On Technology

DEMO, the conference that showcases new technology products for business and consumers, offered up more than 70 companies to the press, investors and technology executives at the Sheraton Hotel & Marina this past week.

Many of the companies are here looking for funding and some of the products are still at the idea stage. If there was one prevailing trend, it's how many are being developed to work on the iPhone and making it the new platform for pocket computing. Here are some of the most interesting ones.

Liaise

Liaise is a powerful add-in for Outlook that follows your incoming and outgoing e-mail, searching for certain phrases and words, and then provides summaries and reminders of follow up action, to dos, and calendar events. For example, you may write an e-mail asking Jim to complete a project ASAP. A follow up note will be created in a list of actions, reminding you to check back with Jim the next day, as well as adding the item to a list of all of Jim's assignments. It's a clever product that lets you continue to work the way you normally would, but provides you with extra help. (liaise.com)

DateCheck

DateCheck is a mobile app that provides nearly instant information about a new acquaintance. It's targeted to those who meet someone at a bar or event and wonder just who that person is. Enter some basic information such as phone number, e-mail, and address and back comes a report. It includes a "Sleaze Detector" (checks convictions, judgments, etc.), financial condition, interests, living situation (household members), and friends using Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. This could be particularly useful information for those in the dating scene. It's useful, but a little creepy as well. (intelius.com)

Micello

Micello provides detailed "inside information" on places people visit such as shopping centers, colleges and convention centers. Maps and data are overlain onto Google Maps, so as you zoom in on a shopping center, for example, you can view a map of the store locations within the center. You can also search to find those stores that carry a particular item such as shoes. I'd expect Google to add this sort of information. (micello.com)

Viaas

Viaas turns video monitoring into a subscription service. The company provides a camera that you plug into an Ethernet connection, it automatically connects to the company's Web site and sets itself up to provide capture video and store it on the company's servers. You can go onto its site to annotate and retrieve stored video. It's designed for use by those wanting to provide video monitoring with a low entry cost and without the hassles of going through a complicated setup, replacing and storing tapes locally. $249 plus $25/mo.

Enthusem

Enthusem is a service that lets you create personal greeting and messaging cards using your own photos and text directly from your computer or iPhone. The printed greeting card is sent by postal mail anywhere in the world for $1.50-$3. You can send it to one or to groups. Signup is free and you are given a credit for sending one card. (Enthuseum.com)

Answers.com

Answers.com showed its new one-stop Web site for finding answers about anything, utilizing 250 reference sites, a database with 5 million answers, and responses from volunteers, called WikiAnswers. The service lets anyone ask, answer, edit or collaborate on answers in thousands of categories. (Answers.com)

TravelTrac

TravelTrac lets you share your travel experiences in real time using streaming media from any location anywhere (but watch out for those roaming data charges). You upload content from your trip including videos, images and notes, and it notifies friends who can view it on a microsite it creates. There's an iPhone app and upcoming Blackberry and Android apps.

MyOwnRealEstate.com

MyOwnRealEstate.com, which claims to be the first property management service Web site, delivers its service to computers and smart phones. It's designed for use by tenants and landlords to provide real-time info and to support the relationship between landlord and tenant once the property is rented.

EMO

Emo Labs, one of the few hardware companies at Demo, showed off its new invisible, zero-footprint speaker system. The sound comes from a thin transparent film applied to the face of flat TVs, monitors and notebook computer screens. The sound demo was very impressive and it was one of the audience's favorites.

Waze

Waze is a free phone app that creates its own maps and traffic data generated by its users, called crowd-sourcing. (It's somewhat similar to the failed Dash navigation unit that relied on its hardware to work.) Waze wants to replace the expensive maps now supplied by Navteq and Tele-Nav. As its users drive, their positions are compiled on Waze's servers; with enough users, not only are roads mapped, but real-time traffic can be measured and displayed as well. Users can also send updates and be updated by others as they come upon radar traps, construction and accidents. According to the company, in its trial use in Israel, where it's on 20 percent of the phones, Waze enabled the company to create its own detailed maps of the entire country. (waze.com)

Rseven

Rseven is a "life recorder" that uses the cell phone to record your daily activities including cell calls, text messages, pictures shots and e-mail. When you sync your phone to Rseven's site, the Web site displays all of your activities by time and date in a horizontal timeline, as well as identifying your important contacts. I haven't quite figured who would use or want this; perhaps those that can charge for all of their waking minutes? Or perhaps it's just something that's being done because it can. (Rseven.com)

CallSpark

CallSpark positions itself as Google for phone numbers. No modesty on their part, but it does seem like a clever product. It's an iPhone app that lets you dial by name. Enter the name and up comes a list of matches from your iPhone contacts, Facebook and Google contacts, and even numbers found from searching online. It's a free app expected to be available shortly from the iPhone store.

What were my favorites? I liked Waze's driving app, Liaise's Outlook add-in, EMO's flat speakers, and CallSpark's dialer.