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Mobile IM tells you where your buddies are, says Palringo

Kerry Ritz is in Soho, London. His colleague Ross is in Newcastle. So there's not much reason to consider ringing Ross, to ask if he fancies a quick drink after work... but then Kerry knew that anyway from the display on his phone.

He doesn't need to ring, because his Instant Messaging system told him where Ross was; it also told him Guy was ten minutes away; so he calls Guy.

This new IM location system knows where all your IM buddies are. And it will tell you if anybody of them is nearby. Unless, of course, they're hiding (but that's OK, they can, too).

The new version of Palringo works on your Windows PC and a Windows Mobile phone. Within two weeks (says Kerry, CEO of Palringo) it will be on Sybian, and iPhone mobiles. And by end November, it will also be on Blackberry "and we're working on Android already," he told NewsWireless today.

The bare details (see the press release) simply reveal that the company "has added location" to its IM. "But it's not just location in the normal sense; we have made it proximity," says Ritz. We won't just show you where you are, but we'll show you how far away your buddies are.

Palringo is a pretty neat IM system, even if it isn't more than a spec on the map of messaging compared with the giants like Skype and Yahoo and MSN and Live! - but that's OK, because it piggy-backs off them.

To play, you download the application into your WinMo smartphone, and - most important! - give it permission to reveal your whereabouts to your contacts.

It fires up, looks for radios, and works out where you are. If you have a WiFi phone, it can be pretty darned accurate; and if you also have GPS, it will spot you pretty quickly. And then it tells you how near your nearest buddy is. At the same time, it tells all your contacts where you are.

"Yes, it's accurate enough to find someone to have coffee with in five minutes," insists Ritz, "even if you don't have any WiFi or GPS. We can work it out; our software 'learns' the neighbourhood."

It's especially good at learning the neighbourhood if there are lots of people around with Palringo software. Each Palringo user keeps the main location server informed as it moves around, as the signal strength rises and falls; and the software quickly learns the patterns (if cell A is rising and Cell B is also rising, then the user is moving this way...) and if there are lots of WiFi cells around then it learns it even better.

The trick isn't just that it can see which WiFi cell you're near to if you have WiFi yourself. It's better than that, says Ritz. "We track GSM users more accurately when they have WiFi. But once our software has built up a picture of how GSM signals change, it can enhance that picture with the WiFi data. Then, when a non-WiFi phone does the same pattern of signal changes, we know where it is by comparing it."

Cost* is the cost of data. "We use very little data, but it has to come out of your mobile data plan. Other than that, it's a free download."

People have asked if it's intrusive, says Ritz. "It isn't. You have to opt in. Even downloading it isn't enough to start revealing your location. And you can disable individuals you want to block (if you don't want your boss to know you're in his village, you can hide that) or you can mark yourself 'offline' like you can with any IM."

The download is free from www.palringo.com and there will be some (secret) demos at this week's Sybian Smartphone show in Earls Court, London, ahead of the launch for Sybian platform next month.

* Cost
According to Palringo, the data cost is actually cheaper than texting; so stop using SMS to send they say:

Just by giving up their text-messaging plans users can save $20 or more per month—and they won't even need to pay extra for text, video or picture messaging. Users do need a data plan from their carrier, but by comparison, Palringo rich messaging takes up very small amounts of data, minimizing costs.

For example, one megabyte [1MB] is sufficient for Palringo to send or receive:

around 100,000 words by text;
up to 15 minutes of vocal instant messages;
or about 32 picture messages using a typical cameraphone.

according to official figures