In just the few months since it was released this summer, Apple’s video streaming to the iPhone has become a part of many business plans. Two announcements were made on that front today:

Multicast announced full support for transcoding, managing, delivering and displaying content on the iPhone, both live and on-demand. However, the company’s customers tend to be corporate — from internal teams like investor relations, human resources and sales that put on live events — while the iPhone is still mainly a consumer device. Nevertheless, it’s useful to have your main online video platform provide extensions to all sorts of devices.

Meanwhile, Stickam, the live video community site, today launched an iPhone SDK of its own. The idea is that other companies, for instance partner 211me, which works with celebrities, can build their own iPhone apps that include Stickam live streaming and chat. 211me’s first Stickam-powered app will be for Twilight star Peter Facinelli. Competitor Kyte already simplifies this process even further, enabling stars and their entourages to make video apps for various mobile platforms.

In other recent iPhone video news, Brightcove pre-announced an iPhone SDK and Livestream added iPhone streaming last week at our NewTeeVee Live conference.

Kyte on Android

White-label video vendor Kyte today said it is expanding the number of mobile platforms that its customers can distribute videos to, with the upcoming launch of new application frameworks for Android and Nokia mobile devices.

The new app frameworks are designed to make publishing videos from Kyte’s management platform into mobile applications as easy as possible. With these frameworks, the company enables its customers to build native mobile apps with features such as real-time chat, comments, ratings, and the ability to share across multiple social-networking platforms.

“Our customers can take a Kyte channel and deliver it as a fully branded mobile app very quickly, and there will only be an incremental increase in cost, as opposed to the cost of building and launching a standalone iPhone app,” says Kyte COO Gannon Hall.

With existing app frameworks for video on iPhone and BlackBerry devices, Kyte will soon be able to easily create apps and send videos to four leading mobile platforms. The company also supports video distribution through the mobile web.

Adding support for more mobile platforms plays to the company’s strengths; While other online video platform (OVP) vendors focus primarily on live and on-demand video distribution online, Kyte has tried to differentiate itself with advanced mobile and social features.

Mobile live-streaming service Qik announced today that you can download its app for the Droid phone from the Android Marketplace, and sign up for early beta access to a high-res version of the Qik client for the Droid that can capture videos in DVD resolution (720×480). The company says it’s the first live mobile provider to enable DVD-quality video capture.

Qik has also improved its capabilities to help users create shortcuts to make sharing Qik-created videos with your contacts or social media sites faster.

In the battle between the iPhone and the Droid, the Droid wins on the live-streaming front because, well, it actually streams live video. The iPhone lets you record video for uploading later.

The NBA has dramatically updated its mobile offerings for the 2009-10 season, including a new application for the iPhone and Android that provides live video streams of games.

NBA League Pass Mobile costs $39.99 for the season, and gives users access to more than 40 live games each week. It identifies a user’s location via GPS in order to block access to the nearest local team, but other than that, the MobiTV-powered app is all-you-can-eat.

I tried out League Pass Mobile last night and it looked great, especially on Wi-Fi. The app includes live DVR capabilities, adaptive bitrate streaming, on-demand access to games for 48 hours, live stats, push alerts, and the ability to turn off all that information while you’re watching a game and just want to experience it in real time.

The app is not yet available publicly, but it should be out ASAP, definitely before the end of the week. Update: iPhone version is here. And paying users of NBA League Pass Broadband will have to open up their wallets again; the two products aren’t bundled.

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After slogging through two iPhone-less years, my contract with Verizon is up and finally — FINALLY! — I can catch up with the Techno Joneses and get the Jesus Phone. But with Verizon and Motorola launching their Droid line of phones today, suddenly, I’m not sure what kind to get, especially since I’ll have a newteevee slant to my usage. I could use some help from you, the reader.

To set the stage, I only use my phone as a “phone” for work, for personal use, I generally prefer texting. I’m interested in apps, and I use a Mac and Gmail. Here’s been my initial thinking:

Reasons to Get a Droid:
-Verizon’s network is better (or so the snarky commercial tells me)
-I’m already hooked in with the Verizon system
-Video recording is 720×480 at 24 fps (quite nice for those impromptu video interviews)
-5 mega-pixel camera (iPhone has 3.0), with image stabilization and location tagging
-YouTube baked right in
-I can play my cat videos on a 3.7 inch 854×480 screen (the iPhone is a 3.5 inches and 640×480)
-It’s on an open platform that many people (hopefully) will be developing all kinds of cool stuff for in the coming months

Reasons to Get an iPhone
-Not first-gen hardware
-Plugs into my existing Mac ecosystem at home and work
-Plenty of apps already available
-YouTube baked in
-Video recording with not-quite-livestreaming apps available

I’ve heard mixed things about the iPhone. Om chucked his, but other friends of mine still love theirs and don’t even mind the cruddy AT&T network. With the Droid not available until Nov. 6, I realize that you probably haven’t used one yet, but speaking in broad terms, what do you think? Should I avoid the Droid or does the Droid pwn the iPhone?

Can a cell phone take the place of your pocket camcorder? More and more phones are trying to serve as compact camcorders like the Flip models, as are MP3 players like the iPod nano. But few — if any — offer the same video quality and ease of use that you’ll find in a dedicated camcorder. One of the latest phones to attempt this feat is Samsung’s Instinct HD. And, though the Instinct HD does offer a very good camera and camcorder, I wouldn’t trade it for a Flip MinoHD…yet.

Samsung and Sprint, which is offering the Instinct HD for $250, are highlighting the HD features of the phone. And it can capture HD video; in fact, you’re reminded of this every time you fire it up. Before you can capture any video, you have to select your desired resolution: HD (1280×720), VGA (640×480) or QVGA (320×240). I found this constant reminder a bit annoying; I’d rather pick a default resolution and just change it via a settings menu.

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Monsoon Multimedia’s HAVA products have long been a lesser-known competitor to the Slingbox line of place-shifting devices. I’ve always been impressed with the HAVAs I tested, which were functionally better then most Slingboxes, though a little less refined. The same is not true of the newly released HAVA Mobile Player for iPhone app, which doesn’t quite live up to the standard set by the SlingPlayer for iPhone app.

The HAVA Mobile Player lets you view the contents of your HAVA-connected TV over your iPhone’s Wi-Fi connection; like the SlingPlayer app, it does not work over 3G connections. It’s available for $9.99 in the App Store. That’s a bargain compared with the $29.99 that the SlingPlayer app will set you back, but it still seems high to me. To use it, you need a HAVA set-top box, the cheapest of which costs $150. I’d love to see the mobile app come with the device.

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Showtime to Launch Animated Dexter Web Series; Early Cuts is a forthcoming 12 part series premiering on Oct. 25 on Sho.com. (emailed release) Also with a new web series is Eduardo Sanchez, co-director of The Blair Witch Project, who is sticking with ghostly themes (albeit with a humorous twist) for ParaAbnormal. (ParaAbnormal.tv)

Warner Bros. Getting More into Mobile; studio creates new position and taps Natalie Farsi to expand mobile video services and more across the company’s divisions. (Variety)

Spotify Eyes TV Service; details about the move to the big screen almost nonexistent, but it will only be in Sweden at first anyway. (MediaMemo)

RealNetworks to Appeal the RealDVD Court Decision; ruling bars the company from selling its DVD copying software and set-top device. (Video Business)

Magnify.net Adds Content Partners; video publishing and curation site to get content from Demand Media and Grab Networks. (Contentinople)