a multi-tasked stream of consciousness or perhaps just emails to myself
Android Demo Video
While there’s no gPhone per se, this demo gives a cool overview of how the platform works and what can be done. Seems like we are just scratching the surface here, but with WebKit, 3D acceleration and 3G data services some very cool stuff will be sure to arrive.
Too bad we have to wait until 2H 2008!
Tonight I gave my Brother-In-Law my Nokia N93 and my Sister-In-Law a Nokia N95-1 which they selected from my collection. To say they were not living on the edge of mobile tech would be an understatement… They were sharing a Nokia 6600 after my Lindsey’s BB Pearl was “washed” by their daughter. I’m not clear what happened to Henry’s phone, but it’s dead and gone.
When I was asked whether I might have any old phones, I did not really have to think for very long …
While I don’t still have all of those devices sitting and waiting, they chose from an array of Palm, and Nokia devices to select their “new” phones. A quick reset and sim swap and they were on the air – thank you open phones!
Neither is a sophisticated user, but a quick demo on S60 and Lindsey and Henry seem to be on their way. Both seem very excited about the image capture options, music features and the ability to connect and share on a TV with the accessory cables.
Having Wifi is also an interesting twist to have since neither have real data plans currently with their carrier TMO… though I showed them how to connect here in the house so they could browse and check email. I even used the Nokia settings configurator to send Henry’s email settings OTA To the N93 so he did not have to tap it in via T9. It will be interesting to track their progress moving forward with much more advanced phones than they have been used to using. I’m hoping they have as positive an experience as I’ve had since making the move into S60.
I had a great conversation this week with SightSpeed CEO, Peter Csarty on the launch of their business conferencing product.
Sightspeed is taking a very unique and aggresive stance in realtime business communications with this update. If you’ve worked in a larger company you may have seen a Polycom (or similar) video conference set-up like I have, though you also probably rarely if ever, used it. Everyone regards these things as unfriendly and expensive and in general they are!
Taking lessons and experience from over a decade of work as well as knowledge gained from the 30,000 business users of the consumer product, Sightspeed has rolled out an enhanced version of their software-only conferencing product specifically geared to the SMB (< 500 people) market. You supply the camera (or bring your existing web cam enabled computer) and you've got a video conferencing ready setup. Since this works with any web cam, you can take your calls on the road and not worry about being restrained to the conference room. Peter assured me that this works on a 256K connection which means mobile 3G users can also get in on calls. Sightspeed has done a lot of work behind the scenes to optimize the video calling quality and general quality of service. The service was developed with video as the priority and in calls you'll see that it shows.
While there’s nothing stopping you from using either the Sightspeed consumer product or even an existing solution like iChat, Sightspeed offers a great deal of features and most importantly support (over video!) for the business customer. As a business product, an IT manager can easily manage the seats, allocate any DID lines and view usage reporting … in other words it’s designed to be simple.
Each account also gets a personal URL which enables participation by parties without a camera for view-only sessions which could be great for an instant sharing session when a phone call or an emailed PDF simply doesn’t cut it. There’s a 30 day trial on the site, why not give it a try!
Technorati Tags:
Video, VOIP, sightspeed, conference, smb
I’m not sure what your experience has been but Gmail IMAP is one slow ass system. On my MacBookPro, I left it running overnight to try and sync everything, but even today I am finding my system feels as though it is underwater. I see beach-balls and find navigating even my inbox to be rather torturous.
Force Quit seems to be the only way out … Guess I’ll stick to web Gmail for now. Perhaps I’ll get lucky and the 2.0 version will show it soon … yeah right.
I learned today that the N95 actually has an accelerometer and that rotateMe 2.0 will arrive next month ready to take full advantage of this making your device much easier to use as you maneuver through multimedia, maps and the web — something I do every day!
Technorati Tags:
N-Series, N95, Nokia, accelerometer, rotateme
Can you hear me Obi Wan?, originally uploaded by atmasphere.
Just having some fun with Photo Booth in Leopard … using the Hologram effect.
Very cool… Apple has decided to offer Nick Haley, an 18yr old kid from the UK, an amazing deal. They are upgrading the production of his home-brew iPod Touch commerical into one that will air on TV during Football and primetime starting this weekend. Pretty sweet to see that Apple is paying attention to the community. Good ideas can come from anyone.
Would you like to win a Nokia N810 Internet Tablet?
Thoughtfix has posted the following video explaining the general idea, but head over to the Tabletblog site to get the scoop with all the rules. I’m one of the judges and I look forward to seeing your entries! The deadline to submit your videos is November 16 so get going!
When I initially discussed GrandCentral, I was given a special conditional call forwading code which enabled my phone to send voicemail messages directly into GrandCentral as opposed to my carrier. This is great for people managing a lot of numbers and as it was pre-iPhone, at the time offered a way to get something like Apple’s soon to launch Visual Voicemail.
I am a few devices later now, and have been craving the Grandcentral voicemail features again and decided to set it up for myself this time (thanks to Phoneboy for the search suggestion).
With a simple code, you can initiate conditional call forwarding on your GSM phone and choose where to send calls….
Dial: *61*yournumber# and hit send. I’ve entered my GrandCentral number as my number, but really you can do this for any number you want. Dialing ##61# and send should return things the way they were if you prefer.
From here it’s a matter of choosing how you’d like to use GrandCentral… The simplest way is to just call your own number when you want to retrieve a message – which is suggested in the alert txt. If you’d like access to a more visual style you need to fire up your browser and check out the m.grandcentral.com site.
As you can see from the N95 screenshots below, GrandCentral offers a pretty robust way to manage voicemail. You can see who’s left new messages, review a historical listing, listen and easily call people back — using your GrandCentral number as the outbound CallerID.
As an added bonus to me, I no longer get the encoded double txt alerts from ATT’s Visual Voicemail system.
Walt Mossberg has a great piece (Free My Phone!) up on All Things D, which is a must read for anyone even remotely interested in the mobile industry.
While he’s not saying anything that we (you gentle reader) have not heard or discussed, to hear it from someone with as much consumer clout as Walt Mossberg is something worth noting.
A shortsighted and often just plain stupid federal government has allowed itself to be bullied and fooled by a handful of big wireless phone operators for decades now. And the result has been a mobile phone system that is the direct opposite of the PC model. It severely limits consumer choice, stifles innovation, crushes entrepreneurship, and has made the U.S. the laughingstock of the mobile-technology world, just as the cellphone is morphing into a powerful hand-held computer.
Whether you are a consumer, a hardware maker, a software developer or a provider of cool new services, it’s hard to make a move in the American cellphone world without the permission of the companies that own the pipes. While power in other technology sectors flows to consumers and nimble entrepreneurs, in the cellphone arena it remains squarely in the hands of the giant carriers. [All Things D]
Interestingly there’s no mention of Nokia in the piece, just that Apple was able to sell the iPhone without the carrier getting inside. This is not entirely correct, there are no ATT apps or services, but there are limitations in what the iPhone can really do…. VOIP anyone? We can argue there are no applications later.
When I was in San Francisco last week the topic of unlocked phones came up and Bill Plummer suggested the phrase Born Free instead of unlocked. The term unlocked implies that the device was actually locked at one point and is now no longer that way. The Nokia N-Series devices are largely sold direct in the US – without a carrier contract and without carrier involvement on any level.
It took me a moment to appreciate that this is not just semantics, but truly an important difference. There are not too many manufacturers offering open devices… Palm has previously sold a GSM Treo without a carrier and I believe Motorola is starting to offer a device or two.
Clearly buying an open device is not something the average consumer seeks today. Devices are not subsidized so they cost more on the surface and you typically cannot use carrier services like music and video. Since I don’t use any of those services anyway. I literally just want open access to the network.
Without a carrier getting in your way, it’s easy to add your own content, browse and customize the device the way you want AND most importantly use things that were intended to be used in full. You simply pick a GSM carrier add your SIM and are all set. Should you choose to switch carriers, you are free to do so (outside of any contract term of course) and use the same device with another carrier.
The carrier BS has progressed to a point that goes well beyond reason and basic business and can only be seen as driven by greed. It hurts the consumer and I think will start to hurt the carriers as people become more savvy to the experience they could be having. There’s absolutely no reason for matters to be as locked as they are and I will advise those who ask to buy open to keep the as much of the power in the hands of the consumer.
Technorati Tags:
Apple, AT&T, broken, DUN, E-Series, Gizmo Project, Google, Internet Tablet, Jaiku, Maemo, Marketing, Mass Market, mobile, N-Series, N95, Nokia, open, Palm, S60, Social Networking, Sprint, Standards, T-Mobile, TruPhone, unlocked, Verizon, Video, VOIP, Vringo, WiFi, YouTube, Motorola
Not sure they are even bothering with this …
AT&T, which already lets Napster subscribers transfer music from their personal computer to their cell phone via a cable or a storage card, said it would sell Napster music directly on its phones for $7.49 for a bundle of five songs, or $1.99 for a la carte purchases, beginning in mid-November.[News.com]
Silicon Alley Insider has the most consise version which they’ve very adeptly recycled from previous attempts at this mobile download BS:
…yet again, consumers are being asked to spend more to purchase something on their phone than they would if they bought it anywhere else. In this case [Napster] and AT&T are charging $7.49 for 5 songs: That’s a 50% markup over what it would cost to buy the songs via iTunes…
I just posted my initial thoughts on the Nokia N810 over on the MaemoApps site… head over and let me know what you think or if you’ve got any questions you’d like to have answered.
This sounds very cool…
In an exclusive interview with Develop, Nokia’s games boss Mark Ollila has revealed that the company is hard at work on multiple cross-platform games for its revamped N-Gage platform.
Earlier this year it emerged the company was developing a new game in association with studio RedLynx which could be played on both PC and mobile and used Nokia’s SNAP technology as its connectivity backbone. That title, Project White Rock, reportedly boasts hundreds of lines of recorded dialogue suggesting it is a more traditional, possibly MMO-like, game experience for multiple players.
But Nokia also has another such title in development, Ollila explained – one which features a user-generated content element.
‘For one of the titles we are working on we are looking at the possibility of letting players create a game and sharing that experience with others,’ he explained adding that the decision to create games that work across both mobile and PC is part of Nokia’s larger plan to build community around its rebirthed N-Gage service.
I can’t imagine there will be Mac love here, but regardless Nokia is feeling very progressive to me these days and that’s a very good thing.
Technorati Tags:
Marketing, mobile, N-Series, Nokia, N-Gage, N81, UGC, Games
A quick hey from our breakfast table after spending a few moments with the new tablet. So far it’s excellent! Very solid build and beautiful screen. The keyboard takes a bit to get used to as it’s small, but easy to use.
The hardware is pre-pro and you can expect the full release in both hardware and software in the next 4-5 weeks.
Reggie at Internet Tablet Talk scores by noting the release of the Nokia N810 Internet Tablet Press images…(below) I’m looking forward to seeing this new tablet today and spending some quality time with Nokia team as well. Stay tuned for more as the day goes on as I am hoping to bring you video updates and live pics…
Technorati Tags:
GPS, Internet Tablet, Maemo, N-Series, N810, Navigation, Nokia
I am sitting on a plane en route to the Web 2.0 Summit writing this on my N800, enjoying my time to write some things wihout distraction… aside from the guy in 11B reading this over my shoulder!
About two weeks ago, Tommi at the S60 Applications blog asked for feedback on the Nokia Beta Labs program. My initial thought is that it’s really a solid idea which enables the feedback loop via the blogosphere and certainly on the applications blog comments. I posted something similarly on Tommi’s site but now that some time has passed it seems that perhaps the focus could be on altering the existing status more rather than pushing out the new. Don’t get me wrong – I’m an applications junkie just like most of you, but I would like to see some renovation before building more.
When I attended the Evening with S60 event in NYC, I was told (incorrectly now) that the S60v3 FP1 browser would be released within 30 days to other S60v3 devices which was great news. I saw a massive spike in traffic after my update on this news which confirmed I was far from alone in looking for this type of update. Nokia, with the exception of Maps, seems to require a new unit to get what become device standard features (of course right after you) purchase your phone.
Of course, a long time has now passed and we’ve yet to see a release. Instead, we heard about the widgets which will be coming in FP2 probably in Q1 2008. Not to take away from widgets (I think I’ve seen the light a bit for very task specific information), the browser now seems a bit limited in one very key area thanks to some healthy competition from both the iPhone as well as Nokia’s own N800 . The iPhone has enabled a VERY rich use of tabs which make maintaining simultaneous activities online possible. The S60 browser can also do multiple tabs and actually does them quite well. There is NO WAY TO MANUALLY OPEN A NEW WINDOW.
The hack I’ve found for this is silly, and takes longer than I would like to get going, but has now become a part of my browsing process on the N95-3.
The browser is the perfect candidate for a quick beta release through the labs. Many devices do not have enough RAM to browse in this manner (yet) and it’s probably more power user than mass feature, but isn’t that who’s visting and using the beta labs anyway? We should not have to wait for a Firmware release (which we all know wipes the device fresh) or worse, a new device to get such aseemingly small adjustment. This really should be something we just have in devices like the N95-3, N95 8GB, N81, N81 8GB, E90 and as well as future devicess that have enough operating RAM to make this possible – which should cover all N and E-Series moving forward, right?
The iPhone has really turned the mobile browsing experience up on its head. Regardless of their true capabilities, all mobile devices are being compared to the iPhone. The fact that the same engine is used in S60 and the iPhone makes this even more open to scrutiny.
The N800, which does not share the webkit engine, can go toe-to-toe with the iPhone even defeating it with some complex sites, but requires a second purchase. This is great for both Nokia’s bottom line (as well as non Nokia handset users) It is admittedly far more enjoyable to browse on the larger screen, it’s not something you always want in your pocket.
There are some great mobile web applications and services which have sprung up seemingly overnight to support the million plus iPhones… How many S60 devices are there? Considerably more…
A device like the N95-3 should not be hamstrung by a missing feature like this. The game has changed a bit now and we need to look how others are doing things and what can be learned to improve what we have and what’s to come.
Love to hear your thoughts here…
Technorati Tags:
Apple, E-Series, Firmware, Internet Tablet, iPhone, Maemo, Marketing, mobile, N-Series, N800, N810, N95, Nokia, Nokia Maps, S60, Nokia Beta Labs
