Monthly Archives: September 2009

Palm chided by USB group for iTunes shenanigans

Posted on September 25, 2009 by Shaun

usbOops! Sorry I am a bit late with this, but the iTunes / Palm Pre news continues with a rebuke from the USB Group to Palm- “Palm’s attempts to wiggle its way into the iTunes ecosphere by dressing up its Pre smartphone like an iPod may have backfired, landing them in hot water with the group in charge of the USB standard.

Let’s recap: Back in May, Palm announced an innovative new method of getting media onto their new Pre smartphone—namely, pretending to be an iPod and latching onto Apple’s iTunes software, lamprey-style. To the surprise of just one guy—to be fair, the same guy who was surprised that Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen was thoroughly unwatchable—Apple went ahead and blocked Palm’s little trick in a subsequent iTunes update.

Palm tried again, this time using an approach where the Pre reports Apple’s own USB vendor ID in hopes of circumventing Apple’s patch. Apple updated iTunes to 9, once again thwarting Palm. Then, mid-scuffle, Palm drew a deep lungful of air and cried “Mommmmmmmm!”—the part of “mom” in this case being played by the USB Implementers Forum, the maintainers of the specification…” More at Macworld.

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waze GPS alternative arrivals for all

Posted on September 25, 2009 by Shaun

wazewaze is an alternative GPS app which has just been released for iPhone, Symbian, Android and Windows Mobile devices, with the possibility of a BlackBerry version coming soon.It does, however, appear to be very US centric at the moment.

Waze is a social mobile application that enables drivers to build and use real-time road intelligence. The service includes constantly-updated road maps, alerts on traffic and accidents, and data providing users with the fastest route to get to wherever they need to go.

Map and traffic updates are automatically collected and generated as users drive with waze activated, but drivers can also actively report and update other users with what’s happening on the road including accident alerts, police traps, weather hazards, cheap gas offers and more. And the best part? Because the map and all of its content is driver-generated, waze is completely free for users.

At waze, we encourage developers to build additional applications for drivers using our live maps. We provide access to the map and the map data itself as well as our real time API. Please check our terms of service for more information and feel free to contact us if you have any questions.

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Vodafone announces the 360 H1 and 360 M1

Posted on September 24, 2009 by Shaun

h1Vodafone has announced the 360 H1 and 360 M1 which are both made by Samsung. The specs on the H1 look particularly good, but compatibility and expandability (software-wise) may be an issue. Check out this video to see what they can do.

The touchscreen Vodafone 360 H1 by Samsung delivers the ultimate Vodafone 360 experience. The crisp, bright 16 million colour display showcases a unique 3D interface, integrated GPS, push email, audio and video playback, up to ten hours talk time, and much more.

Key phone features:
3.5″ OLED touchscreen
16GB internal memory
Wi-Fi / HSDPA / Bluetooth 2.0
5Megapixel autofocus camera with flash
58×115.9×12.9mm / 134g

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O2 to sell the Pre in the UK from 16th October

Posted on September 24, 2009 by Shaun

preaO2 today confirms that the Palm® Pre™ phone will be available in the UK on 16 October exclusively on the O2 network. Customers can purchase the new device directly from O2, the Carphone Warehouse, Phones4U and Business partners who are part of O2’s specific partner programme. It will also be available for purchase online from the O2 shop at www.o2.co.uk/shop.

Ronan Dunne, CEO of Telefonica O2 UK said “Today’s announcement reinforces O2’s position as the home of the smartphone. With the addition of the excellent Palm Pre to our already extensive portfolio, we will continue to offer our customers the widest range of the very best devices on the market today.”

“There’s a lot of excitement about Palm Pre in Europe as we continue to expand Palm webOS products across new carriers and countries,” said Jon Rubinstein chairman and chief executive officer, Palm, Inc. “We look forward to launching Palm Pre with O2 so people in the UK can see firsthand how Palm webOS offers a new and better smartphone experience.”

Palm Pre for consumers

Palm Pre is free to O2 customers taking out a 24-month contract and to customers taking an 18-month contract at £44.05 or £73.41 per month. See attached table or the O2 website for full tariff options. All customers will receive unlimited UK data browsing over O2’s HSDPA network and unlimited access to 7,500 Wi-Fi hotspots through both The Cloud and now BT Openzone.

The Palm Pre will also be sold with some innovative accessories. The Palm Touchstone Charging Dock allows connectionless charging of your Palm webOS™ phone. Palm Touchstone is based on inductive technology based inside the Touchstone Charging Dock which allows you to charge the handset without connecting a wire directly to it. The Touchstone and Back Cover will retail at £44.11 a saving of £10.

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QOTD: What’s PIM?

Posted on September 24, 2009 by Shaun

qotd23What do you count as PIM? Calendar, contacts, to-do, notes, email etc? I’ve always thought it was just the first three for some reason.

Bonus question- how much does PIM management influence your choice of device?

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RIM and Apple finally come together

Posted on September 24, 2009 by Shaun

bmgiPhone 3GS + Blackberry Music Gateway – a perfect match

The one annoying thing about my current car is that all the AV connections are situated way in the rear, making it impractical to connect my iPhone to the car’s stereo.

Until recently, I made do with one of those lame FM transmitters which broadcasts audio over empty FM channels. It was less than ideal: the signal kept dropping out, and I never knew when some other radio station would completely obliterate the signal from my iPhone.

Enter the BlackBerry Music Gateway from RIM. In a podcast, Dieter Bohn from Smartphone Experts mentioned that he was using one in his car with his iPhone and how delighted he was with its performance, so I took the plunge and ordered one.

Put simply, the Music Gateway is a Bluetooth base station which plugs into your home or car audio system, providing a wireless bridge for your A2DP enabled smartphone.

gatewayThe device is ludicrously tiny, less than two inches square and under half an inch deep, making it easy to tuck away out of sight. Mine came supplied with both a standard AUX cable and an AUX to AV cable, making it a cinch to plug into the audio inputs in my car. (N.B. If you don’t already have one, you will need to buy a BlackBerry-compatible mini- USB charger to power the device.)

The included manual is straightforward and, even though the instructions are targeted at BlackBerry users, I managed to pair my iPhone 3GS with the device in less than a minute. (Of course, this is something that only needs to be done once, thereafter the iPhone will automatically hook up to the Gateway whenever the latter is powered up and in range.)

To say I am delighted with how smoothly everything works would be an understatement. I simply leave Bluetooth always enabled on my 3GS so that it automatically hooks up to the Music Gateway as soon as I turn on my car engine. Within seconds, the two devices are talking to each other and music, audiobooks and podcasts are playing back through my car’s audio system. Sound quality is excellent, and I haven’t yet experienced any kind of signal dropout.

When music is playing, the iPhone displays a message showing that the it is connected to the BlackBerry Music Gateway alongside an illuminated Bluetooth symbol. Tapping on the symbol allows you to switch to a different audio output – to the iPhone’s own speaker, for example, or a headset.

I try not to fiddle around much with my iPhone while driving, so I use Voice Control on the 3GS to switch between albums and artists. I’m probably going to get a Jawbone Bluetooth earpiece so that I move to a completely handsfree solution for calls and iPod control.

I only use the BlackBerry Music Gateway in my car, but it will work just as well with in the home. Overall, I can highly recommend this setup for anyone looking for a simple way to get music from their iPhone to an external audio system. Trevor (lazyboy)

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Yankee Group Predicts $4.2 Billion Mobile App Gold Rush by 2013

Posted on September 24, 2009 by Shaun

pda247The Yankee Group is making a huge prediciton for mobile app sales within 4 years- $4.2 billion! “Boston, MA, September 22, 2009 — Yankee Group estimates that nearly 7 billion U.S. smartphone app downloads will garner $4.2 billion in revenue by 2013. And with the number of smartphone users set to quadruple to 160 million at the same time, Yankee Group uses just two words to describe the market to come: gold rush.

How can developers and app store owners position themselves to profit from the impending bonanza? Two Yankee Group reports, “Forecasting the U.S. Mobile App Gold Rush” and “Which Mobile App Platform Deserves Your Software?” offer key insights:

Fit the app to the platform. While Nokia, Apple, Windows Mobile and RIM each have an installed base of more than 25 million devices, not all platforms are created equal. For now, consumer developers should focus on RIM’s Blackberry, where consumer-oriented apps are scarce, while those aiming at enterprises should target Apple’s iPhone and Google’s Android to address those relatively untapped markets.

Price your apps appropriately. Paid apps will account for one in four downloads in 2013. And while 99-cent apps are the norm now, Yankee Group predicts that paid apps will cost $2.37 on average by 2013, increasing today’s $343 million download market by more than 10 times over those five years.

Focus on marketing. App store owners need to attract developers by marketing their apps and promoting the store’s successes via top 25 lists, download counters and running revenue tallies.

“Apps have been around for years,”said Carl Howe, director at Yankee Group and author of the reports. “But app stores have created mass-market products with million-dollar revenue streams attached. Every mobile software developer could be the next Bill Gates for smartphones, but only if they bet on the platforms with the right reach and fit for their application.”

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Twitterlerts for BlackBerry

Posted on September 24, 2009 by Shaun

Twitterlerts for BlackBerry is a new tool for searching the myriad of information which is held with Twitter. It is quite cheap and should help you if you need to find specific information in a hurry.

“Tweet on the go and search out the best of Twitter while you’re mobile – don’t miss a beat when something happens in your world.

Twitterlerts is the Twitter client that makes its easy to stay on top of the subjects that really matter to you – and reveal a world of ideas, comments and opinion on what is important in your life – your company, your products, your competitors, sports team or hobbies.

Twitterlerts is a powerful and convenient tool for searching all that is posted on the Twitter network. You can easily save searches you make often, so they’re just a tap away. If something really matters to you, and getting timely information is crucial – Twitterlerts will alert you on your BlackBerry so you can react on the go.

You don’t need a Twitter account to use Twitterlerts, its available to everyone. If you do sign in, then you can post new tweets of your own, or reply, repost or follow the Tweeter’s who match your interests.

Twitterlerts and the power of the Twitter network give you a valuable new tool, for business or leisure!”

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Winterface 2.0 with new Faces!

Posted on September 24, 2009 by Shaun

w2Winterface 2.0 has been released and comes with some clever new features- “VITO Technology releases new version of Winterface. Now you may customize the look of your phone to your personal needs: change skins (10 new skins are available), background color or picture, headings for the icons and much more. Change the face of your device together with your mood!

NEW SKINS. Some time ago we had a contest “Give a new face to Winterface”. Thanks to this we got lots of skins made by our users for Winterface. Now we’re glad to announce the official support of the skins that we received during the contest. And all of our users now can choose the skins they liked here, download and install the cab file.

CHANGEABLE BACKGROUND. It is possible either to change background color in Casino and Tile skins or to change the whole background picture.

CUSTOMIZABLE HEADINGS. You may now either remove or add icon headings. Besides you can change them. Thus you may name apps on your device the way you like.

IMPROVED FUNCTIONALITY. The dots in the bottom are clickable now so you can be immediately put to the screen you want to. When opening the running apps you may not only close applications one by one but also close all running apps at once. The battery charge is now seen like a %. If you have any VITO software (http://vitotechnology.com/products.html) the icons in Winterface will stylistically coincide with the skin you choose.

BUG FIXES. The lock screen of Winterface won’t interfere anymore while you’re speaking over the phone. If your device is switched on with a password Winterface will allow you to enter it. Calendar widget now shows the appointment for all future events as well as repeated appointments. The locked Winterface can’t be anymore closed by the “v” gesture.

Winterface is available for $19.95 at http://vitotechnology.com/vito-mobile-shell.html.”

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Real Soccer 2010 now available for the iPhone

Posted on September 24, 2009 by Shaun

rfGameloft has released Real Soccer 2010 for the iPhone (sorry, bit late with this one) and first impressions are that the control mechanism is much improved. There appear to be some slow downs with the online play, but this is quite possibly the best iPhone soccer game yet. The ability to upload replays to YouTube is an added bonus and all of this shows that there are still areas in which developers can stretch the capabilities of the iPhone platform for gaming.

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PDair releases Garmin-Asus nuvifone M20 case (already!)

Posted on September 24, 2009 by Shaun

PDair has released a selection of leather cases for the Garmin-Asus nuvifone M20. This is unusual because there is no way to get the phone yet, but you can still buy a case in preparation. Four different styles are currently available-

Belt clip included.
Opens and closes with magnetic studs,for ease of use.
White stitch finishing,making this case look more beautiful.

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QOTD: Mobile gaming?

Posted on September 23, 2009 by Shaun

qotd24What type of games do you prefer to play on a mobile device? For all of the complex and graphically rich titles on the iPhone, I still prefer games that make me think like WordPop! It works well because it truly is one I can plat for 5 minutes or 5 hours. Games like Touch Cricket are also good for a 2 minute play. In short, the simple games still seem to work best on a mobile for me.

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Smartphone magazines

Posted on September 23, 2009 by Shaun

ngSid sent the following to me last week- “With all this talk about ebooks and coupled with the much better syncing of TV shows from itunes to the Iphone I wondered what you thought about eMagazines or eNewspapers.

I know that there are excellent BBC and other sites for news, but these do require an internet connection to read and for me still don’t give the feel of a newspaper.

I think there’s room out there for someone to develop an app that allows you to read a magazine on a smartphone (with a decent sized screen) which gives the feel of a magazine or newspaper, but that is readable.

Imagine subscribing to your favourite journal and have it download via itunes. For me there’s some mileage in this if done right. What’cha think?”

This is something I have pondered for quite some time now and even took some steps a while back to set up such a beast. It would require a huge amount of work, but I agree with Sid that the major magazine producers could pull this off and potentially open a whole new revenue stream.

The problem is that it would cut into their traditional revenues and they would have to charge a ‘lot’ less for each issue. Add this to the fact that the magazine experience will almost certainly not be recreated perfectly on a mobile device and we could have a long wait on our hands for such a service.

What do you think?

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Memory Refresh Elite for BlackBerry

Posted on September 23, 2009 by Shaun

Some BlackBerry’s suffer from memory issues, but Memory Refresh Elite may act as a life saver for some of you. It is currently discounted to only $2.99 and would appear to do what it is supposed to do- “In side-by-side trials Memory Refresh Elite performs consistently equal or better than its higher priced competitors. The difference between our memory recovery program and theirs? About ten dollars. Don’t be fooled by their high price tag, save memory and your hard-earned money with Memory Refresh Elite!

Memory Refresh Elite gives a boost of Flash and Ram memory. Memory Refresh Elite is perfect for high-end users who experience problems with device slowdowns and lock-ups and need a way to maximize performance without a battery pull.”

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Mastersoft moves to the iPhone

Posted on September 23, 2009 by Shaun

mlcI somehow failed to notice that Mastersoft Mobile Solutions now has two titles available for the iPhone. My Last Cigarette and Kakuro Puzzle have both been ported from Windows Mobile and work well on the new platform.

“Quit smoking today with new My Last Cigarette and stay quit.

My Last Cigarette for iPhone is a proven aid to help you resist restarting this fatal habit.

My Last Cigarette is a serious tool based upon years of medical research into the harmful effects of smoking.”

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