Bubble Motion, a social networking provider, today announced the launch of Bubbly, a voice-blogging service built specifically for mobile phones. Bubbly allows users to record and broadcast messages from a phone. The company calls its users "bubblers."
Bubbly is currently rolling out with mobile operators in India and several other operators worldwide. The service touts top national and regional Indian celebrities already voice-blogging using Bubbly. Through the first week of service, Bubbly has recorded more than 150,000 bubblers.
The service is SMS- and short code-based and does not require a subscription. According to a press release, users enter a short code and start recording their messages. To follow another voice blogger, users dial the Bubbly phone number for whomever they want to follow. Whenever there's a new audio update, followers are notified via SMS with instructions on how to listen. Bubblers can also control who is able to listen to their messages and have the option of masking their actual phone number to prevent followers from calling them directly.
Bubble Motion says the service is designed for fans to follow their favorite celebrities, or to simply stay in touch with friends and family. The company also says that it is seeing interest from businesses that want to use the service to announce promotions to customers.
Bubbly is deployed through partnerships with mobile operators to ensure easy recording, storage and retrieval of voice messages, instant distribution of SMS notifications and hassle-free billing. Bubbly is an extension of Bubble Motion's BubbleTalk service, which has already delivered more than 1 billion voice-based bubble messages worldwide.
Bubble Motion currently offers a variety of social services deployed with Airtel, Vodafone, Turkcell and other mobile operators throughout the world. Bubble Motion's investors include Sequoia Capital, Palomar Ventures and Comcast Interactive Capital. The company is headquartered in Silicon Valley and Singapore.