Are you interested in exchanging your Layar experiences with other users? Or want to share your ideas for new layers? Then follow @layarmobile on Twitter!

Layar founders Raimo van der Klein, Claire Boonstra and Maarten Lens-Fitzgerald also post their thoughts on Twitter. You can follow them at: @rhymo, @claireboo and @dutchcowboy.

Registration of the amazing keynote by sf author and design critic Bruce Sterling, “At the Dawn of the Augmented Reality Industry”. He talks about its history, the cool side, the dark side and gives the industry some pointers to be successful.

Recorded at the Layar Launch Event on August 17th in Amsterdam where the Layar Reality Browser was launched for the world.

Some quotes:

“Right now this is the peak of my interest”
“A techno visionary dream come true”
“People can actually, conceivably make some money off of this”
“It’s not too geeky” “It’s Artsy”
“It’s Girls, Money and Fame!”
“It’s happening” “I put on a tie”
“New names will not work”
“It’s a tag”
“AR language top 3 at Google Trends: 1: Korean, 2: Dutch & 3: English”
“Do some high culture things”
“Criminals are going to come…”
“You are going to get the four horse men of the infopocalypse”
“You are going to get the fear about…”
“Don’t be a deer in the head lights about it”
“You are going to need an industry journal”
“You are going to need an industry code of ethics”
“You are heading for the trough of disillusion” “It’s human nature”
“Be prepared to work for the other guy” “Be prepared to hire the other guy”
“The majors will buy you out”
“It’s gonna happen, get ready for it”
“Augments eat batteries like popcorn”
“Is there an Augmented Reality system for building Augmented Reality systems?”
“Do you have your own language?”
“You need to have a look”
“You are gonna be glamorous”
“Pretty chique… you are video people”
“…hot Dutch augmentation chicks”
“You are in for a wild ride”

Raimo van der Klein, CEO of Layar, announces the new global release of the Layar Reality Browser and walks through the new features. The video is less than 10 minutes.

View the slides here in pdf or as a webversion

This is the rough cut of the video. More coming soon.

In the mean time check the content catalog, over 87 examples of layers available all over the world.

Over 100 partners worldwide developing content layers including well known brands

AMSTERDAM, August 17th 2009. Layar, which was first launched in June 2009 in The Netherlands, announces that its second generation Reality Browser is now available globally on Android devices. Many new content layers are available in the Reality Browser which vary from Wikipedia, Twitter and Brightkite to local services like Yelp, Trulia, store locators, nearby bus stops, mobile coupons, Mazda dealers and tourist, nature and cultural guides.

Layar Reality Browser 2.0
To discover new content quickly and with ease, the new Reality Browser includes sections for ‘Featured’ and ‘Popular’. All layers are also accessible via a keyword search in the search function. Layers that are used often can be saved to ‘Favorites’. In addition to the enhanced augmented reality camera view, it is now possible to select Map or List view. For every Point of Interest (POI), several actions can be taken such as: linking to a mobile site for more information, playing a live location based trivia game, linking to a video or sound clip, clicking to call for reservations, and looking at a route description to the POI. Content partners can fully customize their layer to provide a distinctive experience for the user.

500 more developers
Over 100 developers worldwide have been given access to the Layar platform by means of an API key, and are currently developing layers.

Scott Halcomb of SystemK from Japan, who developed 22 layers including the ‘Sapporo Hotspots’ layer:
“With the Layar API and support of the developers community, creating layers has been a pleasure.”

Dave Elchoness of GoWeb3D from the USA/ India, with 11 layers published including FlickAR:
“We strongly believe that Layar represents the next evolution for mobile applications and feel privileged to participate.”

Michael Coutinho, Technical Manager at Trulia, USA:
“This is a great idea. I was able to develop our layer in about three hours.”

To further grow the community of developers, Layar has released an additional 500 new API keys. The supporting wiki (http://layar.pbworks.com), with developer instructions and documentation, is now available.

Layar for all
Starting from today, Layar is available for everyone with an Android phone anywhere in the world. The Reality Browser can be downloaded in all local Android Markets and is pre-installed on the new Samsung Galaxy (i7500) in The Netherlands.

Dirk Groten, CTO:
“The next platform on which Layar will be available is the iPhone 3GS. We are currently investigating other platforms that support our functionalities.”

Raimo van der Klein, CEO:
“With the release of this Reality Browser we believe we have created a worldwide platform that will bring both fun and relevant Augmented Reality experiences in one application to a growing audience of users.”

Boilerplate
The Layar Reality Browser displays real time digital information on top of reality in the camera screen of the mobile phone. While looking through the phone’s camera lens, a user can see houses for sale, popular bars and shops, tourist information of the area, play a live game, etcetera. Layar first launched on June 16th, 2009 and announced the opening up of its platform by means of an API on July 8th, 2009. The Layar platform serves as an enabler for mobile location services - any database with geo-location information can easily be turned in a content layer. The Layar Reality Browser is globally available for mobile phones running the Android operating system. Layar is a company based in Amsterdam, The Netherlands.

Contact Maarten Lens-FitzGerald at press@layar.com for press inquiries

All press material is on www.layar.com/press
View all new content layers here: http://layar.com/layar-20-content-catalog/
View all new functions here: http://layar.com/layar-20-functional-screens/
View all developer videos here: http://layar.com/7-layar-20-videos/

View all functional (navigational) screens in this presentation.

Choose the web/HTML version by clicking the image below or download the PDF version.

An overview of the functional screens as direct downloads.

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