Steve Jobs Approves Live iPhone-to-iPhone Video Streaming

Steve Jobs has intervened to approve Knocking Live Video, an iPhone-to-iPhone video streaming application.

Knocking Live Video creates an instant, device-to-device connection allowing one iPhone user to broadcast live streaming video to another iPhone handset.

"We are focused on phone-to-phone, not uploading to the Web," Pointy Head developer Brian Meehan explained to Ars. "Who really cares about fleeting moments other than friends and family seeing it as it happens? With Knocking people share what they are doing right now. Our testers have referred to knocking as a 'visual tweet,'" he said.


To make it work, the app relies on the use of a private API that enables capturing frames live from the iPhone's screen. "Our app uses a form of screen capture to create live moments which we have built a complex algorithm around,"

Due to its use of a private API, Knocking Live Video was rejected from the App Store. "When it was rejected, I decided not to give up and reach out directly to Steve Jobs via e-mail," Meehan told Ars. "I reached out to Apple to reconsider our application due to its potential to culturally change how people share live moments phone-to-phone."

Meehan "humbly" requested that Jobs himself demo the app and consider it for approval. He sent the e-mail to Jobs at 11pm on Saturday, November 21. At 8:30am the following Monday morning an Apple Executive contacted Meehan to discuss the app and its rejection. He revealed that the order to reverse the app's rejection came "directly from the top." Within three hours Knocking Live Video was available in the App Store.

“We cannot be more elated to bring live video broadcasting to the iPhone,” explains Jim Montalto co-founder of Knocking and Pointy Heads Software. “Knocking Live Video is truly a breakthrough in technology and social media. At the most fundamental level, Knocking Live Video lets users be in the moment with friends and family, regardless of distance.”


Existing video apps make the Internet both a boundary and enabler of “sharing.” Most require users to shoot video, render it small enough to be sent, then upload and transmit content using the Internet as another person waits for a lengthy download. Knocking Live Video eliminates that process, letting users broadcast moments directly from iPhone to iPhone, live. The app maximizes the potential of the iPhone camera, connecting any generation of iPhone, regardless of 3GS ‘video’ capabilities. Knocking treats the iPhone camera as a keyhole into another moment, letting users look through to another device, place and event.

All Knocking apps include a ‘Facebook Connect’ feature which automatically publishes stories on users’ ‘Knocks’ in real-time. Knocking Live Video is available for download in the social networking category of the Apple app store today, free for the first 50,000 users.

How it Works:
It’s simple. ‘Knock’, then share:
* Open Knocking Live Video Sharing
* Set up account
* Request and ‘Knock’ your friends
* Aim your camera

Read More [via Ars]