Featured Mashup: iBloks Video Messenger
Where? http://www.ibloks.com/
Developer: iBloks, Inc.

The Site

Founded by entertainment and software industry innovators, iBloks began in 2005 with a vision for social innovation and personalized self-expression. The company’s latest offering, iBloks Video Messenger, enables site visitors to watch and share videos while logged into Microsoft® Windows Live Messenger, a component of the Windows Live™ network of Internet services. iBloks Video Messenger is designed to connect online video enthusiasts and instant messenger customers with an integrated 3D viewing and communication offering. Site visitors can view videos and share comments with each other in real time, eliminating the delay of sharing and viewing when done through email or when posted onto social network sites. Viewers can also post their multimedia experiences as a “widget” on their web pages, blogs or social network pages. The video application and user interface was developed using another Windows Live Services component, the Microsoft Silverlight™ multimedia development platform.

Why the Windows Live Platform?

Silverlight and Windows Live Messenger provide an ideal application platform for iBloks Video Messenger, according to Julia Miller, founder and CEO of iBloks. “Our vision is to combine multimedia consumption with viewer interactivity,” says Miller, an IT and business veteran who held sales/marketing and general management positions at SegaNet and Xbox Live and executive positions at Apple, Microsoft, Pepsi and Citibank. “Silverlight provides an extremely high-quality video experience, and Windows Live Messenger gives us the IM component, along with a huge established user base.”

Miller cites several further advantages of Windows Live Services:

• Live Services provides a proven, scalable platform that increases iBloks’ reach to over 300 million Windows Live Messenger users around the world.
• Modular web services can be deployed with re-usable code, enabling fast development cycles: the iBloks Video Messenger was created in under 60 days by leveraging previous work.
• Clear, easy to use API’s enable quick application development with minimal additional investment.
• Strong third-party Microsoft Partner developer network and online support.
• Ad-free services provide a quality environment for targeted advertising.

Programming Environment

The iBloks Video Messenger application was developed with Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 and Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF), using a combination of C#, JavaScript, and other programming languages.

Under the Hood

The iBloks Video Messenger can be deployed throughout the web as a widget. This enables anyone to take advantage of the iBloks technology without writing any code. Simply paste this HTML code into the page:

<iframe width="632" height="655" frameborder="0" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0" scrolling="no"
src="http://www.ibloks.com/services/videomessenger/" name="iBloks - Live In 3D" title="iBloks - Live In 3D">

<!-- Alternate content for non-supporting browsers -->

Your browser is not able to render this page properly.
<a href="http://www.ibloks.com/services/videomessenger/">Click here to continue.</a>

</iframe>