By Burt Lum

With all this interest in camera phones, a banker friend of mine asked me how to make money with it.

My answer: Maybe start a moblog with all your cool pix and sell advertising at your site. That's what Buzznet does.

The truth is, the banker isn't alone in seeing the potential, but hasn't figured out a way to capitalize. There isn't an easy answer.

Nevertheless, the camera phone craze is upon us and people are toying with novel ideas.

One site that caught my interest is Hiptop Nation at www.hiptop.bedope.com. This site is put together by Mike Popovic, as an homage to the little-known Be operating system started by Jean-Louis Gasse, formerly of Apple Computer in 1990.

As described by Popovic, he wanted to start a Web site and picked a relatively geeky topic (computers), then picked a sub-category about computers, namely operating systems, and finally chose an obscure OS like BeOS to write about.

And as I tell my banker friend, it's all about niches.

So when T-Mobile came out with Sidekick service using the Danger, Inc. Hiptop device, Popovic decided it would be cool to start a communal Web site for anyone in the world using one.

Hence began Hiptop Nation. With your Hiptop, you can shoot pictures and e-mail them to the Hiptop Nation site. You can post multiple photos and have group captions, slightly different from sites like Buzznet.

Popovic also takes a much more personal role in Hiptop Nation. Last Halloween he staged a Halloween Scavenger Hunt. He conceived, facilitated and coordinated this nationwide hunt.

His latest side project is the Phortune-Teller project at fortune.bedope.com.

Burt Lum is one click away at www.roughtake.com.