Blippar is an augmented reality mobile app for iOS and Android devices (Windows on the way).

Upon opening the app and holding the phone up to visual ‘markers’, traditional print media, advertising and real-world objects can be recognised and instantly jump to life with exclusive content and interactive opportunities. Users can literally ‘pull’ information, entertainment, offers and augmented reality 3D experiences out of the world around them, simply by holding their phone up to a marker. No clicks, no delays – just instant gratification.

For instance, an artist could have links to their website, social pages, and streaming music come up if the user points Blippar at their CD cover. Or a food brand could have a recipe book appear that showcases all the different uses for the ingredient.

A differentiator for Blippar against other AR apps is that it caches all live campaigns into the app as soon as the person open it for the first time. This way, users can still experience AR without a data connection - perfect for subway campaigns. Beyond that, it doesn’t require additional downloads or app updates to run each campaign. It simply refreshes the content each time you open the app.

Blippar’s clients include Heinz, Wrigley’s, Kit Kat, Asos, and many more. The majority of its campaigns have been in UK where its headquartered, however it is currently ramping up its sales efforts in the US.

For more information, visit Blippar.com.

Last night I went out to The Knitting Factory in Brooklyn to check out the NYC Music Demo night. Great event, here are the companies that demoed:

• Cantora Labs: Music+Tech incubator that allows technologists to focus on the tech by providing the business strategy and music industry contacts. They’re investing in about 8 startups over the next 2 years ($25-100k each) and will be providing space for all of the companies to work in. The founders signed and launched MGMT’s first album, and are now working with their first startup implementing a new tech solution for Lady Gaga’s upcoming tour.
• PlayMySong: Recently featured on TechCrunch, PlayMySong is a free app for iPhone and Android that allows users to cue songs in participating bars and venues. Users can view all the songs in the venue’s library and choose which they want to play. Venues can limit repeats and requests per person.
• TuneSat: TuneSat’s unique audio fingerprint technology monitors hundreds of TV channels and millions of websites around the world, helping rights holders collect millions of dollars that would otherwise have been lost. They can detect the audio even when its shrouded by announcers, crowdnoise, and more. It also captures the entire audio recording for proof of when the song was used.
• Tomahawk: Tomahawk is an open-source music player that connects all of your accounts into one player - including your hard drive music, streaming accounts, and more. If someone shared a link from a service you don’t use, Tomahawk matches the metadata from the link and find the song on another service that you do use eliminating the barrier to listen and discover new music. It does this in addition to all the standard features of other music players like iTunes.
• Blank On Blank: Not a music startup, but a cool guest demo. Blank on Blank gathers old American interviews that have never been heard before from famous figures like Martin Scorsese. It works with journalists and other media outlets to convert and edit tape and digital recordings that were never used into timeless content - ultimately reviving content that would have previously never been used.
• Grooveshark: A free music streaming and playlist service, Grooveshark has over 40 million active users that use their service to discover and share music with their share. Unlike other services, Grooveshark allows anyone to upload their tunes to share making it a great distribution outlet for unsigned and other artists.

In their words:

House Party makes it easy to have a party in your own home and get exclusive access to awesome products for you and your friends. We provide the fun, you provide food, your friends and feedback and promise to have an amazing time.

Our parties are sponsored by the brands you love. By hosting, you and your guests get to try their products and receive an incredible Party Pack chock full of goodies! You don’t pay anything or sell anything. It’s a no-pressure party. Just tell us what you and your guests think. 

House Party collects location, social, income, interest, family, and other data points to ensure the host is a good fit for the brand.

Brands on board at present include Playstation, HGTV, Huggies, Johnsonville, Dole, Courvoisier, and more.

To learn more, go to HouseParty.com.

Video is on the rise - big time. Youtube dominates the market, however even with its re-design it’s pretty poor at discovery. Social networks spark virality, however offer a terrible viewing experience due to all the non-video clutter.

Video curation startups VHX and Shelby.tv are out to solve these problems, and will be something more and more people spend time with in the near future.

Why?

1. Lean-Back: Video curation tools stream videos back-to-back with no breaks similar to how TV delivers content. Users simply need to select a channel, then sit back, relax, and consume. It increase time of engagement, and can be considered a substitute for television.
2. Relevance: Whether sites curate by social, interest, or location graph info, they offer much greater relevance than TV. Also, content is short-form, which is a fan favorite amongst Gen Y.
3. Any Screen - Although cable programming is doing a better job of offering content on any screen, its still expensive and nowhere as easy as just pushing play on VHX or Shelby. Shelby has iPhone and iPad apps, can connect to Apple TV, and work on your computer. That’s huge.

Although neither offer formal ad opportunities at present, they’ll ultimately be able to increase views, interaction, and virality as both platforms have built social into the core of their products.

i strongly encourage everyone to play around w/ both products and see what you think. Shelby’s strength is its social curation and any screen compatibility, allowing users to pull videos from their Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr feeds.

In addition to social, VHX offers a list of non-social channel including Boing Boing, Buzzfeed, and more. It also allows users to create and embed playlists making it a great solution for blog content.

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Also, if you’re looking for music videos, the founder of VHX hacked together a Pandora for music videos called Music Video Genome. They don’t promote it, so it’ll be our little secret, okay?

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In conclusion, video curation is the future of content and will continue to eat up market share of people’s online viewing time in the coming years. These two players are ahead of the curve and are definitely something to keep an eye on.