Consumer mobile software news: Oct. 16 - Nov. 17, 2006

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Kinoma has upgraded its media player and producer for Treo smartphones and Palm Powered handhelds running Palm OS 5. Kinoma Player 4 EX provides playback of internet digital media including Windows Media 9, Flash Video1, MPEG-4, 3GPP, MP3, and RTSP (Real Time Streaming Protocol).

Kinoma Player 4 EX sports a sleek new all-black user interface. On Treos, Kinoma Player 4 EX can be operated with one thumb, making it faster than ever to operate. While viewing video and photos, Kinoma Player 4 EX provides real-time pan and zoom - even while playing - providing a closer look at the content. Kinoma Player 4 EX works together with the Blazer 4.5 web browser on Treos, so selecting a supported link on a web page launches Kinoma Player 4 EX to play the media. The software can bookmark any playing stream, allowing users to build a collection of their favorite media links - and for easy sharing, bookmarks can be beamed to another device. Kinoma Player 4 EX still supports playback of audio, video, and photos from internal memory or a memory card.

Another new addition to Kinoma Player 4 EX is the Kinoma Media Guide, a catalog of hundreds of feeds linking to thousands of free streams around the internet. The content in the guide is carefully selected to ensure compatibility with Kinoma Player 4 EX on most major mobile networks, says Kinoma.

Kinoma Player 4 EX and Kinoma Producer 4 can be purchased at kinoma.com for $24.99 and $29.99, respectively. A free trial edition of Kinoma Producer 4 is available for download with registration. For more information about Kinoma, see the company's summary page on MobileVillage.

Kinoma also introduced Kinoma Producer 4, the desktop companion to Kinoma Player 4 EX. The software supports dozens of devices, including most Palm handhelds, Treo smartphones, Sony PSP, and the Apple video iPod. Kinoma Producer 4 includes support for Windows Media 9 output for compatibility with Windows Mobile devices including the Treo 700w.4. On Mac OS X, Kinoma Player 4 EX is delivered as a Universal Binary providing optimal performance on both Intel and PowerPC based Macintosh computers.

Orb Networks announced that its free MyCasting service can now stream Internet videos from YouTube, Google, Guba and DailyMotion to mobile devices. To start MyCasting, the user downloads the Orb software to an always-on Windows PC. The software allows users to stream the site's RSS feed from their home computer to any Web-enable mobile device with a browser. Orb automatically transcodes the video stream into the appropriate media format, bitrate, and screen resolution. The Orb MyCasting service and the Internet Video Mobile "OrbThis" plug-in are available for free download at orb.com.

PixSense recently launched its new software that allows users to manage rich media created on their phone, directly from the handset. The application uses patent-pending compression technology to simplify the process of managing and sending media files created with camera phones – photos, videos, audio and text. PixSense is available for download at http://pixsense.com.