Qik to be bundled with every Nokia smartphone – is live streaming about to take off?

It’s been possible for over a year but until now it’s been the preserve of a few geeks, bloggers and journalists. Could 2009 be the year live video streaming from mobile phones goes mainstream?

It’s been announced that one of the most popular live streaming apps, Qik, is to be pre-loaded with all of Nokia’s S60 smartphones, starting with their new flagship N97.

Qik’s CEO Ramu Sunkara is understandably upbeat about the news. “To be pre-loaded on all their Symbian S60 devices speaks to the confidence that Nokia has in Qik for its consumers around the world. We are extremely pleased that this pre-load is starting with Nokia N97, a truly game changing device.”

With the new video camera-touting iPhone 3G S launching this month, the prospect of Qik finally appearing in the iTunes app store is a possibility too. Although the current iPhone is perfectly capable of recording video, Apple has kept that ability locked away. Only a handful of lucky beta testers and users of jailbroken iPhones and have been able to stream live from their phones as yet.

There’s no doubt that the ability to stream live video from wherever you are is a powerful thing and once the public understands that power it’s likely to be a hit. Qik has been used to great effect already. Live video was streamed from the G20 protests in London in April, helping to show the way police were treating protesters as it happened.

If live video streaming does take off, just look forward to even less privacy than you have already in today’s connected world. If you think people monitoring your tweets to burgle your house is bad, wait until people can ‘video stalk you’ live to the world.