Android App Review: QIK
“Live from your cell phone, it’s Saturday night!” or any other showtime. QIK (pronounced “quick”), for Android phones, lets you stream live video directly from your cell phone to the Internet and then automatically shares it on social networks and blogs. Does this really work?
The application downloaded and installed without a hitch on my HTC Hero. I registered for the service through my cell phone, but then went to a PC to do the configuration. (I’ve yet to connect with the joy of typing on a cell phone keyboard.)
The first field test involved annoying my daughter’s cat. Wisely, the moment the cat saw me pointing something at her, she attempted to retreat to a more defensive position. My first video ambush worked and can be found here .
You may annotate your videos with a title, comments and tags.
I used the Facebook button provided on the QIK site to share the video. It took about 30 seconds before I was able to type in the comment box for Facebook, but I can’t say that was the fault of qik.com. From your profile page you can set up automatic sharing to Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and a bunch of the usual suspects.
Hitting the explore link on the QIK site brings up a page of videos being uploaded live from around the world – India, Israel, Germany. Lots of people and things like babies, cats, and music concerts. You can also switch to a “recent” tab.
The app and the site are free for non-commercial use. The free account, however, doesn’t let you download your videos, so this is for sharing only. There is also no way to edit video once it’s there, although you can delete it. This seriously limits the value of the site, as your video is captive unless you pony up for the commercial account.
The commercial option allows you to use and embed QIK on commercial websites, blogs and applications, download the videos in MP4 format and get enhanced support. The introductory offer for his service is a hefty $49 per month or $499 per year. Some small market TV stations are using this for live news feeds.
The software works as advertised, is easy to use, but you won’t be able to download the video and create a DVD for grandma.
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