We haven’t covered live video streaming startup Bambuser until now, but the Swedish startup is rapidly shaping up to becoming a formidable contender to the likes of Qik, Flixwagon, and Kyte in the race to turn mobile phones into portable TV studios. Bambuser has just released an updated version of its site, which features a new embeddable player and more intuitive interface.
The site strongly resembles Qik, which we’ve covered extensively. Users can stream videos directly from their mobile phones to their profiles on Bambuser and can also syndicate their video elsewhere on the web using embeddable video players. Videos can be streamed over either Wi-Fi or 3G, and the software supports a range of phones running on Symbian and Windows Mobile platforms (you can see a full list here).
The site’s biggest differentiator is its ability to automatically pinpoint where users are streaming from using GPS, which it then presents in a Google Map alongside its videos. It’s not a major feature, and is one that Qik and its competitors could likely implement without much trouble (Update: Qik actually does have it). In the end, it will be the service with the best quality and ubiquity that will win out (so far Qik has the advantage in terms of compatibility – it already supports BlackBerry, which Bambuser doesn’t).
There may also be another entry into this space soon: we’ve received leaked footage of a mobile version of Ustream, a live video streaming site that until now has not supported mobile devices.
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