Made-for-cell-phone videos star at trade show

By BRUCE MEYERSON

Associated Press

NEW ORLEANS - With names like Sean ``P. Diddy`` Combs, Paris Hilton and R2-D2 headlining, you`d be forgiven if you didn`t recognize this week`s conference here as the cell phone industry`s annual trade show. ADVERTISEMENT

Of course there are corporate types attending this CTIA Wireless 2005 expo as well, including the CEO of Eastman Kodak Co., a legendary company which, by the way, sees a big opportunity in printing photos from the digital cameras now built into so many cell phones.

With more than 175 million Americans toting around cell phones these days, and more than a billion worldwide, there`s a gold rush on to identify and deliver the next blockbuster to the wireless market.

After all, a once silly-sounding idea known as ringtones -- who in their right minds would spend a buck or two to buy a snippet of music to replace the ringer on their phones? -- has quickly developed into a multibillion-dollar industry.

``Everyone wants to invent the next ringtones,`` said Sanford Squires of Nextcode Corp., a company in Concord, Mass., which develops technology to read bar codes using a cell phone camera.

That`s why Verizon Wireless and 20th Century Fox are betting on Paris Hilton, the hotel heiress who seems to stumble into public embarrassment with uncanny regularity. They`re launching a ``made-for-cellular`` series of one-minute videos based on The Simple Life: Interns, the Fox TV series starring Hilton and Nicole Richie.

The series of ``mobisodes,`` to be announced at the show Monday, is the fourth to be offered on the new V Cast mobile video service launched in February by Verizon Wireless, a joint venture between Verizon Communications Inc. and Vodafone Group PLC.

Unlike the first three, including a weekly cellular version of the Fox show ``24,`` mobisodes of The Simple Life will cost $1 each on top of the $15 a month subscription to V Cast.

Cingular Wireless plans to offer exclusive mobile content based on the upcoming film, Star Wars: Episode III, Revenge of the Sith, and past installments of the Star Wars series.

The lineup will feature 100 ringtones, including dialogue, the voice of C-3PO and the sound of a ``TIE`` fighter aircraft.

There also will be nine video games, 50 animated screensavers, and about 200 ``wallpaper`` shots for a phone`s screen. Cingular is a joint venture between SBC Communications Inc. and BellSouth Corp.

Beyond mobile entertainment, handset makers will be showcasing phones that can take pictures at resolutions as sharp as most digital cameras marketed to consumers, as well as shoot video.

On Monday, America Online Inc. plans to introduce a picture-sharing feature for the mobile version of its AOL Instant Messenger service. Cingular has signed on as the first carrier to offer Instant Pictures, though an actual launch date and pricing has not been set.

The industry also will be listening to what Eastman Kodak Co. CEO Daniel Carp says Monday in a scheduled keynote.

Kodak`s $4-a-month service via both Verizon and Cingular enables users to upload and download pictures with cell phones, as well as order prints.

But Kodak users can also get prints from many cell phones by sending them directly to a personal printer or one of the company`s photo kiosks located in stores by using short-range wireless technologies such as infrared and Bluetooth.

Such arrangements can cut the wireless carriers out of the revenue equation -- a situation which critics say has prompted cellular operators to avoid or disable such capabilities in the phones they sell for their service.