Heh. Good marketing.

YouNeverCall, the online cell phone store, has jumped on the coattails of Google’s $30m moon landing prize announcement….

YouNeverCall has decided to allow a few more days to place the first cell phone call from the moon and so the deadline has been set for January 7, 2015.

Just in case you were wondering, that’s a Wednesday.

In order to claim the $10,000 prize a cell phone call must be placed by a device or person present on the Moon’s surface. This call must pass through a commercially available cellular phone to YouNeverCall’s corporate headquarters in Los Angeles, CA. The call may travel via any protocol or compression before reaching our offices, and it must be possible to for the caller to answer a few yes/no questions correctly.

That’s not it though!

Like Google, YouNeverCall is offering a lesser prize for companies who achieve a related but lesser goal. YouNeverCall is offering a $500 prize to the first SMS message that travels via the moon and lands on one of our corporate cell phones.

Furthermore, the company is offering a $100 bounty to the first party who receives a cell phone call on the Moon that rings using the infamous Crazy Frog Ringtone.

I think I’ll happily up this oneto $200 NOT to ring using the Crazy Frog Ringtone…

Mobile payment initiative, Payforit came into force across all mobile internet services and UK networks officially on September 1, 2007. The payment system was welcomed by the mobile industry; and now key operators, content providers and API’s (Accredited Payment Intermediaries) believe the future success of the initiative will rely on the developments made over the coming months.

Dialogue Communications hosted a NOC - The Future of Payforit seminar in London last night to look at what the future holds for this payment mechanism. Dialogue’s MD, Guillaume Peersman was joined by Iain McCallum of O2, Jeremy Flynn of D2See, and formally of Vodafone, and Phil Cooke of I-Play, to discuss where Payforit is heading.

Since Dialogue went live with Payforit in January 2007, the feedback has been positive, with statistics from content providers and API’s demonstrating a clear increase in conversation rates. Dialogue has seen a rise of up to 27 per cent on conversion compared to premium SMS solutions for its connected customers and I-Play is now approaching a 15 per cent conversion rate for customers visiting its mobile site.

“Payforit was in development for nearly two years and I think that now we have created a clear user interface and single click payment method that will be a success and consumers will trust. I believe Payforit will dominate m-payments for some time to come, but it is by no means the finished product and further developments need to be made, which is something all operators and API’s are working to achieve over the coming months,” explains Guillaume Peersman.

Price points have been one area of debate amongst the operators, with the consensus being that a £5 maximum purchase value is not enough to offer a broad range of content, and this rate should be increased to £10.  Operators are already working on solutions to tackle this problem and in only a matter of months some may well raise the limits.

Iain McCallum, Head of Interactive Messaging Products at O2, echoes Guillaume’s statements: “”Improvements need to be made to the customer experience and that is the key issue that Payforit is trying to address. A lot of work and expense, by Accredited Payment Intermediaries and MNO’s working together, has gone into optimising the PFI scheme rules to ensure that they are both robust enough to deliver the best possible subscriber experience and can be implemented by our partners with the minimum hassle and complexity. The next few months will, no doubt, throw up issues of concern and the MNO group will study these and fine-tune the scheme rules accordingly.”

Consumer awareness is one of the key issues facing the brand. Simply, consumers are not being told what Payforit is and what its purpose is. Operators need to increase the promotion of the system before it can achieve its objectives.

Data charges involved in buying the content is another major concern for Payforit. Consumers don’t know the final amount they will end up paying for a game or music download, as the purchase price does not include the data charges that come with downloading the content. Two solutions were discussed at last night’s seminar including, listing the size of the download at the point of purchase, so the customer can work out how much extra it will cost to download. Secondly, some operators have introduced “all- you-can-eat” data tariffs that remove the worry of not knowing how much you are paying for a download, as all data downloads are included in the monthly line rental cost. This seems to be the way the industry is heading and would remove the barrier of unknown data charges.

"The next stage in the Payforit development process is to ensure that the standard is used not only in the off portal market but also on operator portals. For it to truly achieve its goal, the customer needs to see the standard payment screen wherever they buy content, be that on or off portal," said Jeremy Flynn, CEO of D2See.

Currently, on portal content purchases still make up around 25% of the market, therefore it is very much an active area in purchasing content and needs to incorporate the Payforit standard to ensure the user’s buying experience is always the same.

Subscription services have been available on mobile for many years but the trust in them has diminished over time as customers are unclear as to what they will be charged, when and how. Phil Cooke, CTO at I-Play explains how Payforit could lead to the revival of mobile subscriptions: "With Payforit taking over off portal buying, subscriptions are set for a rebirth as API’s now ensure consumers receive all the payment terms, including details of how to unsubscribe and helpline information at the time of purchase. This will hopefully demonstrate to the customer that a streamlined system is behind the subscriptions and all previous problems have been resolved."

In terms of marketing, opt in boxes are currently left ticked on certain networks and unticked on others and there is a feeling amongst some operators that this is an issue that needs to be standardised across the whole industry. In addition to this, there is the matter of a merchant’s memory of consumer choices. Put simply, should consumers have to re-tick a box every time they revisit the same merchant?

Payforit will come up against some tough competition over the coming year from systems such as Google Checkout and Paypal Mobile. However, by making some minor developments, this registration free payment tool, which is quick and easy to use, looks set to become the market leading initiative it has always looked likely to be.

“The next stage in the Payforit development process is to ensure that the standard is used not only in the off portal market but also on operator portals. For it to truly achieve its goal, the customer needs to see the standard payment screen wherever they buy content, be that on or off portal,” said Jeremy Flynn, CEO of D2See.

Currently, on portal content purchases still make up around 25% of the market, therefore it is very much an active area in purchasing content and needs to incorporate the Payforit standard to ensure the user’s buying experience is always the same.

Subscription services have been available on mobile for many years but the trust in them has diminished over time as customers are unclear as to what they will be charged, when and how. Phil Cooke, CTO at I-Play explains how Payforit could lead to the revival of mobile subscriptions: “With Payforit taking over off portal buying, subscriptions are set for a rebirth as API’s now ensure consumers receive all the payment terms, including details of how to unsubscribe and helpline information at the time of purchase. This will hopefully demonstrate to the customer that a streamlined system is behind the subscriptions and all previous problems have been resolved.”

In terms of marketing, opt in boxes are currently left ticked on certain networks and unticked on others and there is a feeling amongst some operators that this is an issue that needs to be standardised across the whole industry. In addition to this, there is the matter of a merchant’s memory of consumer choices. Put simply, should consumers have to re-tick a box every time they revisit the same merchant?

Payforit will come up against some tough competition over the coming year from systems such as Google Checkout and Paypal Mobile. However, by making some minor developments, this registration free payment tool, which is quick and easy to use, looks set to become the market leading initiative it has always looked likely to be.

Link: BBC NEWS | Technology | Hot picks: UK tech start-ups

Nice to see the BBC getting excited about mobile technology..

Monitise is a young UK start-up that has already made significant in-roads into the US market.

The firm was founded four years ago by ex-professional sportsman Alastair Lukies and provides a mobile phone banking and payment service.

“An injury put paid to aspirations of being a full-time rugby player,” said Mr Lukies. “Ever since, I’ve been building businesses.”

(thanks to Ben for the tip!)

If you’re based in the UK, or even if you’ve only visited, I’m sure you’ve heard of PayPoint. They’re the people that let you top up your mobile or pay your utility bills at virtually every corner shop, newsagent and off-licence. Now thanks to a deal with Telrock you can use PayPoint from the comfort of your own mobile.

The Telrock textDebit service enables end users to make secure payments to clients of PayPoint using SMS text messaging.  Consumers will pre-register a debit, credit or pre-paid card which can then be used to pay a variety of bills such as energy, telecommunications or water, or top up a prepaid mobile phone.

The partnership will create a new payment channel for PayPoint, complementing its existing over-the-counter cash payments network and internet payments division. It will also offer Telrock an opportunity to work closely with the market leader in handling cash and pre-payments for utility providers and mobile phone operators.

Telrock’s leading mobile payment and customer account servicing platform is already being used by British Gas, Scottish and Southern Energy and Royal Bank of Scotland Group.

Dominic Taylor, Chief Executive of PayPoint, commented: “This partnership with Telrock will enable PayPoint to exploit the increasing popularity of mobile payments while broadening its proposition to existing and new clients and offering customers a further convenient way to pay bills and buy other services.”

Commenting on the deal Russell Robinson, Managing Director of Telrock, said: “The deal provides Telrock with a new route to market, serving a large and growing industry through a popular consumer brand. The agreement acts as a clear endorsement of our services and we look forward to working with this leading cash and internet payments group.”

Link: Google puts in patent application for SMS text message payment system - say what?

Wait, hasn’t this already been done before? Indeed it has. SMS text message-based payment system have been in use for quite some time now, and it seems that Google has been keen to the new trend for about a year and a half.

The search giant has just published their patent application (filed Feb. 28, 2006) for an SMS text message-payment system, ostensibly called “GPay,” that would facilitate private transactions between a merchant and a customer for goods and services.

On this note, today I’m going to put in a patent application for something I call walking. It involves the movement of one foot in front of another, in a forward motion. It should facilitate transportation of people from one location to another without any increase in carbon emissions.

Hell, if Google can patent something that’s obvious and been around for ages, why can’t I?

Link: Mobile TV ads ‘irritate’ consumers | New media | MediaGuardian.co.uk

According to new research, consumers find traditional format advertisements delivered via their mobile handset ‘irritating’, despite the area’s growing importance for the marketing industry.

Advertisements on mobile internet and TV services are “irritating” for consumers, according to new research.Branded content and opt-in Bluetooth downloads are better ways to reach the millions of people worldwide using portable gadgets such as phones, music players and games devices, the study by media agency Universal McCann suggests.

Patrick Parodi, CMO and General Manager of EMEA at Amobee Media Systems, who do mobile ad-funded media systems, got in touch - and had this to say:

“To grow the mobile industry, we need to move away form the current model where mobile content is almost 100% user funded, as this model does not offer any direct value or relevance to the user and impacts on mobile content uptake.

“All other media by and large use the traditional ad model of offering benefit to the user - generally though ad-funding - so there is no reason why mobile should be different.

“We have found that if we offer subscribers the benefit of receiving ad-funded content they are more likely to opt-in, interact with the advertising, and download more mobile content.  In fact, 90 per cent of mobile users opt for ad-funded mobile content when given the option.

“This not only ensures the user has a good experience with the advertising, but also increases mobile content downloads to
effectively grow the entire mobile entertainment value chain.”

Link: Domino’s Pizza by TXT Explained

You can now order pizza by text message from Domino’s here in the UK (via The Register) - although it’s not quite as flexible as you probably think it could be.

To use the service, you just hop on over to their website, pre-register, and create your regular order. Give it a name (for instance ‘Alex’s coronary’ or ‘feed the 5,000′), and save it. Then when you want to order, just text that name to Domino’s and they’ll do the rest.

Useful for all the people out there who just hate the teeth-pulling experience of phoning for a pizza

Technology from Dialogue Communications is behind the UK’s first mobile shopping mall, 2shop4, which launched its trial service today and is set to revolutionise the way mobile users shop.

2shop4 will allow users to buy products instantly through the mobile internet and text codes. Shopping adverts for global brands, high street shops, supermarkets, travel agencies, sports and film tickets to name a few, will appear across multiple media outlets including bill boards, magazines, TV and online, advertising a 2shop4 Buy-Now code or keyword which shoppers can text to purchase goods.

The shopper texts the 2shop4 code or keyword; such as ‘Flowers’ to 84777 and receives a 2shop4 Buy-Now WAP advert direct to their mobile phone. The user then selects the advertised product and buys it via a secure payment system and the goods are delivered to their home.

SMS technology behind 2shop4, has been supplied by Dialogue Communications, an interactive mobile specialist, the UK Managing Director, Guillaume Peersman, is excited to be involved in this unique mobile shopping service:

“2shop4 is pushing mobile shopping into a whole new area. Before this service launched, buying on mobile was very limited and this service will bring a whole new dimension to mobile shopping. Dialogue is very excited about being involved in such a forward thinking project, as we pride ourselves on our innovative attitude in the mobile market and 2shop4 most certainly is that. Working with Evevoy, we believe 2shop4 will provide shoppers with a truly unique shopping experience.”

Following an initial trial phase, 2shop4 will be launched in the UK in October, expectations of global services available within 2008. Evevoy is in talks with leading Global Advertising Network for exclusive rights to 2shop4. 2shop4’s mobile Buy Now shopping service will enhance the marketing and advertising campaigns of its clients.

Andrew Curry, Chairman of Evevoy is looking towards the Brand’s future: “2share4 is currently being developed for Buy-Now Stocks and Shares, which will include a brand charity loyalty programme. Evevoy team’s will continue to be the architect and developer of innovational, commercial and technological products by working with trusted brands as global
strategic partners or VARs.”

2shop4 works on all UK mobile network operators and the system allows payments to be made with MasterCard, Maestro, Paypal, Visa, Delta and Switch. 2shop4 shopper lifestyle and gift profiling, keywords and codes can match clothing sizes, brands, products and services to the 2shop4 shopper needs.

Link: RBS offers mobile banking - vnunet.com

Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) has joined HSBC, first direct and Alliance & Leicester in offering mobile phone banking services.

The service, run in conjunction with mobile banking network MONILINK, allows 13 million RBS and NatWest customers with debit cards to view their account balance and statement information on their mobile handset.

Paul Geddes, RBS Group Consumer Banking chief said: ‘We are giving people another easy way to access account information and even greater flexibility in managing their money at any time’.

The news comes just a few weeks after MONILINK tied up a deal with Vodafone to offer banking services to HSBC, first direct and Alliance & Leicester customers.

I have been watching the development of PixMeTV over the past months (it was launched in November 2006). They’ve created a brilliant micro-economy of content purchasers and content developers all generating value… in terms of hard cash and in terms of entertainment.

By the way, PixMeTV is definitely NOT SAFE FOR WORK, especially if you work for a company with zero tolerance to nakedness or even a hit of hardcore.

Five minutes on PixMeTV is an illuminating experience. The mobile cameraphone has done a lot for the budding exhibitionist. Big time.

Here’s how it works. You can either pay £9.99 a month for unlimited access to the content, or you can become a content supplier. That is, whip out your camera phone and start documenting your deepest and darkest preferences, whack the resulting movie or picture to PixMeTV and, before you can spell Polyvinyl Chloride (PVC), you’ll have tons of folk downloading and rating your performances — and filling your coffers.

What’s more, you can easily get feedback from your, er, customers, via the PixMeTV adult chat facility that connects the site’s members.

If you reckon you’d like to get in on the action, you can get yourself your very own white-label branded version — just whack a mail to sales at pixmetv.com for more information (talk to Jason). They’ll set you up a completely branded version of PixMeTV, already pre-populated with content (that’s a big plus) and they’ll take care of the day to day business of running the site (moderation, hosting, billing infrastructure).

Speaking of Jason (PixMeTV’s Director), he’s particualrly delighted with their success to date. So he should be. 1 million+ page impressions a month is wickedly good performance. I really like his perspective on what they’ve created:

We’ve created an environment that lets anyone with a videophone be the Producer, the Director, the Star - and importantly the Salesperson - of their own adult movie.

They’ve just recently partnered with MobVision to deploy their Admoda advertising service across PixMeTV and third-party white labelled PixMeTV services. So if you’re up for white-labeling, you get ads as part of the package.

The PixMeTV Director’s Tips page is worth a read:

Camera Shake. When you’re filming try to keep camera/videophone as still as possible. The steadier the camera work, the better the picture!

Lighting. Try to get as much light into your movie as possible. This helps to improve the quality - draw back a curtain, turn on a light or get outdoors. Alfresco sex!

Audio. Try to record good, uninterrupted audio on your movies. The people who buy your movies may want to hear you!

You can get stuck into PixMeTV over at www.pixmetv.com.

If you’re at all interested in mobile payments, Paul Ruppert has a heck of a lot of data linked on his blog at the link below - definitely worth a look!

Link: Mobile Point View by Paul Ruppert

A compendium of 56 Mobile Payments press releases over the last six months (a ton of reading if you click on the links) reveals that notwithstanding the mobile payments debates and dialogue centered in the carrier centric mobile industry, the real action is already occurring with trials in the financial services and retail segments, plus through government central bankers around the world. These are the concrete emerging COIs (centers of influence) for this developing market. The operators are just going to go along for the ride….

From today The Eden Project in Cornwall, UK, will become even greener as it launches a mobile ticketing service - which it claims is the first-ever paperless ticketing system that uses mobile phones from start to finish. 

The organisation says that previously mobile ticketing involved a phone call or a visit to a website to make payment - however thanks to a three-way partnership between the project itself, Swiftpass and LUUP, the whole process can be carried out using just a mobile.

Jeff Berry, Managing Director at Swiftpass, welcomed the development as “an exciting step forward in ticketing technology”.  He said: “This is the first large scale implementation of mobile ticketing that incorporates payment and fulfilment through the handset in a very simple way. We have known there has been a missing link for some time, but that gap has now been filled thanks to the partnership with LUUP.”

Jon Curry, Eden’s Head of ICT, said: “This development builds on the good work on ticket fulfilment we did last summer with Swiftpass. Now using the LUUP payment system for the first time we are able to offer our customers, including those who are on holiday and probably have no access to our ticket website, a fully automated, paperless advanced ticketing system using nothing but their mobile phone.”  

“As environmental issues continue to shift the public’s focus to living a less wasteful lifestyle, LUUP is proud to be part of this innovative partnership with The Eden Project and Swiftpass to make mobile ticketing easy, convenient and for the first-time truly mobile from start to finish,” said Christopher Lovold, UK Director for LUUP.

Following on from the news a few weeks back about the Two Thousand Trees festival introducing mobile ticketing, ethnical music event Big Green Gathering has teamed up with tixmob to do the same thing.

Festival goers can choose to receive all tickets on one phone or, for those buying multiple tickets, to have them delivered direct to their friends’ mobiles. Unlike traditional ticketing services tixmob charges no costly delivery fees. You simply pay the face value of the ticket plus a nominal processing charge and tickets will be available right up until the final minutes before the event starts.

Penny Kemp, Marketing Director at Big Green Gathering said, “Festival goers who come to Big Green Gathering will be delighted that we are going mobile. Mobile ticketing reduces the environmental impact of the festival and is just another small step on the road to becoming the most environmentally sound entertainment event in the UK.”

Big Green Gathering will take place from 1st-5th August, 2007 in the Mendip Hills, Somerset and has grown out of the original Green Gatherings and the Green Fields of Glastonbury Music Festival.

Masabi, the secure mobile applications company, today announced that BT has completed validation of the cryptographic
algorithms used in EncryptME, the world’s first mobile Java security application that provides web commerce level security on the vast majority of existing handsets. EncryptME is to be used by train ticketing technology specialists YourRail to enable tickets to be securely bought and used from almost all mobile phones using credit and debit cards.

In a single SMS message, or a few bytes of GPRS data, EncryptME can set up a secure session and sign up a new user, a new credit card and make a transaction thereby bringing fast, secure and convenient m-commerce to mobile users across virtually all handsets in current use.

“The main reason internet commerce has not been extended into the mobile world has been that most handsets cannot support the security available on PCs which is necessary to safely authenticate users and perform transactions. EncryptME symbolises the turning of the tide,” said Ben Whitaker, Co-Founder and head of Security Development at Masabi. “For the first time EncryptME brings internet security to mobile phones thereby enabling the likes of Amazon, eBay and any other internet retailer to extend their offerings to users on the move”

Link: PayPal Mobile Checkout Opens for Business

Popular Internet payment provider PayPal has announced the launch of their new mobile payment service.

The company, owned by auction giant eBay, says Mobile Checkout will allow consumers in the USA, UK and Canada to purchase items securely by simply clicking on a PayPal button on the merchants mobile internet site.

Kevinj Dulsky, senior director of PayPal Mobile commented: “As the mobile commerce market grows as an extension of ecommerce, it will be critical for online merchants to adopt a secure mobile payment platform to reach new consumers and to remain competitive in the market.”

This is not the first move by PayPal to capture the fast growing mobile commerce sector. In April 2006 they began to offer a mobile payment service using SMS, which allows consumers to buy, donate or send money from their existing PayPal account via text.

News of the service comes in the week that Juniper Research predicted mobile payments will generate transactions worth $22bn by 2011.

Link: Vodafone UK Customers Get Mobile Banking Services

Interesting news from Vodafone and MONILINK, the mobile banking network. Vodafone UK customers can now get access to their bank account to check balances, request a mini-statement or top up prepay mobile accounts, straight from their mobile handset.

Available now to HSBC, first direct, Alliance & Leicester customers, with Royal Bank of Scotland, NatWest and Ulster Bank adding the service later this summer, the service uses a secure application on their handset to connect to the MONILINK platform, which then in turn interacts with their bank.

Al Russell, Head of Vodafone Internet On Your Mobile said: “With the launch of the Vodafone Internet On Your Mobile we want to give customers access to all the services they see as essential, in the palm of their hand.  Banking is one of the most important services that our customers use and by partnering with the MONILINK network we can ensure that all of our customers are able to access their bank accounts on the move, whenever they wish.”

The MONILINK service has been developed by Monitise, a specialist in mobile banking technology, and VocaLink, the transaction specialists behind the UK’s ATM network, processing over eight billion transactions per year including 15 per cent of Europe’s automated payments.  Monitise is currently working with partners across the world, including Metavante in the United States and T-Systems in Germany, to create a single mobile banking and payments ecosystem for the global population.

Alastair Lukies, CEO OF MONILINK added: “The mobile phone is the world’s personal communications device and it’s only natural that consumers want to use it as the ‘remote control’ to essential services.  Vodafone’s commitment to providing mobile banking services is a great step in ensuring that financial provision in the UK is as convenient and accessible as possible. 

The service is free until the end of 2007. Apart from the lack of a hole to get cash from, it seems very similar to the services you already find on most ATMs in the UK.

P2P fund transfers and mobile payments will generate transactions worth $22bn by 2011, predicts Juniper Research. In addition, they reckon 204m mobile phone users will be paying for services with their handsets by then. Interestingly this figure includes payments made using Near Field Communications (NFC) technology - already in daily use with London’s Oyster Card and the Octopus service in Hong Kong.

Greater availability of NFC devices, for physical mobile payments, coupled with secure and easy-to-use applications, backed by the large credit card organisations and financial institutions, will create the foundation for a healthy alternative to cash and other mainstream payment applications.

Report author Alan Goode said: “The technology is available now to enable secure and fast payments to be initiated on the mobile phone. The business model stills needs some work but there are positive signals emanating  from the industry  that will create considerable revenue for all parts of the ecosystem. I am cautiously optimistic for the future success of mPayments.”

Something struck me the other day - and it wasn’t a bus or a large object falling from the sky. There’s an increasing number of sites that ask you ‘what are you doing’, and update your presence on the web, via SMS, send an IM, or an email, or any number of options.

If, like me, you’ve got a few of these sites and services on the go, it’s rather a chore to keep going round and updating them all. I use Ecademy, Facebook, Twitter, Jaiku, and Pownce - and they’ve all got various types of status options. There are already some mash-ups out there that link some of these - for example the Twitter Facebook plugin. However, I wanted the choice to be able to update my status on any of these sites and have it automatically propogate to the rest.

A little PHP hacking with XML, RSS, JSON and some other interesting bodges later, and I’ve rustled up a connector that brings all these sites together. It basically polls all the status sources, works out which one I last updated, and pushes that status to the other sites that are out of date.

When I’m in front of my PC, I’m likely to have Facebook or Ecademy running in the background, so it’s easier to change my status on there. However when I’m out and about, my application of choice is Jaiku. I find it easier to use than Twitter, and cheaper too - if I used Twitter via SMS it’d cost me 24p a go (thanks T-Mobile).

 No matter where I enter my status, within five minutes it’ll update all the other sites and services. Interestingly the Jaiku app on my E61 also shows this information even if I didn’t use Jaiku to create the update - so it’s not just relying on what I last typed in to it.

The next step? With Jaiku’s ability to map my location by cell ID, I could add location information to my feeds too - or make a Google maps mashup, sort of along the lines of Buddyping. There’s obviously privacy concerns here - I don’t always want the world to know exactly where I am. With the status messages I don’t microblog my every moment, and have a choice of what I write, so that’s not a problem.

Link: Mobile ticketing on the buses - vnunet.com

Bus company Go North East have announced plans to introduce a mobile ticketing service this Autumn.

The service, supplied by IT company Atos Origin, will be a prepaid service - with funds being added via a website. Before getting on the bus, the end user texts a supplied code and gets a barcode ticket in return. When they get on the bus, they just have to show the barcode - or scan it on a special modified ticket machine.

Honest opinion on this? As a long time user of London’s Oyster contactless ticketing system, it’s a lot less hassle than what’s been proposed here. I can top-up my Oyster account in quite a few stores locally, online, or at a tube station. No fiddling around texting and waiting for a barcode to come back just to go 5 minutes down the road. Besides, with Nokia, O2 and Orange already in talks with Transport for London over combining the technology with mobile handsets, I wonder how much mileage is in this?

Link: Bulgaria: Sofia Launches SMS Payment of Parking Tax

Starting today, Bulgarian city Sofia is allowing motorists to pay for parking by text. Launched in a handful of parking zones in the capital, and only available to MTel or Globul subscribers, residents just text a shortcode, pay one Bulgarian Leva (about 34p) plus their normal text charges, and get an hours parking.

The blue zones, where people can pay via SMS for parking, are three. The firs zone includes the Alexander Nevski square, Moskovska Street in front of the Vassil Levski monument and Oborishte Street.

The second zone wraps the Narodno Sabranie square and the side lane of the Tzar Osvoboditel Boulevard. The third zone is at the Macedonia Square.

Meanwhile back in the UK, London’s Westminster Council have recently done away with parking meters completely - rolling out a system that allows motorists to pay by phone or text. The Telegraph has an interesting article on the subject here.

UK property website RightMove has launched it’s new mobile-enabled website, allowing home hunters and property professionals to search for property on the move.

Although the new mobile site is accessible to users on all networks, Vodafone subscribers have access to a ‘find me’ facility, which allows them to see all available property in the area and locate their nearest Rightmove agent. The service makes use of Location-based Services (LBS), although the press release quite excitingly claims “the user can ask the Vodafone mobile network to find their current location using satellite technology” - which I’m sure sounds more exciting than cell triangulation and the like. 

The new mobile RightMove site is available at http://mobile.rightmove.co.uk - just be careful of low flying satellites if you’re a Vodafone user.

Ethical music festival Two Thousand Trees has become one of the first festivals in the UK to introduce mobile ticketing, thanks to a tie-up with tixmob.

The festival, to be held near Cheltenham on 13th & 14th July, is giving fans the ability to receive the tickets direct to their mobile phone - or for those buying multiple tickets, to have them delivered direct to their friends mobiles.

James Scarlett, organisers, Two Thousand Tress Festival said, “The ethos of the festival is very much one of sustainability and laid back consideration. That stretches to the ticket too. Using tixmob we are happy that we are helping reduce our environmental impact by reducing the need for paper based tickets as well as giving festival goers a convenient, hassle free way to buy tickets.”

To book tickets, visit www.tixmob.com - or to find out more about the Two Thousand Trees festival and view the line-up, head over to www.twothousandtreesfestival.co.uk

Link: Bango Reports Fewer Refund for WAP Sites Compared to Premium SMS

Mobile billing experts Bango have just released some interesting statistics on consumer satisfaction for mobile purchases. The study shows that customers who purchase content through mobile websites are generally happier than those that do so via the traditional premium SMS route.

During the month of May, Bango reported just 142 refunds per 100,000 transactions; customer queries were closer to 70 per 100,000 transactions. So compelling is the data for off-portal WAP that network operators in Europe are showing a strong preference for this model and in the UK, WAP billing through the cross-operator “Payforit” scheme is being mandated.

Or to put it another way:

Compared to the traditional Premium SMS off-portal content model, where refunds can be between 10-20% of sales, off-portal WAP sites result in refunds for fewer than 1% of transactions, on average.

I’m all for Payforit - it’s long overdue. Hats off to Bango for being so open with these figures when they’re involved in both charging models.

Link: iGamingBusiness.com > World First: Magazine Subscriptions by SMS

Bluff Europe (www.bluffeurope.com) is the first magazine in the world to offer its magazine subscriptions by SMS. By texting ‘bluff’ to short code 60155, poker enthusiasts can subscribe to the magazine and pay via their mobile phone bill. This innovative subscription service costs users £3 per month, which they pay via their phone bill through any UK mobile provider.

Once the SMS is sent by the subscriber to Bluff Europe, the sender receives a confirmation SMS followed by phone call from a subscriptions representative who takes the subscribers mailing address information. The subscriber will then get a copy of Bluff Europe sent directly to his home each month following. Once the magazine is dispatched, the user’s phone bill will be charged just £3.

Link: Wild Jack Mobile Casino - Get £10 Free & Get Mobile Gaming today

I’ve never been much of a gambler, but seeing this news story come in this afternoon is tempting me to take them up on their offer of £10 free credit

Wild Jack Mobile Casino (WJMC), one of the UK’s most loved, fully functional mobile casino provided by Spin3, congratulates one lucky mobile player who has just won £20,000. Darren M, a UK resident, bagged the sum in a series of spins over the course of a day on WJMC’s Roulette game making him the second big winner in as many months.
 
“Get ready for summer and get ready for some Wild Jack Mobile Casino” said Nicc Lewis, UK Country Manager for WJMC. “This second payout of £20,000 comes as the number of players joining our mobile casino hit an all time high. With our progressive slot, Major Millions, standing at a very cool half a million we hope our next big winner is a mobile customer.”

“This win further demonstrates how mobile gaming is truly primed to be the next big thing for interactive gaming,” said Matti Zinder, Head of Spin3. “Mobile casinos that can offer best-of-breed games, like Wild Jack Mobile Casino, are strategically positioned to take the lion share of this industry.”

Of course the usual disclaimers about being over 18 and gambling responsibly apply. However if you do hit the jackpot, we wouldn’t say no to a few pints to help you celebrate