Written by NEWS on Saturday, December 6th, 2008 in News.
FROM APPLETELL - The MPTVOutWindow class in the iPhone 2.2 software allows developers to output the iPhone’s screen to a larger screen, such as a TV, thereby taking advantage of its speakers and size. MORE »
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Written by JG Mason on Saturday, December 6th, 2008 in News.
Section: Communications, Cellular Providers, Smartphones, Mobile
Who would have predicted this: 16 months after its introduction the iPhone is #1 in sales in the US displacing the RAZR, beating Windows Mobile in smartphone sales and still going strong. Now, we learn there is no bubble of interest in the iPhone applications that can run on the phone, demand continues to grow.
“It’s unbelievable,“ says Piper Jaffray’s Gene Munster. “It’s a differentiator. We think in ‘09, it’s going to be a $1 billion market place and Apple will probably take about 30 percent of that. There’s virtually no operating expense for them. They just approve the apps. It increases our confidence that” Apple can make these numbers.
For those slow at math like me, that is $300 million Apple will make off the app store by doing nothing than keeping the electricity on for the servers to hum. If I were Steve Jobs, Apple’s #1 man, I’d sit next to the servers and laugh demonically. Maybe he does that, I won’t judge.
But what intrigues me is the community Apple is building around the phone. Lately, big businesses are creating iPhone apps to reach customers. Obama had his iPhone app (I’ll refrain from suggesting it is what won him the election). If everyone and everything is on the iPhone, why get any other phone?
And this could lead to my very favorite thing: car integration. Yes, the BMW has iPod integration, but I want to dock my iPod on the dash, charge/play/talk/navigate etc. all on the iPod all at the same time. All these users and infrastructure could give folks the inclination to help integrate the iPhone into our car. I am tired of the wires, hokey docks, too few cigarette lighters, blah blah blah.
This stone is rolling and continues to pick up steam. It is only going to go faster if Wal-Mart really does have a $99 iPhone up its sleeves.
Read [CNBC]
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Written by JG Mason on Friday, December 5th, 2008 in News.
Section: Communications, Cellphones, Cellular Providers, Email / IM, Smartphones, Mobile, Originals, Columns, Who's On Crack, Features
This is where we call out the tech moves that seem odd, out of touch or just plain straight up smokin’ crack. This week sees posturing, positioning and flat out insanity.
Here’s what I am calling out this week as whack:
Sure, supporting all these OSes isn’t easy. Your tech’s knowledge has to be limited by all the myriad of OSes they’re supposed to know. News came today that you blue-sky-guy says Symbian would be good choice for a company-wide one OS to offer and support. But consolidating down to one OS? And you think Symbian is that OS? Really?
Whispering sweet nothings into Symbian’s ear isn’t going to get you anywhere. Stop worrying about a Nokia take over of the US market, that train isn’t leaving the station. A much better idea, at least in my mind, is to convince Apple to license its software onto other devices. Hitch your train to that engine, crackheads.
Sometimes, all that is needed is an email to customers. Something quiet in the night that says, “hey boys, go here and download this and you get Outlook Calendar support, sweet huh?“. But no, you had to go and issue a press release telling everyone our out-of-the-box expectation of calendar syncing was off. Thanks for pointing this out, as I’ve not made fun of the Instinct in a while. I feel better now. iPhone killer? LOL.
I watch the stock market. I watch the price of light sweet crude. And now, I am watching the daily price of Verizon’s Samsung Omnia. This thing is more volatile than a barrel full of gasoline next to a Sony laptop.
Jump beside me in the way back machine, we travel back to 2008, a cloudy November day, the 25th if you are taking notes. The shiny Omnia is introduced at $249.99 after a lame $70 mail in rebate. Now, as we are chased by the bizarre inhabitants of November 25, we land on Dec 2nd of the same year. Here we find the same Omnia, now priced at $199 after the same lame mail in rebate. Nervous much?
Did you wake up, presumably strung out, in December and say to yourself, “Holy cow! Have you heard about this economy stuff? And this Apple phone, who knew about that? Quick, slash the price before these phones end up at Odd Lot!“ Lay off the dope.
I believe we all keep expecting someone else to “get it” with phone software and it clouds are judgment and/or enjoyment of an otherwise snazzy phone. The new Nokia entry is beautiful, well-built with lovely screen resolution. But. And then things start flowing. The biggest “but” is Nokia refuses to update its OS for the touchscreen times.
HTC gets it. Their Windows Mobile skins walk the line of needed Active Sync support mated with something actually functional and close to fun to use. But not Nokia. And the N97 is a bit brickish. Keep at though, your getting warmer. Appletell’s Josh Holat, while espousing his love for Apple’s device sums up his look at the N97 with:
“Although companies like RIM and Nokia can try to beat out Apple, I don’t see it happening anytime soon, that’s for sure.“
That’s my list for this week. Let me know in the comments what crazy things I missed and stay off the crack kids.
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Written by NEWS on Friday, December 5th, 2008 in News.
FROM APPLETELL - The Joost streaming video app for iPhone/iPod touch crashes a lot and features a terrible user interface, but it also has porn. MORE »
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Written by Mike on Friday, December 5th, 2008 in News.
Written by Mike on Friday, December 5th, 2008 in News.
Written by JG Mason on Friday, December 5th, 2008 in News.
Section: Communications, Cellphones, Cellular Providers, Smartphones, Mobile
Man, would I have loved to be in the crowd at the Symbian Partner Conference when AT&T’s Director of Next Generation Services, Roger Smith, stated the telecom’s lofty goal of having the company’s smartphone offerings on the same operating system. You know what is coming: he said Symbian is “a very credible and likely candidate” to become that one operating system.
Symbian, which garners 45% or so of the worldwide smartphone OS market, owes much of its success to Nokia. The platform is stable, works well, and is loved in Europe. As of late, Symbian was purchased by Nokia and is committed to going open source.
Other news this morning from Bloomberg states Apple’s iPhone is recession-proofing AT&T thanks the steady line of new customers for the device. The company is expected to be the only carrier to post accelerating growth this quarter as companies hunker down for the economic storm. While AT&T has announced layoffs, subscribers are not detered from obtaining these luxury phones.
“People still want those iconic devices and are willing to pay up for them,” said Will Power, analyst at Robert W. Baird & Co.. “Look at wireless and consumer behavior generally, this also applies to the lower- income demographics.”
Additionally, iPhone buyers are among the industry’s most wanted customers, those that pay 1.6 times what the average customer pays for phone and data services. In a time where carriers are running out of new customers, they are looking to steal or hold onto these higher-paying customers.
Perhaps Mr. Smith was sucking up the Symbian crowd? Certainly a unified OS would make AT&T’s life easier. One OS to support would be a welcome task to AT&T’s customer support team who currently deal with Windows Mobile, Blackberry, Apple, and then the home brew jobs from Pantech, Samsung and lots more. Is it possible AT&T could narrow that list down to just one?
Perhaps, but at what cost? When you remove consumer choice, demand will typically lessen. Unless other carriers adopt similar rules (and who wants to be the first?), AT&T’s dream of one OS is just pie in the sky thinking.
Source: [Bloomberg]
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Written by Naveen on Friday, December 5th, 2008 in News.
Yet another day and yet another fake creation from the land of cloned phones, but we must agree that many of these Chinese phones prove to be better than the real ones. It’s the Barbie P520 clamshell phone this time that shares the looks of Mattel’s Barbie B2 mp3 player. Anyway, this one is not a sponsored product of Mattel. The most interesting part is that the pink heart shaped box even bears the tag line that reads “Barbie Music Phone.” The Barbie P520 phone doesn’t look phony by any means when it comes to technical specifications. The phone measures 60 × 63 × 21mm and weighs 110 grams.
Written by Naveen on Friday, December 5th, 2008 in News.
If your current phone just can’t handle the extreme conditions such as dust, shock, vibration, temperature extremes, low pressure and solar radiation, all you need is a rugged phone. Are you on the hunt for a phone that could take a beating? Here we present the 10 best rugged mobile phones of all time. Check the out after the jump…
