Would you rather spend $60,000 adding an app to the 100,000 plus in the Apple App Store or would you rather spend a more modest sum creating a branded "augmented reality world" on Nokia Point & Find?  read more »

If you see want to see what a new sofa and armchairs would look like in your lounge, an iPhone app from metaio enables you to do exactly that, by integrating 3D images of furniture into a picture of your home. The iLiving app let's you move the furniture around, change its size or rotate it, while shaking the iPhone will randomly shuffle the sofa and chairs within the picture.  read more »

Want to start browsing the world, as well as the web?  read more »

In the mobile industry, augmented reality has been a hot concept for less than a year, but some software start ups have been working for more than a decade on the thorny technical problems involved in combining animated 3D digital images with live video streams of the real world.  read more »

User-generated services are popular, not just because they help like-minded people find each other, but also because they strike a balance between fun and information. Scanning Twitter is both entertaining and informative, while photos on Facebook tell you what your friends have been doing and often make you laugh.  read more »

This month, many of my blog posts will be taking a close look at the emerging market for "augmented reality" services and apps that enable you to use your mobile handset to "browse" your immediate surroundings.  Augmented reality is an exciting concept for the mobile industry because it opens up the opportunity to provide search and advertising services that are markedly different, and in many ways superior, to those provided by browsing the Internet on a PC in a fixed location.     read more »