Pointy Heads Software on Tuesday launched Knocking Live Video, the first officially sanctioned Apple iPhone app to offer live video broadcasting over a 3G network. The app, which is billed as working with any generation of the iPhone, allows users to broadcast live to other iPhones. In its promotional materials for the new app, Pointy Heads attempts to position the live device-to-device broadcasts that it enables (which the company terms "knocks" or "knocking") as representing a new form of digital communication, on a par with email or SMS: "Knocking is an entirely new form of mobile communication redefining the way users share moments," the materials state. "Knocking is direct, visual communication. Where mobile users once got a call, an email, text or multimedia message, they now get a knock...Knocking treats the iPhone camera as a keyhole into another moment, letting users look through to another device, place and event."

According to Pointy Heads, the new app includes a Facebook Connect feature that "automatically publishes stories on users' 'knocks' in real time." The company bills the app as easy to use, describing the process of using it as follows: "Open Knocking Live Video sharing, set up account, request and 'knock' your friends, aim your camera." The app is available for download in the social networking category of the Apple App store, and Pointy Heads says it will be free to the first 50,000 users.