Watch http://mwc09.mobilejones.com for the latest articles, photos, videos and news. If you’re attending the conference and would like to see your experience and views featured on the site, send an email or leave a voice mail.  Email address and phone number are available on the About page.

The conference runs through February 19th and as the sources for reporting, opinion and insight grows, so with the resources made available on the MWC09 section of mobilejones.com. Comment below with ideas, suggestions or praise. Those are welcome.

Related articles

• Mobile tech conference kicks off (news.bbc.co.uk)
• GSMA Mobile World Congress in Barcelona: we’re here! (engadget.com)

Swype isn’t a pure mobile play as an embedded solution it may be applied to any screen as a enhancement to text input.  The screen might be a mobile device virtual keyboard, but the screen might also be a TV display or visual radio or navigation device, or any device which has a display and can receive text input.

Congratulations to the TechCrunch50 winner: Yammer, but my personal pick for top startup was Swype.  Swype has an amazing team including CEO, Cliff Kushler the co-inventor of T-9 and co-founder Randy Marsden, developer of the virtual keyboard included in Windows.  The company has funding and with the explosion of touch screens including the iPhone and all it’s competitors the market is ready for Swype.

The short video below represents my anticipation that my choice would also be the choice of judges at TechCrunch50.  Apparently, my prediction skills need refinement.

New media and social media have come of age in the political arena.  Mainstream and corporate media organizations are committing to the use and integration of social media into their coverage.  For example, CSPAN has just announced their Convention Hub production for both the DNC and the RNC.  The Convention Hub will include the following features:

— Real-time tracking of credentialed state and national political bloggers, aggregated on the websites, to enable users to follow the latest online convention news and analysis;

— Video clips from the network’s convention coverage, embeddable, to facilitate use by political bloggers and other convention watchers;

— Linkable access to the complete C-SPAN Video Library, allowing interested users to fully search all C-SPAN video content;

— Live coverage of C-SPAN television and radio networks;

— Blogger Tips and Online Convention Video Finder tools;

— Real-time feeds from Twitter users using the hash-tags #RNC08 and #DNC08

Major developments in the ease and low cost of production have generated an explosion of indie media in 2008.  Blogging has transformed into microblogging with services like Twitter and it’s open source alternative Identi.ca.  Online video has transformed from YouTube to Qik and even more powerful platforms like Mogulus have provided the tools to integrate all forms of indie media into full featured interactive TV.

Many of these tools are still in beta state, but their existence along with the build out of faster mobile networks have freed the production of media from multi-million dollar broadcast studios to the mobile phones in everyone’s hand.  “We the media” has arrived.

Not only are corporate media organizations coordinating and cooperating with indie media producers and bloggers, but many protagonists are by passing CNN, ABC, NBC, CBS and other news organizations to engage in conversations directly with the public and their constituents.   The role model for early adoption is Representative John Culberson (R – TX).  Culberson not only established a presence on Twitter, but he regularly engages in dialogue with anyone in the network who attempts to communicate with him. Further, Culberson regularly posts video from outside the House chamber on Qik.  All of this Rep. Culberson does using his Nokia N95 for video and his Blackberry for Twitter. A number of Republicans have followed John’s example are now engaging with the public using mobile social media and publishing tools.

I considered my own coverage of the Republican National Convention pondering what I might add to the obsessive commentary and observations by cable news, network news and blogger pundits, wonks and journalists.  The short answer is: nothing. But what I could add of value is to train and equip actors and protagonists of the RNC, itself.  I can enable the creation of a view of the convention from the people who are behind-the-scenes presented and duplicated by all other media outlets. Thus was born GOP Unconventional.

Mobile Technology plays a major role in the production of GOP Unconventional.  With the help of sponsors including: Cradlepoint Technology, Qik and Mogulus and using powerful mobile devices like the Nokia N95 and other smartphones GOP Unconventional will deliver workshops on the use of the technology for creating a unique and “unconventional” perspective on the event.

We are still looking for additional sponsors to support the creation of media and also to provide giveaways which will go to lucky audience members during the week of Sept. 1 – 4.  Stay tuned to the site for more information on show times and how you can win some of the mobile technology we use to create GOP Uncoventional.   You can follow us on Twitter too at GOPUnconvention.  Twitter didn’t allow the enough letters in the id to get “al”on the end.

There are more than a couple of techniques that I’ve learned since CTIA on improving sound of the video which is critical.  A couple of other improvements will be featured either before the convention or at the convention as they are used.  You can probably imagine the areas of improvement if you’ve A) attempted to create videos with your mobile device using one of the streaming services or B) had painful experiences watching the live videos.  The indie media tool kit for mobile reporting is something I plan to share once the final products are selected and tested.

I’m also looking for more sponsors for the GOP convention productions, so if your company would interested in this opportunity please contact me for more information at mojo@mobilejones.com.  More about this as things progress and the new design for mobilejones.com takes shape.

If you have questions you’d like addressed by campaign staff or voters leave a comment here. Or participate live by watching at http://www.qik.com/mojo/ and using the chat feature while I’m broadcasting.

Supervising Producer for MTV, Michael Scogin discusses the network’s Choose or Lose social media project, the live video streams from Super Tuesday. We also hear what MTV sees as the future of its citizen journalism efforts.

Another mobile video captured with a Nokia N95 8GB recorded locally featuring Louis Libin who discusses the challenges with coordination of all wireless communications at both the Democratic National Convention and the Republican Natonal Convention this summer.