This is the LightPole blog, where you’ll find all the latest news, conversation, tips and tricks about our mobile discovery software for your phone.
As seen in Forbes: Ultimate Showdown: Microsoft Vs. Google June 2, 2008
As a start-up focused on delivering services to the next generation mobile Internet devices, we are constantly amazed at the failure of Microsoft to repeat its Windows and Office success in the mobile world. And the problem is just that: Microsoft has a history of seeing all opportunities within the narrow definition of its existing world and past wins. Repeatedly they have seen new devices, for example, as simply "little PCs." This has led to a long litany of disappointments in handhelds that will repeat unless a new approach is realized.
With the release of v1.2 of LightPole, you can now not only look for interesting information around were you are or where you want to be but participate in developing channels of content and contribute points of interest to content communities. We have also integrated LightPole with Yahoo! Fire Eagle.
So what is this all about?
Company adds well-known bloggers to content partner network
Burlingame, CA — May 13, 2008 — In conjunction with O’Reilly’s Where 2.0 Conference, LightPole, Inc., a mobile application service provider focused on the “Long Tail” publishing market, today announced a partnership with Six Apart, the world’s leading blogging software and services company. LightPole, working with Six Apart Services, co-developed a plug-in, which allows Movable Type bloggers to geo-tag their entries, add and manage related points of interest (POIs) and publish feeds that can be used to create LightPole channels – seamlessly delivering content to their readers’ mobile phones. The Geo-Type Plug-In for Movable Type is available immediately from plugins.movabletype.org.
LightPole, Inc.
May 13, 2008
This plugin allows you to associate locations with blog entries using Google Maps. Each blog entry can have a location (latitude, longitude), and a map can be shown for the location. Also, a map can be shown which displays all of the locations for the entire blog. Locations can be found using addresses or by scrolling the map, so you do not need to find or lookup the coordinates for your location like many other plugins force you to do.
The plugin also allows for these blog entries to be published to mobile devices using the LightPole Publishing System.
Download the plugin click here.
Mobile Posting and My Channels Features Among Other New LightPole Enhancements
San Francisco — April 23, 2008 — LightPole, Inc., a mobile application service provider focused on the “Long Tail” publishing market, today announced integration with Yahoo! Fire Eagle, a personal location service platform. LightPole also added the Mobile Posting and My Channels features to its flagship release - two new capabilities that provide users with a more interactive and content-rich experience from their mobile device, no matter where they are or what they’re doing. The latest enhancements can be trialed at beta.lightpole.net.
LightPole has just launched the Geo-Wikipedia channel that presents over 1.2 Million geo-tagged Wikipedia entries for your mobile phone as a LightPole Geo-Browser channel.
San Francisco — March 18, 2008 — LightPole, Inc., a mobile application service provider focused on the “Long Tail” publishing market, today announced availability of the LightPole Publishing System, a complete solution that enables publishers, bloggers and other content providers to distribute content to mobile devices, and engage those users in two-way communication.
We are pleased to announce the availability of our second major release. This release includes many enhancements and fixes, primarily aimed at improving the usability and performance of the system in general, and in increasing the flexibility to support an increasingly diverse and interesting set of publishing partners.
A major enhancement in this release is our first international support. With 1.1 we now support European phone numbers and maps. Several of our existing channels currently have rich support across Europe already — try locating a good watering hole with MappyHour!
We have also made numerous improvements to our website. If you have not logged into your web account, please try it and look at our other available channels. Simply use your phone and PIN as your login to see your personal LightPole pages (Click here if you have forgotten your PIN).
Updating your application
If you have already updated your phone client, run the LightPole application and it should automatically inform you that an update is available and you if you would like to update the application. Follow the prompts and the LightPole application will guide you through the process.
We have just launched our location aware Mobile Discovery publishing system and consumer focused mobile application. The LightPole service makes publishing geo-contextual content as easy as blogging. Through LightPole, publishers can reach mobile users, leveraging the publishing tools already in place. No advanced programming or heavy IT investments are required. Distribution can be supported by ads, subscriptions, transactions, or other models. Mobile phone users can select channels of geo-contextual content, post comments and annotations, and record their own Points of Interest.
The LightPole service already supports hundreds of models of mobile phones, including Blackberry, Motorola, Nokia, and most phones from leading carries such as AT&T, Sprint/Nextel and T-Mobile as well as the Blackberry on Verizon. LightPole continues to add support for new phones all the time.
Consumers can download the LightPole mobile browser from LightPole's content partners' sites: MappyHour (a community driven site of over 43,000 Happy Hour spots around the world) or HotSpotr (a community driven site with over 6000 entries showing which cafes have free WiFi ) or sign up for the private beta at www.lightpole.net.
We also published a Yelp! mobile channel which allows users to search and view Yelp! reviews with the LightPole mobile browser.