Jaiku: Mobile Social Presence

Jyri Engestrom and partners have launched Jaiku, an application for Nokia Series 60 Second Edition phones which broadcasts your presence and status to others with the application (see the blog widget below left in the sidebar as one example). Installed on the mobile device, Jaiku reports your  presence on a network, your position, ring style (on or silent for example), upcoming calendar events, which bluetooth devices are connected to your mobile, and a few other fun widgets. They call it a "rich-presence" application as it tells people more than just whether you are nearby.

The key with Jaiku and applications that are emerging in its class is context. It provides the viewer not only with on-off information about your presence, but projects what IBM calls "social translucence", passively providing information about your state as well as location--the more context provided to the viewer the better. I may know Jyri is nearby when I go to Finland next month, but it's just as important to see if he is busy doing something else, has his ringer turned off and doesn't want to be disturbed, or is heading for a meeting or home.