data and GPS use will hurt.

2. Good mobile user interface - included in this is the need to be able to quickly restrict your region of interest to just the friends on your current trip, for example, and it must be more convenient to use than calling the person really quickly.

3. Seriously configurable privacy settings - you should be able to set times of public and private locations, etc.

4. Broadcast meeting points - in order to beat the convenience of a phone call - you have to be able to easily broadcast meeting points and messages to the group in a push fashion - like SMS.

I think this software could almost be considered a google map hack.  Will this be a problem if they get big and start to make money?

Update: This does have a messaging feature. I think the application has to be running though. What is needed is a way to push people into the app if they aren’t in it initially. Like sending an SMS to those who aren’t currently using the app and sending an in-app message to those who are.

Hey FlashLite developers. Did you read my last post?

We developed our ad system to be so easy to use, I actually wrote a FlashLite app to use it in about 10 minutes. You can download the swf and fla here.

Note that I took out our actual server address in the fla. You’ll get that when if you decide to sign up. But the swf should work on any Nokia S60 phone as long as you give it permission to access the network. Note that it’s using our demo server, not production, so there may be some periods of downtime.

Since our server sends back XML (or JSON if you want), the FlashLite XML parser does all the work for you. All you really have to do is to map a way for the user to click on the ad and then shell out to the web browser.

We did the shell to browser thing so it would be easy to integrate the full ad after the user clicks, but if you don’t want to leave your app, we support full-featured ads without leaving the application. You just have to do a bit more UI work for display.

Also know that the banner in this app is just an example format. We offer these ads at all sorts of resolutions, scaled serverside to save bandwidth and CPU. You can even go with an all text ad if you want. The integration options are endless.

I hope you like what we’re offering here. We’re a company of developers, so we want our API to be as developer-friendly as possible. Please feel free to comment and ask questions - and of course contact us if you want to sign up (for free!!) to use the service!

As the last post said, we’ve been deep in the trenches getting our new company and product off the ground.  Now we’re finally able to announce what it is.  But first, a little background…

In a previous life, we focused on making new and exciting networked mobile applications.  Our main product, The BEAST, was very ambitious and had huge potential to bring unique ways of interacting with content to mobile devices.  But one of the major problems with getting these new and exciting apps out there was creating a recurring payment model that a) would be practical for users and for a small company with no carrier or aggrigator ties, and b) not put users off, given that the vast minority would not be willing to pay monthly for a single specific phone application.  Many small and large mobile content publishers face this challenge to this day, and there are no ideal solutions available to them.

Our new company, AdHoc Mobile, addresses this challenge with mobile advertising.  Yes - mobile advertising isn’t new.  But the way we do it is.

There are a growing number of companies focusing on ads for mobile web pages.  This is becoming a huge market as anyone following the industry knows.  But no company that we know of allows the small and large application developer to include revenue-generating ads in a flexible, non-intrusive way.

We do.

Imagine being able to integrate ads of extremely customizable format and specifically target content into your application in a matter of minutes.  Pick a platform - MIDP1/2, BREW, FlashLite, Windows Mobile, whatever.  Integration of our ad system is easy on them all - and you set the rules for display.  Do you want a blurb of text in the top left corner of your app?  Go ahead.  A small graphical banner at the bottom?  Sure.  A full screen ad before you let the user start the game?  No problem.

What does the user get from this?  Believe us - we’re fans of new and exciting mobile apps, so we want this to drive adoption, not hinder it.  We’ve designed the system to allow content publishers to use non-intrusive ads in order to offer their applications for free or reduced prices.  No more hating yourself because you purchased a game without a preview and you hate it.  Play a free ad-supported version and buy the ad-free one only if you want.

The system doesn’t stop there.  We have a sophisticated targeting system to allow content publishers to send parameters that specifically target the ads to users.  We’re also working on even more targeting options including location-based services.

I know the debate is hot out there regarding ads on your phone.  But believe me - they do not have to be intrusive, and they can be the driver of tons of free new mobile content.  My personal goal is to see the small developer able to have a valid business model when they offer their new, never been done before, networked mobile app - and be able to publish it themselves with no need for aggrigators or carriers to sell it or institute a monthly charge. Yeah, it’s a dream. But an honest one!

Right now, developers and advertisers can sign up to use the system through the contact information on our web site.  Soon, we hope to launch a public web interface so that developers and advertisers can sign up as they wish.

Please check out our press release and send your comments and questions.  We really believe that this will benefit the mobile community, and if you have reservations or suggestions on how not to mess it up - we’re listening!  We want to empower people, not be a thorn in their sides.