Evolving avatars – the next phone craze

Rating: Charge the phone or the fish gets it

Forget ringtones and wallpapers, the latest fad for mobile phone is evolving avatars. Or so Bluestreak Technology and Cellfish Media would have us believe. The first two avatars are Pilou the Hamster and Surimi the Fish.

Surimi the Fish is akin to a mobile Tamagotchi. [The Android version available here costs €1 .] Basically it swims around the phone’s idle screen.

Surimi the fish

However, Surimi becomes less active and more distressed as the battery’s power diminishes. If thebattery isn’t recharged, presumably Surimi disappears down to Davy Jones’ locker. A similar fate awaits Pilou who stops racing around his favourite wheel and goes to hamster Heaven.

The important point is that these avatars run on a wide variety of devices including the latest Android, iPhone, Java, Symbian, and Windows Mobile powered phones. Moreover, the apps can be found on iTunes, the Ovi Store, the Android Market.

Cellfish Media is hoping, however, that consumers will visit its own storefront which is named KKO Club. This store offers apps for the Top 100 most popular devices in France, although Cellfish is taking the service worldwide.

“The mobile phone’s home and idle screens have traditionally been locations to display simple static images, but with these new animations we now offer richer multimedia options that are both entertaining and informative for the consumer,” said Dominique Jodoin, Bluestreak Technology’s CEO.

“By combining Cellfish Media’s popular content with Bluestreak Technology’s mobile application solutions, consumers can now animate their phones like never before.”

While Cellfish Media is obviously keep to promote its content any way it can, GoMo News rather suspects that Surimi and Pilou are actually BlueStreak’s secret weapons to expose its mobile phone Flash prowess.

The company does claim to be “The leader in open Flash platforms for wireless and wired devices.” Which is a bit of a clue.