Members of i-mate’s online club are being given the chance to turn their pocket PCs into TVs with the launch of Cjaq, the world’s first video drama series for i-mate mobile devices.
Launched by i-mate founder and CEO Jim Morrison at a special event in London, Cjaq is a ten-part series that users can download exclusively from Club i-mate (www.clubimate.com), the firm’s customer web portal.
Described by i-mate as “a gripping thriller set in a futuristic night club,” Cjaq is a series in which five twenty-somethings awake to find themselves trapped – all of them after receiving a hoax text message invitation to attend the trendy club’s opening night. Each Cjaq episode lasts up to two minutes, with a twist at the end of each instalment designed to leave viewers craving more. New episodes of Cjaq are now being posted onto the Club i-mate site each day.
“Part of the i-mate proposition is to provide our customers with exclusive applications, services and content which enable them to maximise the functionality of their Windows Mobile wireless devices both for business and pleasure,” said Jim Morrison at the London launch. “Wireless video content has great potential and this drama series is an innovative way for us to deliver a fun consumer viewing experience which engages our customers through the club i-mate portal.”
Cjaq video clips are hosted online as Microsoft Windows WMV files and can be subsequently played back using Windows Media Player on any i-mate Pocket PC (a.k.a. PDA) or smartphone device. Club i-mate members can choose to fully download episodes, stream them via GPRS, or browse the web and download episodes to PC before transferring them to their handheld via Microsoft ActiveSync.
i-mate is not the first company to offer video content on handheld devices. UK telecommunications company Vodafone for example is currently offering customers 24 one-minute “mobisodes” of the TV series 24, featuring Kiefer Sutherland, as part of its 3G service. However, i-mate’s Cjaq is the only drama series to date to be created exclusively for mobile devices. The series was created with SMG Television and Cool Crew Media, and directed by BAFTA winning director Michael Hines in his first commission for the small screen.
Cjaq’s launch follows the recent introduction of new i-mate handheld devices into the region. Look out for a review of i-mate’s PDA2k pocket PC in the February issue of Windows Middle East.
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