Qik has made a name for themselves as the premier live video-streaming service that allows mobile phone users around the world to stream their lives to the web in near real-time. Qik makes it easy to share a live concert, your kid’s first steps or your new-found recipe for pineapple bundt cake with friends and family. And, now that Qik has been approved to enter the iPhone AppStore, iPhone users can get in on the fun. There’s just one catch, that whole “live video streaming” feature that helped propel Qik to stardom has been nixed from the iPhone app. The currently available version of the Qik iPhone app only allows users to upload pre-recorded video from the iPhone 3GS. To make things worse, it only works over WiFi networks.
Last we heard, Qik was working on bringing live video streaming to the iPhone – which would have made sense. Alas, Apple’s policies have struck once again. Qik isn’t the first application to come through Apple’s AppStore approval process neutered beyond recognition. Sling Media’s SlingPlayer Mobile for iPhone was restricted to WiFi networks. Ninjawords had to censor itself of crude language. Other apps, like Newber, were never approved (no reason was ever given). At this point, it’s really not that much of a surprise that the current version of the Qik iPhone app has been restricted to uploading pre-recorded videos over WiFi networks.
On the upside, the Qik iPhone app can automatically start uploading videos to Qik as soon as you’ve finished recording. Videos can be recorded in portrait or landscape orientations and location data is integrated into the videos. That auto-upload feature could get you in trouble, so use it wisely.
Qik says they’ve submitted a new version of the app that would allow uploading over 3G networks. We’ll keep our fingers crossed for Apple to approve this 3G version. As for live-streaming from the iPhone 3G or iPhone 3GS? Don’t hold your breath. AT&T would probably never stand for that. Instead, we’d recommend jailbreaking your iPhone and downloading Qik from Cydia.
[Via: Qik]