Say what you like about CNN, but when a major cable news network starts using a single service as the “real-time” voice of opinion, I think its really says something about not merely “just-in-time” reporting, but opinion and news as it happens — rightly or wrongly.

So, if Twitter has finally hit it big time, it behooves me to ask the question “who will be the next Twitter?”  I think there are a number of contenders, but for the purposes of just-in-time video streaming from your phone, I think there’s no one else in the space except for Qik.

Check out this video on Qik of Mumbai trying to recover from the terrorist attacks one day later:

I may be wrong, but Seesmic, Phreadz, 12Seconds, Justin.tv are all great alternatives if you happen to be near a webcam.  Qik is the only application that runs on your mobile phone to not just record video — but stream it via 3G connection, so there’s a live recording AND watching component on Qik.com.  

For my money, Qik’s the next contender to the Twitter crown, and is the next obvious step in bringing real-time communication in the form of real-time streaming video, to the masses.  And it doesn’t even need to be during times of crisis, although I suspect that its probably where it will earn its spurs.  For young parents (such as myself), using Qik is so deliriously awesome it is hard to describe how “insanely” great it is to capture moments, and then be able to share them online pretty much instantly.

Check out this in-the-moment video when I just realized that my son had drawn his first “smiley” face.  He’s two and two months, so being able to draw a circle, a line and three dots in a co-ordinated manner was pretty awesome:

While I am very glad the boffins behind Qik are expanding beyond the iPhone to other wireless phones that support 3G, its obvious that a big stumbling block with uptake of the service is the necessary wireless plans that accompany it.  You need a 3G plan.  You also need a phone.  And even though the iPhone (for example) has had great penetration in the US and Canada, it hasn’t all over the world (India particularly) for a variety of reasons, you also need to jailbreak it, which is not for the faint of heart.  That video above from Qik live from Mumbai is the only video I can find on Qik so far, for example

With pimping by Kevin Rose and Leo Laporte, its obvious that its got its fans amongst the early adopter elite (and lesser fans, such as myself).  The interesting thing to watch is how its going to cross the proverbial chasm.  It may come in time, as prices and penetration both change in Qik’s favor.  As a fan myself, I do hope that it survives the recession long enough for Qik to take advantage of both factors, and perhaps one day, to hit CNN as well. :)

post script: Kyte.tv mobile producer also looks pretty rockin, and supports a ton of Nokia brands.  But not the iPhone so far.

I’m happy to admit that I’m in the tank for the iPhone.  Its not a perfect device, but it is a magnificently close enough to perfect that I don’t really care.  

In no specific order, however, are the three most delicious things I’ve experienced (perhaps you have your own).

1. live video streaming: To this, of course, I am referring to Qik.  Perhaps there are other applications that do this for the iPhone, and perhaps, you can use this on other devices.  But being able to shoot video on the fly — and stream it to a webserver — is almost magical.   Much like with the camera on the iPhone, once you get into the habit of using it, you find yourself shooting almost anything.  And with a young child, this is, actually a very good thing.  My family has a long history of capturing things on film / video (perhaps it is bred into our Asian DNA), and I never regret the stuff I do capture of my son, with my parents, with my wife, or even with his friends doing every day things.  With video, I’m capturing small details and nuances as he’s growing up, and it is so easy.  You whip out the iPhone. You press a button.  And away you go.

*caveat: you have to jailbreak your phone to use Qik —  I don’t know how long its coming to the apps store soon. 

2. The earbuds:  I didn’t realize this at the time, but the earbuds that come with the iPhone not only function as a receiving device for your phone (duh), or, are clickable so that you can stop music at any time(double duh), but are ALSO clickable so that you can *advance* a song, or *go back* a song.  By double-clicking the little doo-hicky, you can advance, and by triple-clicking, you go back.  What’s amazing, is that by incorporating these actions into this small device that’s on the line to your ears, it makes the actual device small.  Its not this giant thumb-sized thing you have to look at with three separate buttons.  Its this sleek little thing that you can just click without looking at it.  When you’re walking around on the subway, holding a huge bag of medical stuff in a heavy jacket, its nice to just click the damn thing rather than fumbling around for a control. 

3. a tethering device:  easily the most sublime thing about my experience that I know is not quite unique to the iPhone — and yet, in Canada, there are only a few devices that work with the 3G network.  Anyway, a few weeks ago, I did jailbreak my iPhone with the aim to use a service called PDA Net, which is a piece of software available for the Treo as well, although for the iPhone its free.  I got it working with minimum fuss, so let me reassure my American / AT&T using friends: if / when your data plan supports using your iPhone as a tethering device so that you can use it as a wireless modem for your laptop to surf the web … it is almost magical.  The downside is that it drains the iPhone’s battery, which is to be expected.  But as my laptop has a negigible battery I’m usually next to a power socket anyway.   Bottom line: setting it up AND using it is a breeze.  You literally just press a button and you’re off to the races.  I get about 3Mbps down and 300kbps up, which is imminently usable for light browsing, video watching, and blogging.  I’m so happy Rogers (the local wireless company that I have the iPhone with) allows tethering as part of their data plan.  Quite frankly I was having a hard time using 6 gigs anyway, and it allows — as you can imagine — to surf anywhere you get a 3G connection, freeing you from Wi-Fi nodess.

BONUS: Yes, Box.net got some coverage about cloud access via the iPhone, but what’s also cool is using dropbox via your iPhone.  Its now open to the public, and they’ve done a great job creating an optimized iPhone interface via the web.  You can browse all your files, and in a pinch, download them for viewing, watching, or listening.  Smooth.

Now, two of the three things require you to jailbreak your iPhone.  Boo.  Happily this is a pretty painless procedure.  Also, they’re not specifically unique to the iPhone as well.  Fine.  But on the iPhone I am happy to report that they’re easy to set up, and otherwise transformative in the way that you use this device, and the way you interact with new media … and well, life.