A service that is only available in Asia is enabling short voice recordings. Called Bubbly (warning: turn your audio down before clicking on the link), think of it as SMS for group voice messaging. You can insert your voice recordings in a text, and like Twitter, follow certain people. You click on the link and the recording is played back as a voice call. Over the past three months, Bubbly has launched on Vodafone in India, SoftBank Mobile in Japan and Indonesia’s biggest mobile phone operator Telekomunikasi Selular. There is a Facebook plug-in so you can track who is bubbling along.
The service is from Bubble Motion, who plans on having iOS and Android apps later this year. Given the market reach of the service, Bubbly is frequented by the likes of Bollywood stars Amitabh Bachchan and Lara Dutta, along with recordings of Indonesian singers and Japanese comedians.
For the moment, don’t expect to hear recordings of top trending stars like Justin Bieber or Lady Gaga, as Bubbly has no immediate plans to expand into North America. “It is definitely the kind of thing that you could build on top of Twilio’s platform,” according to Danielle Morrill, their director of marketing.
