Nokia crowd sources ideas for innovative mobile apps at SXSW

Nokia launched a new website during SXSW (South By Southwest), an annual conference and festival held in the USA, that attempts to connect innovative thinkers with application developers in the hope of creating mobile applications that solve "challenges."

The company's IdeasProject website is "a web-based, innovation community where application enthusiasts (consumers, developers, anyone) can join, share and collaboratively create applications for mobile platforms."

"Participants can create or respond to innovation 'challenges' and work together to solve the challenges," explained Nokia in a March 13 blog post.  

The first challenge on the IdeasProject website is called "Apps That Change the World" and asks thinkers, developers and community members to share their ideas about how mobile applications can be used to make positive changes around the globe.

The best submissions will be turned into free applications and will be distributed through Nokia's Ovi Store.

Developers around the world are already starting to explore the ways in which mobile applications can become solutions to global problems: the GoodGuide app lets mobile users scan product barcodes to find safe, healthy, green products while they are shopping; Locavore helps people find and eat local food when it's in season; and MIT is working on a mobile app and inexpensive optometry device called NETRA (Near-Eye Tool for Refractive Assessment) that could help diagnose optical problems in people living in the developing world.

http://www.ideasproject.com/