You know when you're on google or gmail and they put links that correspond to whatever your last email was about or what you are searching for? The links usually go to some out of the way news article that you are just amazed about. So today I was thoroughly intrigued by "A Cupcake on your iPhone"
Here's the article stolen from forbes.com
With hundreds of applications ranging from games to password-keepers to calorie counters, what's next for the iPhone?
One firm is betting on virtual cupcakes and Tamagotchi-like digital pets. Viximo, an 11-month-old Cambridge, Mass.-based start-up, has created four iPhone applications that revolve around digital goods--digitally produced images that people buy, exchange and display online.
When the applications debut in September or October, users will be able to exchange digital goods, such as a cupcake to celebrate a birthday or a teddy bear as a get-well gift. Senders will pay anywhere from a few cents to a few dollars for the goods.
Recipients will download the digital presents to their phones, possibly using links in text messages. "It's about connecting people and celebrating relationships…everything from flirting to gift-giving to playing," says Viximo Chief Executive Rob Frasca.
Such services are common on social networking sites like Facebook, where users send and store digital gifts on their online profiles. Lightspeed Venture Partners, a Silicon Valley venture capital firm, estimates that the business generates up to $15 million a year for Facebook. In fact, two Facebook applications, Birthday Calendar and Family Tree, currently use Viximo's designs.
But technical and billing complications have kept companies from promoting the practice to cellphone users. Apple's Apple (nasdaq:
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people ) App Store ecosystem, which uses iTunes to access customers' phones and bill them, takes care of those challenges.
As a result, Viximo is confident that consumers who have iPhones will pay up, citing the multi-million dollar market for ringtones, another kind of digital good. "Digital goods allow people to reach out in a new way on their phones," Frasca says. "Right now, they're limited to text messages and e-mail."
What's more, the iPhone, with its sophisticated touchscreen, crisp graphics and motion-sensing accelerometer, is the perfect showcase for digital goods, Frasca notes. Most digital goods resemble static computer icons. The iPhone, however, can allow users to shake a virtual 8-ball, "drink" a can of beer or launch a 15-second movie clip with a flick of their handsets.
The phone's geo-tracking function could also come into play. Retailers could identify iPhone owners that walk into certain stores and offer those consumers digital gifts. "The iPhone has a lot of horsepower…this is unparalleled stuff for digital goods," Frasca says.
It goes on and on with some shite about virtual pets or something so I cut it off after they stopped talking Cupcakes. But I am super excited for this new adventure in iPhoning.
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