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Original 'Color' App Rises From Ashes As 'Color for Facebook'

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Original 'Color' App Rises From Ashes As 'Color for Facebook'

You may recall the original Color app launched in March 2011 with a ton of hype surrounding it. Color was developed by Color Labs Inc. founded by Bill Nguyen who had also started Lala.com and Onebox. Color Labs Inc. was funded with $41 million before the idea for the Color app was even hatched fueling the flames of high expectations.

The concept behind the original Color app was people could snap pictures which would then be instantly shared with everyone in a 150 feet radius who also sported the Color app, without restriction. In an increasingly semi-private world governed by social networking seismic shifts, the idea that pictures taken with the Color app would be viewable by anyone on the basis of proximity was scary and unappealing. This coupled with Color Labs' decision to include zero instructions on how the app worked, doomed it to failure.

So the folks at Color Labs went back to the drawing board and created Color for Facebook giving you the capability to broadcast videos live from your iPhone rather than recording them and uploading them. Users shoot videos by “hosting” visits, i.e. inviting fellow Color users to watch your broadcast. The video automatically appear on your Facebook timeline so all your Facebook friends (or only the ones you select) can see it.

The catch is you can only broadcast thirty seconds at a time. Color also has its own timeline, composed of only the photos that you’ve been tagged in, and newsfeed, composed of other photos your Facebook friends took (whether or not they have Color). Call me old-fashioned, but I don’t see the appeal of the new Color for Facebook app. Unlike the original Color app, which went up in flames in spectacular fashion, Color for Facebook has tapped into a possible advantage by linking with Facebook. But is it really important for your friends see your thirty second video as you take it, rather than wait till you upload it to Facebook? In this wired society of ours, maybe. But the live video feed is the main feature of the app; the newsfeed and timeline offer nothing beyond the photo- and video-sharing features that Facebook already offers. The new app requires both a Facebook account and an iPhone but doesn’t improve much on either. AppPicker Rating: 2 / 5 Stars Pick It Up in the App Store: Color for Facebook

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