Nakama.ca the latest venture from Toronto based Ambient Vector - the brainchild of Sutha Kamal - is  a media and other rich content sharing site for handhelds. Images and other rich content can be easily uploaded and the service even lets you know (via SMS) about successful submits. The free service is compatible with MySpace, Flickr Windows LiveSpaces and other popular photo blogging sites and has familiar social netowrking functions such as tagging ratings and syndication.

Mobile Crunch had a good review of the inital launch saying:

The free service (you will get hit with an mms charge if you’re uploading images from your phone though) seems to be catching on well. Their official launch was the 27th of September yet going through the user galleries they seem to have already caught the attention of hundreds of new users in spite of the fact that aside from a well publisized blog they’ve done no advertising whatsoever.

Nakama (loosely translated from Japanese, the name means circle of friends) did score well with The Globe and Mail, one of Canada’s largest newspapers which is profiling the first 90 days in the life of this startup that has the good fortune of being funded by one of their country’s top VC’s; Celtic Ventures.

Like its competitors, Nakama aims to generate revenue through context based ads and premium services although I wonder how it will genetate the traffic and needed membership given that fact that the mobile photo blogging market seems to be coming increasingly crowded. Apparently, the folks at  Mashable feel the same mentioning how popular and long established sites such as PhotoBucket and WebShots already incorporate much of what Nakama offers while there is no shortage of Flickr and MySpace photo blogging tools either. In other words, Nakama faces the same challenge as any new entrant in the photo blogging arena. How does it build a community and actually gain converts from the major players?

Will the ability to browse community albums and videos over one's phone allow people to fully embrace the service? Several have commented on its ease of use since no software is needed, just a multimedia capable phone although everytime I hear that I start thinking SMS/MMS charges. Photojunkie likes the ability to record a personal message with each image, which I agree is a neat feature. Let me know what you think:) Meanwhile head over to Nakama.ca and check it out for yourself.

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