12mail: Short video messaging arrives on iPhone

Your received video messages look just like an e-mail in-box.

(Credit: Screenshot by Harrison Hoffman/CNET)

12seconds.tv, a micro video messaging service dubbed by some as "Twitter for video," is bringing the same short format to private video messaging in its second iPhone app, 12mail.

The basic gist of the app, released this week, is that you can record a video, up to 12 seconds, and send it off to one of your friends. Your friend then gets a push notification and can watch it.

Unfortunately, in order to take advantage of the video recording part of this app, you have to have an iPhone 3GS. Those with the 3G or original iPhone can take a photo and record 12 seconds of audio as an alternative. The app does not require a 12seconds account, but rather allows you to link with Twitter or Facebook. It then pulls down your contacts from either service and you can video message to your heart's content.

12mail is a great concept as a private video messaging app, but it seems to have missed the mark when it came to Facebook Connect implementation. When you send a video message to one of your Twitter contacts, it shows up as a direct message on Twitter and as a private message in the iPhone app. In contrast, when you message a Facebook contact, it posts it in public on that person's Facebook Wall and shows up in the iPhone app. The result of sending a video message in these two scenarios is very different. It would serve 12mail well to alert a user on Facebook by sending an Inbox message. In its current state, the Facebook integration just doesn't work as you would expect it to.

Despite some of these functionality issues (which can be worked out), I really like the idea of private video messaging or "video voicemail." It has a lot of great potential uses and opens up a whole new way of communicating.

You can download the app from the iTunes App Store here.

12mail's push notification.

(Credit: Screenshot by Harrison Hoffman/CNET)

12mail's Facebook friend list.

(Credit: Screenshot by Harrison Hoffman/CNET)

[DavidSpeiser]

Hey Harrison, this is David Speiser, I work with the 12seconds team. Glad you liked the app - just wanted to clarify the Facebook issue. Limitations in the FB API prevent us from sending private email directly to an inbox from an outside app. We're working on a fix, but for now (as you noted) FB 12mails will post to the wall and are public. We think this is a good thing in some ways - it's fun to send up videos publicly too. But people should definitely be aware that the Twitter 12mails are DMs (private) where the FB 12mails are wall posts (public.) As long as that's clear, we see advantages to both options. Thanks!
-David

[harrisonh1]

@DavidSpeiser Thanks for taking the time to comment. Don't get me wrong, I love the concept behind 12mail, I just think (as you said) that it needs to be more clear when you are going to send something off for public consumption and when it's private. I think that there are definitely killer use cases for both public and private messaging. I'd just like the ability to send a private video message to a Facebook friend without the whole world seeing or a public one to a Twitter friend in the form of an @reply even.

--
Harrison

[philnolan3d]

Dear Apple: Please allow video recording on older iPhones. Signed, The majority of your customers.