New Disney iPhone App debuts today
From Yahoo! Business:
Disney iPhone app makes photos the key to content
LOS ANGELES - The Walt Disney Co. is releasing an iPhone application that rewards users for poking through the Disney.com Web site and could one day offer exclusive bonuses for activities such as shopping at Disney Stores.
The free app, which debuts in the iTunes app store Wednesday, offers bonus animations to users who follow clues to take cell-phone pictures of characters from movies such as "Up," "G-Force," "Ratatouille," and "Wall-E" on the Web site.
Taking the correct picture unlocks an exclusive video and downloadable content such as frame images that can be overlaid on photos, or wallpaper images for cell phone screens. Disney is calling the feature "Click2Life," because it makes characters captured in photos appear to suddenly become animated in one's hand.
In the future, the family entertainment company said it could allow bonus content to be delivered to phones based on their location, pinpointed with GPS coordinates, such as inside a Disney Store. Future photo keys could also include movie posters to drive interest in the company's upcoming releases.
Jason Davis, vice president of Disney.com, said the main purpose of the app was to deepen fan relationships with Disney characters, rather than just drive traffic to stores, theaters and online.
"We treat it just as a unique content experience," Davis said.
The app also corrals all of Disney's 17 apps together in one place, allowing users to shop for other programs and manage ones they have already purchased, some of which sell for $4.99.
The app is unrelated to a so-called "Keychest" technology that Disney is developing to give consumers access to movies across multiple devices with one purchase.
Disney launching iPhone, iPod touch applications
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Walt Disney Co is launching free iPhone and iPod touch applications, giving fans access to Disney content and interactive features anywhere.
Disney.com, part of the Disney Interactive Media Group, said it will offer users of the popular Apple Inc devices items like the new "Click2Life" feature that lets fans take pictures of images from the Disney.com Web site, and eventually in the physical world, and unlock exclusive content.
For instance, a teenager may one day see a poster of an upcoming "Pirates of the Caribbean" film in a mall, snap a picture of the poster with an iPhone and then generate video content related to that picture or character.
Jason Davis, vice president of Disney.com, said in an interview that the media giant realized it already had a huge audience of iPhone and iPod touch users for its content on its existing mobile application on Disney.com.
Disney.com reaches nearly 31 million unique visitors per month and said that among mobile Web sites, it ranks as the No. 1 entertainment mobile site.
It also has an expanding lineup of many paid applications currently available in Apple's App Store including Toy Story Mania!, Disney Fairies Fly, The Nightmare Before Christmas and Breakspin.
"Our iPhone and iPod touch traffic is heavily made up of kids and moms. The iPod touch has a very specific demographic geared to the tween," he said, adding that within Disney content, there are various safety controls.
"Because the applications are self-contained, once you're in the application, you can't get into anything else," he said.
The new application organizes Disney-branded content within one destination on each device, lets users interact with Disney characters through customizable photo frames and audio greetings, listen to Radio Disney live, watch music videos and buy Disney music on Apple's iTunes Store.
