O2 Litmus – a new community program for interacting with developers

O2 kicked off their new Litmus community and partner program at an intimate launch event at London’s O2 Arena in December 2008. NAVTEQ was invited to speak and Tony Hand and Mimmis Olsson gave an introduction to location-based services and how NN4D can support in application development (download presentation here>>). James Parton, the Head of the new Litmus program, was there to host and mingle with the guests. Ewan Spence from AllAboutSymbian gave an introductory presentation and lead the developer hacking competition. The best application of the day was to be featured in a forthcoming press launch of the Litmus developer community in the new year.

The VIP Lounge was buzzing with players from different parts of the value-chain, including well-known companies like EA Games, DeviceAnywhere (Mobile Complete) and Mob4Hire. The crowd of interested developers were sprawled around the lounge area in bean bags and armchairs with their laptops all connected – taking notes or responding to e-mails might have been 50/50 - taking a chance to learn more about O2’s new initiative. The attendees even got a guided tour of the O2 Arena.

You can view photos from the launch event on Flickr and videos on YouTube.

Developers may want to check out one of the other presentations from the day, held by Antony Ribot from Ribot, a design agency for mobile. He talked about the importance of design in the everyday life of a mobile developer and the resultant user experience from making programming decisions. Check it out here>>

You can also read a blog post from one of the developers attending the launch and hacking day, Adam Cohen-Rose of Kizoom here>>. He was the lucky winner of a Sony Ericsson C905 Cyber-shot™ phone which we raffled as a promotion of the NAVTEQ Global LBS Challenge (of which Sony Ericsson is a global sponsor).

So what is this Litmus thing?
O2 is the operator brand of Telefónica Europe, providing mobile, fixed and broadband services in the UK, Ireland, Germany, the Czech Republic and Slovakia. The new O2 Litmus program is a community project dedicated to finding and nurturing the best new mobile, wireless and internet-enabled applications and services – anything from network-aware applications to widgets for Vista and Mac.

The idea is that consumers can engage with the developers through community tools, review and rate their applications and suggest new features. Regular rewards will thank the most active and influential Litmus users that help to create the ideas that will define the mobile experience of the future. The best applications get the opportunity to be included in future O2-branded network and handset services.

For the programmers and developers among you, Litmus offers an unrivalled opportunity to bring your ideas for mobile applications and services to life, on whichever platform or technology you choose. You’ll get access to all the tools you need to create modern, cutting-edge applications: network APIs, handset toolkits and resources and even free advice on marketing and legal issues. Litmus can help you make money from your applications, get access to millions of customers across Telefónica/O2’s international networks, as well as O2 resources and testing venues such as The O2.

O2 Litmus should be especially interesting for developers working on location applications as O2 Litmus developers can make free location lookup’s using the O2 UK location API.

Learn more from the man himself - James Parton, Head of O2 Litmus – as he gives a webinar presentation on NN4D on Thursday March 5th, 2009 at 4:00pm GMT.
Log-in details here>>

Sign up and become part of the Litmus community. It’s free. http://www.o2litmus.co.uk/

NAVTEQ Network for Developers is here to support O2 Litmus in their new endeavors. http://www.nn4d.com/ – Your home for LBS development.