Link: Sky News: SMS smog alerts

Environment groups have attacked the New South Wales Government for a new plan that could see pollution alerts sent out to Sydneysiders.

Subscribers would receive a text message or email telling them when levels are high, but critics say the money would be better spent cutting Sydney’s smog.

Sounds a good idea, but there’s a lot of opposition:

The Asthma Foundation says more needs to be done about what’s causing air pollution in the first place.

And the state’s Shadow Environment Minister Pru Goward says that warning people about days on which they could be poisoned, but doing nothing about it, is a disgrace.

The Greens say the plan ignores the big picture and something should be done about getting cars off the road.

Fair points really, I guess it’s like sending you a text telling you you’re about to be run over by a bus when you’re nailed down to the road and can’t move. Or something like that! Still, good to see governments around the world getting on the text bandwagon at last.

Link: SpinVox picks Six - www.mobile-ent.biz

Here’s a neat one. Six Apart are the people behind LiveJournal, TypePad and publishing platform Moveable Type. Spinvox - well I doubt they need any introduction to regular readers!

SpinVox has teamed up with the blogging software provider Six Apart to enable the latter’s 12 million users to speak a message into their phone that is posted as text on their online blogs.

SpinVox is best known for a service that converts voicemails to text and sends them to the receiver as an SMS. The Six Apart deal is based an another SpinVox product called SpinMyBlog, which works on the same principle but emails the text message to a web site.

Great idea - personally I prefer writing things myself with a keyboard rather than dictating them. If this blog entry had been done by dictation there would have been lots of ‘errs’, ‘hmmms’ and the odd bit of profanity in there when I knocked my cup of tea over

Link: Scripting News: 5/24/2007

Europe travel questions 
1. Will my Cingular Blackberry work in Europe?
2. Will my Sprint EVDO?
3. Will there be Internet on the KLM flight from SFO to Amsterdam?
4. Will there be power at the seat?
5. Which power adapters do I need to bring?

Answers on a postcard please!

Yes, no no no no and Apple’s own proprietary power cables (purchasable from Apple Store Regent Street by the way), as Jeff Jarvis notes). Am I right?

Ben Harvey returns for another observation for a Friday afternoon, fresh from a week of relaxation in Portugal.

- - - -

They say that you don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone – mostly, this is true, especially in the areas of money & being happy with your own body. However, it really stands out, of course, when you detach yourself from all your links, all your connections with friends and colleagues and business and go on holiday. And then don’t like it.

I’ve just returned from a week away in Portugal and I am incredibly, incredibly glad to be back. The relief, as the wheels of the plane kissed down onto this green & pleasant land (at least, as pleasant & green as Heathrow can be. Duty-free absinthe springs to mind, for some reason) was incredible – it rose off me like steam. I’m not a nervous flyer, even when storm-fronts over Spain kicked our little flying tube around the sky and flung my poor gin everywhere, but I did get the feeling that the crap, wonky technology upon which Portugal relies may have somehow infected even the hallowed, proud vehicles of British Airways.

Don’t get me wrong. Portugal has a plethora of smashing things about it, and the people there are embarrassingly friendly, but the same laissez-faire attitude that defines the relaxed, sociable, three-hour lunch-break culture is a total anathema to two things; business & technology. It’s telling that a country that receives whopping subsidies to spunk on everything else (building pointless motorways, stealing all our fish…) has a still-dormant telecoms market that’s totally dependent on foreign providers. Not even its own government wants to throw money away on communications, and that’s saying something.

All of this got me thinking – recently, our own market here in the UK seems to have taken the tiniest of pauses, a quick breather, just to catch up with itself. The relentless push from providers & retailers, unbroken now for a decade, for better handsets, better packages and the general rabid-pace of weaving services into every new gadget, laptop and media-device has led – quite naturally – to a certain plateau. It’s not a mid-life crisis, because (in my unhumble opinion) the industry is, relatively, in its early twenties; but it does share certain similarities in terms of wanting to make sure it’s in a place, a state that it actually wants to be in.

This self-awareness, snapping as it does across an entire industry simultaneously, is as rare as a rocking-horse turd, and so we should savour it. It’s the equivalent of those charming football matches they used to have at Christmas in the trenches of World War One; a time to catch up with friends and not feel too pressured by your competitors, and have a bit of a snigger at the Italians as they feel the repercussions of attempting slide-tackles in a minefield.

However, before you know it this brittle, short-lived bubble of calm will burst and it will be back to the status quo of relentless development, of non-stop rivalry and the buzzing - albeit breathless - rush of life at the bleeding-edge of business which, let’s face it, is why you read this website in the first place. But, bloody hell, isn’t that preferable to the alternatives? We’re privileged, as it were, to work where we do and to do what we do. My reasons are as follows:

Exhibit A: Portugal

There’s a reason why you never hear about network executives hurling themselves in desperate despair out of their windows when they fail to make sufficient headway in this territory – it’s because none of the networks give the faintest of shits. I must admit to being staggered that this country has landlines, let alone the Star-Trek level of underlying technology to be able to send a text-message. I saw no shortcodes on adverts. I saw no media streamed between people in streets or in bars or in offices. The entire nation was bereft of BlackBerry and the only bluetooth available was a type of chewing-gum. But they’ve got great coffee, though, so…you know. That’s OK..

Exhibit B: Japan

There’s a reason why you never hear about network executives hurling themselves out of the windows in Japan, too; they find ritual disembowelment to be rather more effective, in times of corporate disappointment. Japan, as you’re no doubt aware, is so far ahead of us in terms of mobile usage, capacity & capability that it’s not even funny. A full and rather more useful essay on Nipponese telephonic culture will be forthcoming just as soon as I’m able to squeeze Ewan for the cost of the air-fare, but needless to say it’s roughly comparable, market to market, as our car industry is to theirs. The upside, of course, to being second-place in terms of turnover & innovation is that we don’t have to listen to the happy mewls of Hello Kitty handsets which is, as I think you’ll agree, a small price to pay.

Thus: in conclusion, I’m glad to be back in the UK if only because we’ve got the balance right; we’re pushing all fronts forwards but not so fast we’re over-extending. The Great Unwashed are still hungry for newer, better kit. Everything, basically, is respectable. Where else, really, would you rather be working…?

Anyway. Enough patriotic flag-waving. I must leave you now – I’m off to the Chinese embassy to get a work permit.

- - - - -

Hilarious stuff, thanks Ben!

Link: Noodle for cheap calls

Had a tip in from an SMS Text News reader earlier about a service called Noodle. The concept is quite simple - you get a new number which you use instead of your existing mobile number, and everytime you make or receive a call you earn 2p a minute cash. Is it too good to be true? My source has done a bit of digging..

- - - -

First of all - lets look at the ‘UK’ number range. According to
 
http://www.ofcom.org.uk/telecoms/ioi/numbers/numbers_administered/s7.xls
 
the 07000 range is allocated to Wire9 telecom, based on the Isle of Man.    Wire9 (or Cloud9) offers a portioned soft switch service which allows third parties to basically operate as MVNOs using Wire9’s number range.  As Noodle themselves happy admit (http://www.noodle-oodles.com/question.php), the Noodle service (driven by Wire9) falls under the FM06 interconnect range - lets just say that Three weren’t the only operator managing to extract +15ppm rates from other networks.
 
Now, I’m not quite sure how Ofcom’s latest ruling on interconnect rates affects Wire9, but I believe that they will likely still be extracting 15p+ per minute during peak even though Three has be regulated to 5.9p.
 
So, this explains how Noodle can both provide free international calls AND a rebate on your outgoing and incoming MoU - they receive such high interconnect payments that they can afford to give a little back.
 
What does this mean to you as a mobile punter?
 
You have to check if 077000 numbers are included in your bundle.  I can categorically say that as of last month T-mobile do not consider these numbers as part of a bundle, and you are charged quite a bit for making these calls.  Two example calls:  A 56 second call costing 39.7p and a 105 second call costing 74.5p
 
Now I have heard that other operators are including these calls in their bundles - I fail, however, to see how this can be sustained if the interconnect rates exhibit such asymmetry.
 
So, if you plan on going with noodle
a)  check that your network treats 07000 calls inclusive of your bundle
and
b) Tell your friends to check or else you may very well end up costing them a tonne of money!

- - - -

Interesting. Anyone else use Noodle, or have experience of using their service?

Update: Just signed up for a Noodle account and tried calling it using my office VOIP provider. It couldn’t route the call. Then tried using Skype - the charge came up at 14.4p per minute. Curious..

Yesterday Ewan blogged about the E61i, and how he was contemplating getting one offline from the Nokia Store for the bargain (!) price of £299.

SMS Text News reader Robert Gale dropped us a line, with his experiences of using the store.

- - - -

At the time that I bought mine, I think the Nokia Store was the only place to buy an E61i and appeared to be far cheaper than the pre-order prices on other sites. I placed my order online at 9am, received a confirmation call around lunchtime and then the phone was delivered the next morning.

When they call they check a ton of information such as what was ordered, the email and phone number used, the delivery option and the type of card used. It was reassuring that they took the time to check out the details.

- - - -

Thanks Robert! You can check out his blog - A Welsh View - at http://xo.typepad.com 

Clickatell have partnered with Dutch self help service provider Growerz.com to create an interactive, mobile-powered self development programme that can give you a nudge via email and SMS when your willpower wanes. Even better, the messaging technology keeps members in touch with each other to stay motivated, making Growerz a pioneer in this new world of tech-enhanced self-development and motivation.

Growerz.com’s Web-based service offers users customised programmes, consisting of an interactive online course and additional self-help reference material, to effect changes in their lives. Using SMS and email messages, users (called ‘Growerz’) are prompted to focus on goals and assignments for personal growth and make the necessary lifestyle changes.

With the July 1st ban on public smoking in England looming, maybe it’s time to quit the habit? Hop over to Growerz.com and you can get their quit smoking programme for just $49.95. Bargain!

Link: GooSync Home Page

David just dropped me a quick note about this - he says it actually works too!

Goosync will seamlessly synchronize almost any mobile device with your Google Calendar. It’s quick and simple, sign-up and start syncing.  Never be without your vital calendar information again!

.. and it’s free. Hurrah

Link: Workers admit to online toilet habit

Some interesting research courtesy of T-Mobile shows that 15 percent of office workers regularly surf the internet from their mobile whilst sitting on the can.

As bosses increasingly clamp down on Internet usage at work, a study commissioned by the mobile network found that a hefty one in four workers (26 per cent) have no access whatsoever.

Nearly half of respondents said they used their mobiles to log on while at work and 15 per cent admitted they were forced to log on in the bog.

Curious facts and statistics aside, the company also found that nearly 44% of the 2,000 people surveyed said mobile net access was ‘too costly’ - despite the rise in availability of ‘unlimited’ data plans.

Link: Japan tries ‘cell phone diet’

With cell phones ubiquitous in Japan and rising concern over expanding waistlines, health care providers have put two-and-two together to help the weight-conscious send photos of their meals to nutritionists for analysis.

The concept is only on a test run for now, and one little drawback is that dieters have to wait three days to find out how much damage they did by eating the meal they just photographed.

Link: >»» Mobilcast Social Media Community and Podcast Directory - Get Mobilcast Mobile Phone Podcast Listening Software - Mobile Phone Podcasting and Social Networking - Mobilcast.com

This is one of Ewan’s favourite apps, so when they emailed about a survey I thought it’d be worth a post.

If you haven’t used Mobilcast before, they’ve put together a nice demo video here. However if you do use the app, give them a couple of minutes of your time and fill our their short 10-question survey.

Link: Mobile Phones Could Wipe Car Ignition Fobs

Owners of some new Nissan motor cars are being advised to keep their mobile phones away from the keyless-ignition fobs which are used to start their cars, as the phones can “wipe” the fob memory. The problem is limited to the 2007 Altima and G35, and the problem can be avoided by keeping mobile phones at least an inch away from the fob.

The Tennessean newspaper said that if owners send or receive calls while their phones are touching the fob, there’s a chance the fob’s electronic code could be erased. Once erased, the fobs cannot be reprogrammed, and owners can restart their engines only by using the spare fobs sold with their cars, a Nissan spokesman told the newspaper.

Link: SMS2Wall - Your SMS message directly in the Western Wall

Here’s an interesting use of SMS. You can now get text a prayer, wish, hope, or any other kind of message and get it printed off and deposited in the Western Wall (also known as the ‘Wailing Wall’, or ‘Kotel’) in Jerusalem.

The service is currently available to mobile users in the US, Canada, UK, Australia, Holland, Belgium, Spain, and (rather randomly) Peru.

I had a quick scoot at the UK service. It costs £1.50 plus your standard network charges, and rather bizarrely is on an 89xxx shortcode. Which is, according to ICSTIS, for adult entertainment services. That aside, it’s a cool idea - and certainly saves having to fly all the way to Israel to pop your note in the wall.

Update: Thanks to Ewan for asking the obvious question - what’s the text number for the service in Israel? There isn’t one apparently. The plot thickens.. Still, it’s ok if you’re in Peru!

I have worked with Hetty for about 7 years. She’s an extremely efficient Managing Director of an array of our operations and is constantly on the pulse of the latest fashion trends.

First among her bewildered friends with a Nokia E61 (at my instigation), she converted to it with total delight. It was the first handset that I’d shown her to which she immediately answered ‘yes’ to my ‘the company should buy one of these for you’ question.

Working in the mobile industry, I’m particularly over-eager to make sure the company purchases the latest technology — you know — any excuse. Hetty is generally the sensible voice, eyebrows raised, asking if we actually need another [insert handset] to add to the array across my desk.

Typically speaking, it is business critical to have the hardware sat there. Let me just get out my credit card… but of course, there’s always room for good financial management, right?

Chatting with Hetty recently, she remarked that she’d been on the T-Mobile site hunting for the E61i — ‘the one with the camera’. No dice. It’s not there, alas.

I heard through the burgeoning grapevine that Three, who certainly led the way with the E61, are reportedly not bothering with the E61i. Bit annoying that.

And T-Mobile? Well, like the geek that I am, I’m always excited when a non-geek seeks a new handset and I’m rather disappointed that it doesn’t appear to be anywhere near the T-Mobile site.

I’ve been trying to convince her to get a Nokia N95, particularly given it’s wicked 5 megapixel camera. Why not, Hetty?

“Because I like having my phone and my email in one device. I had my Blackberry and some other phone before and that was just silly.”

I think, alas, it’ll need to be a buy-it-new job. I’ve been looking on eBay. I might just plonk the cash for the E61i, £299, on the Nokia store. I’ve never bought from the Nokia shop before you see, it would be good research.

Right?

Link: Doug Richard: Exit the dragon - Independent Online Edition > Profiles

 But Richard, an American who has lived in the UK for five years, has high hopes that Hotxt can become a seriously big business. The start-up has already secured nearly £4m in funding, and its founder believes it can be a big hit with mobile users around the world. The Hotxt website says that the company offers a service that enables mobile users to send text messages to each other over the internet. But this is not a clue to what the company will become, according to Richard. “What it is now will not be what it becomes in the future,” he says.

Thanks for John and Tom for spotting this!

Link: icWales - PC apologises for texting from dock

There’s a time to text, and a time to leave the phone alone…

A POLICEMAN accused of “pleasuring himself” in front of a female prisoner in the back of a patrol car had to explain to a jury yesterday why he was sending text messages from the dock during his trial.
 
“I’ve had a number of well-meaning texts wishing me good luck or whatever, I felt it was simply common courtesy to reply.”

Got an email from Stephen Keegan, the founder of Callpedia.com yesterday. It was a rather lengthy mail, so rather than do some random cut and pasting I thought I’d give the service a try and write a quick review.

Here’s the deal. Callpedia is like a talking encyclopedia for your mobile. Think of a subject, then just text it to a number. Wait a few seconds, then call a different number. All the information you’ve just asked for will be read to you.

Having sunk a few last night, I tried texting in the word ‘Guinness’ to the service. About 30 seconds later, I dialled the number. After a bit of weird stuttering, a strange robotic male voice started talking. I had to concentrate hard, as it didn’t initially sound like English. But with a little bit more listening, it was English - just not very understandable.

Give it a go for yourself and let me know what you think. Text your query to +353 873 204 111, then give it 30 seconds and call +353 766 020 331. Obviously from your mobile and without the CLI barred, or else I’d imagine it breaks horrendously

It’s a nice concept for a service, but please fix that awful synthesised voice! Takes me back to the days of my ZX Spectrum with it’s Currah Microspeech.. things have moved on a long way since then!

Why we hate the modern mobile phone | The Register

Yesterday I posted a link to an article on Sci/Tech news site The Register, which talked about the mobile industry and why they thought it’d lost the plot.

There’s been a few comments made here, but El Reg got a mailbag full. Check this lot out - seems like the nail has well and truely been hit on the head.

Not even 24 hours ago, Motorola announced that their new Z8 phone had been used to make the world’s highest phone call, from the top of Mount Everest. Bet you reckon they couldn’t top that? Not for want of trying!

weComm, the leader in interactive mobile data solutions, today announced that it has delivered Sky Anytime on Mobile for Motorola’s recently announced MOTO Z8.

weComm develops the Sky Anytime on Mobile application for BSkyB, and has worked closely with Motorola to port the application to the MOTO(tm) Z8 for pre-installation in the factory. The Z8 is a ‘kick-slider’smartphone running the UIQ on Symbian OS platform with a Motorola soft key implementation.

Nice. Now if only they could get it working on some other popular phones (it won’t work on my N80 or my E61 for a start), I’d be a happy bunny. Market size of the Z8 vs the Nokia handsets that don’t support Sky Anytime? Doesn’t take a genius to work out they’re missing a trick here. Still, if you’re lucky enough to have - or be getting - a Motorola Z8, and you wanted Sky Anytime, worry no more!

Link: Guy climbs Everest to send ludicrous SMS | APC Magazine

You’ve probably heard about the guy climbing Everest to make the world’s highest phone call. Well, he got there yesterday - and what’s the first thing he did? Yep, make his phone call. And as he was being sponsored by Motorola, he rang them - and had some very kind words to say about the handset they gave him.

“My MOTO Z8 has totally enhanced the experience up here, giving me the added confidence and peace of mind to know that friends, family and even help were just a phone call away.”

How lovely. And after that call? He sent a text.

Baber also had a pithy text message ready to go: “One small text for man, one giant leap for mobilekind - thanks Motorola.”

Hmm. Corporate sponsorship gone mad?

Link: ElectricNews.net:News:RTE goes mobile with Three

The partnership will see RTE shows such as ‘The Late Late Show’, ‘Off the Rails’ ‘Tubridy Tonight’ and ‘Show Me The Money’ being made available to both pre-pay and bill-paying Three customers at a rate of EUR0.50 for a period of 24 hours.

“We see your mobile as being your personal TV — no sharing the remote, so you can watch what you want, when you want, where you want, up and down the country,” said Three’s head of entertainment David Riley. He added that RTE was the first of many mobile TV channels set to be launched by the network in the coming weeks.

50 eurocents (about 35p) isn’t bad for a days worth of programmes, especially if you only use it on the odd occasion and don’t want to fork out each month for a subscription.

Link: Avis to offer wireless Internet gear

This is an interesting one. Car hire company Avis are launching a Wi-Fi service that’ll work in your rented car, hotel room, or by the sounds of it pretty much anywhere you go. It’s US-only at the moment and is only available from a select number of locations, but it sounds like a nice idea for a service.

The new Avis Connect service, priced at $10.95 per day, can transmit a Wi-Fi signal to multiple laptops and other mobile devices at the same time.

The service is provided with a portable device developed by Autonet Mobile that gets its Internet connection from a cell phone network. The company declined to disclose which one, though the cellular technology involved suggests that it is being provided by either Verizon Wireless or Sprint Nextel Corp.

Given a choice between fiddling with mobile data and just firing up my laptop and finding the access point, I know what I’d rather do. Wonder if there’s any plans to launch a similar service in the UK?

Link: Mobizines - Update All: The Devil Wears…

The guys at Mobizines have got their hands on one of the very sexy LG Prada phones - and haven’t wasted any time on making their app work on it. It’s not quite there yet, but they’re working on it!

Now - as you know the other day we finally got our hands on a brand new LG Prada phone… We’re all busying away on our next big release and we haven’t really got time to develop a whole brand new variant of the Mobizines client to work on this handset…

So imagine our surprise to find that our touchscreen client, very nearly, works on the Prada! Admittedly it does need a small bit of tweaking here and there… But our resident touchscreen guru Andre, (Big up the Dre!), is on the case.

If you’ve got an LG Prada and want to help beta test the app, drop an email to bloggers@mobizines.com (with LG PRADA in the subject line) and they’ll be in touch when it’s ready to be unleashed.

Link: E-Series » Blog Archive » spodtronic - Radio Application

Now this is rather neat. It’s a radio player for Nokia S60 mobiles, and although it’s heavily branded by Virgin Radio, I’m very impressed. In fact I’m so impressed that everytime I go to write the main bit of this blog entry I find another feature to rant about.

So, what can you listen to? Apart from the Virgin stations (Virgin Radio UK, Classic Rock, Groove and Extreme) there’s also a selection of genres from Sky Radio, Digitally Imported if you’re into dance, and a few others to choose from.

It’s a free download and doesn’t appear to cost anything apart from data charges to run, so I don’t mind the odd bit of advertising. So far I’ve seen album cover art, now playing info, and been asked to rate songs. Quite impressive. And the interface.. slicker than a (insert clever analogy here)

Go grab yourself a copy at www.spodtronic.com, and let me know what you think. I would have done some nice pretty screen grabs, but all that hard work streaming and displaying pretty visuals is proving a bit much for my poor little E61.

Link: How the mobile phone biz lost the plot | The Register

The author of this article seems to think so..

Nokia’s recent announcement heralding the arrival of “widgets” is further proof that the entire mobile industry is a rudderless ship furiously innovating in circles.

Having lost sight of consumer sentiment years ago, all sectors of the industry seem to be clamouring to give every crackpot idea a chance in a desperate attempt to differentiate themselves from the competition.

Will the iPhone be the saviour of the industry, or another missed opportunity? Only time will tell..