The lovely Helen Keegan of BeepMarketing, Swedish Beers, etc etc. fame recently agreed to answer the very tough and grilling SMS Text News interview.
Here’s what she had to say.

1. What was your first mobile? Make/Model/Network
It was a Motorola brick on Cable and Wireless with a sim card the size of a credit card. That was back in 1996 I think. My next one in 1999 was a Motorola Timeport.

2. What was your first exposure to working with the mobile industry?
It’s all Russell Buckley’s fault (Admob.com and Mobhappy.com)! We were working together at a dotcom and he left. Next thing I know he calls me up to tell me he’s working at ZagMe and needs someone on board with retail experience. I fitted the bill with more or less 10 years retail experience and the next thing I know I’m working out how to get which message to which phone at which time, working with retailers putting campaigns together, and managing the customer experience. That was a mobile lifetime ago in 2000/1

3. What do you think has been the one biggest technological advance that has revolutionized the mobile industry?
Batteries – without decent, small, longlife batteries, we can’t do any of the fancy stuff we want to on the move. I’m still waiting for wireless charging.. it’s coming, but we’re not there yet.

4. What gave you the inspiration to start BeepMarketing?
I was made redundant as an indirect result of 9/11 and rather than go work for a ZagMe competitor, I thought I could do it myself! Little did I know what was involved. Probably just as well, otherwise I wouldn’t have made the leap.

5. What’s next on the horizon for you and your team at BeepMarketing?
No idea. But if the last year or so is anything to go by, more consulting and marketing projects with media owners, brands and mobile services companies with the odd training course on mobile marketing and media thrown in for good measure. And I expect more travel, conferences and networking for me personally.

6. If you could only have one mobile phone for the rest of your life, what would it be? Why?
A smartphone of some description with a camera, decent screen and long battery life. I don’t have a particular allegiance but am currently using a Nokia N95 and but for the battery life it’s pretty darn good.

7. What was the last movie you saw? Worth it?
La Vie en Rose – Marion Cotillard’s performance as Edith Piaf was astonishing.

8. What mobile services can you not live without?
Gmail, Twitter, Googlemaps, TFL tube map, Mippin, Mobizines (for the Sudoku), Shozu (one-click publishing) and Zyb.com for backing up your phone

9. What is your current ringtone?
The theme from Roald Dahl’s Tales of the Unexpected

10. Most used feature on your handset?
Gmail and messaging in general

11. What sites do you read regularly to keep up with the industry?
Mobhappy
SMStextnews
Mtrends
And I track key topics I’m interested in via technorati and google alerts

12. What University/College did you go to? What did you take?
University of Westminster where I studied Business Studies and Marketing. I came out with a First and I know guest lecture there on the Masters Degree in Integrated Marketing

13. What was your mobile bill last month? Do you think it’s a fair price to pay for your mobile service?
I don’t know exactly what last month’s bill was but my average is about £60. It rises and falls depending on how much foreign travelling I do.

14. Complete this sentence. The iPhone is…
underwhelming and I won’t be buying one.

15. What’s your favourite type of music?
Good music! I have eclectic taste to say the least. Fave artists seen at the festivals this year would be Soul II Soul, Bat for Lashes, Nouvelle Vague, The Undertones, Shirley Bassey, Crazy P and the Trojan Soundsystem

16. Name 3 people you really admire in the mobile industry and why.
Mike Short, just for being Mike Short and supporting the industry and those within it, and still managing to do the day job.
Steve Flaherty [link www.starsightproject.com] for starting Swedish Beers Mobile Networking 6 years ago. I wouldn’t have had nearly so much fun but for the folks I have met there.
Russell Buckley for dragging me into the industry in the first place and for keeping me up to date (with Carlo Longino’s help of course) with what’s going on via Mobhappy.

17. What’s good and bad about the mobile industry?
Good - It’s vibrant, fast-moving and attracts interesting characters and there’s always something going on.
Bad – it’s exhausting, the technology changes so fast you can’t keep up and it attracts ahem interesting characters

Thanks Helen!

Congratulations to Louis Corrigan — previously CTO at Accuris Networks — Louis joins global messaging giant, Acision, starting today. Nice one Louis!

If you’ve got a question for Louis, whack it to me by email quickly and I’ll put it to him this morning. I hope to have a Q&A with him up soon.

Purple Labs, a leading supplier of embedded Linux solutions for the wireless industry, announced today the appointment of Simon Wilkinson as chief executive officer of the company.

Previously Wilkinson was founder and CEO of Magic4, a market leading provider of messaging solutions to wireless terminal manufacturers. He took Magic4 through all stages of development, from venture capital fundraising to the recruitment and management of a senior team of industry professionals to a global organization of 150 people located in offices in the United Kingdom, the United States, China, Hong Kong, France and India. Magic4 was acquired by Openwave in 2004. In 2002, Wilkinson was personally recognized as the Ernst & Young Emerging Entrepreneur of the Year.

“It is a pleasure to join Purple Labs at this pivotal time in the company’s strategic growth,” commented Wilkinson. “Purple Labs has successfully developed a powerful software platform and established its credibility in the wireless marketplace. We are now primed to grow the company operationally and commercially in order to achieve ambitious milestones.”

Wilkinson will recruit a number of proven individuals to round out the existing Purple Labs team, creating a formidable team with the collective experience and expertise necessary to accomplish the company’s aggressive growth plans.

Purple Labs recently announced the closing of a $14.5 Million USD (10.5 Million €) round of venture capital funding. The financing was led by Sofinnova Partners (Paris), Earlybird (Munich) and Partners Group (Zurich).

Acision today announces the appointment of recognised industry stalwart Rory Buckley as Chief Executive Officer (CEO).  Acision, the messaging and charging company of choice for over 300 network operators and service providers worldwide, was formed in June 2007 following the purchase of LogicaCMG’s Telecoms Products division for £265m (US $525m) by a consortia led by Atlantic Bridge and Access Industries.

Buckley joins Acision from Ericsson where his accomplishments over 30 years have seen him advance from technical trainee to top executive positions across EMEA, North America and Asia Pacific, including tenures as Executive
Vice President Middle East and Africa, Executive Vice President USA and finally President and Head of Ericsson, North East Asia.

Buckley will take up the position as CEO on 1st October 2007, taking over from Chris McDermott who leaves the company to pursue new opportunities. Larry Quinn, Chairman for Acision commented on the appointment: “In acquiring Acision at the start of this year we demonstrated our belief in the potential for the messaging market and in Rory we believe we have found the right leader to take the company forward.  We thank Chris for his hard work in driving the company to where it is today, and look forward to welcoming Rory to lead the team in Acision’s next phase of consolidating its global market leadership as the experts in messaging and charging.”

Rory Buckley commented: “Since its launch, Acision has often been described as a half-billion dollar start up, and as such it offers an exciting leadership opportunity.  From a firm market leadership position we are perfectly equipped to undertake innovative product development in the areas of messaging and charging to ensure we continue to support our customers’
market strategies.  On a personal note I am excited at the opportunity to lead Acision through its next stage of development and to work closely with the team as we continue to make the name Acision synonymous with innovation, assured. This will ultimately contribute to our customers’ growth and success.”

We’re big Stephen Fry fans here at SMS Text News. Especially when it comes to Blackadder. Or Absolute Power. Or the Harry Potter narrating. We even have our very own Mini-Fry in the form of Ben Harvey who writes our weekly Friday 3pm column.

So it was with some delight that I discovered The Big Man Himself is a huge unabashed mobile geek. You must take some time out to read his extremely thorough dissection of the (modern) mobile device.

Link: Stephen Fry » Blog Archive » Device and Desires

My guess is that iPhone 3 is going to be closer to the Dynabook than anyone dreamed possible. It’s a small wait by anybody’s standards. Except mine. Except the standards of the impatient early adopter.
I might as well end with a wish list.
Someone to take the UIQ platform and give a bolt of lighting.
The Palm OS to receive ditto.
The iPhone to open and expand.
D’loadable ringtones? C’mon, Apple, you can do better than the sop you’ve thrown us with the latest iTunes release. You wouldn’t want to look greedy would you?

Thanks Martin for pointing the link out to me.

I think we’ll need to A) add Mr Fry to the SMS Text News weekly flowers list and B) try and see if we can get him to answer some uber-geeky questions like:

1. What was your first mobile handset
2. What is your current mobile handset — and why
3. Which network provider do you use? What’s your current device strategy?
4. Out of every handset you’ve owned, which has been your favourite?
5. What do you use your handset for? Calling/texting/data…?

I’ll see if he can be contacted.

Bubble Motion, providers of Voice SMS product BubbleTalk, have appointed Tom Clayton as CEO and President with immediate effect.

According to the company, Clayton - previously the Worldwide General Manager for BEA Systems’ Telecom business - was appointed to the role based on his track record of success across a number of high profile leadership roles and his ability o thrive in entrepreneurial positions. In his various roles, Tom onsistently succeeded in rapidly building very loyal, high-calibre rganizations which capitalized on high-growth markets. Prior to BEA Systems, Tom also consulted at the very highest levels of Government and business and has attended some of the world’s leading universities including Harvard Business School and UC Berkeley.

Gaurav Garg at Sequoia Capital commented: “Tom’s appointment is great for Bubble Motion and for the whole of the Voice SMS market. Tom has consistently delivered incredible results and growth in numerous early stage markets and he understands the dynamics of the global telecom market extremely well. Looking at the quality of the management team and the technology that they are pioneering, I think it is fair to expect great things from Bubble Motion.”

Tom Clayton, CEO and President, Bubble Motion said: “Many industry observers see a very bright future for ‘Voice SMS’ and I agree with them. I particularly admire Bubble Motion for having the vision and skills to create and grow a new sector in the way that they have. All that, combined with the quality of the management team and its investors made me sure that this was a company that I wanted to be involved with.”

Bill Crawley, VP Bubble Motion commented: “Candidates of Tom’s quality do not come along very often, so we are thrilled that he will be joining us. I think it is testament to the quality of our technology vision and our current team that we have been able to attract such an excellent candidate.”

We recently caught up with Stuart Brown of MediaBurst and asked if he’d like to answer one of our SMS Text News interview questionnaires. MediaBurst has a lot on the horizon so it was great of Stuart to take the time to answer our questions. Here’s what he had to say.

Read the rest of this entry »

Mr Whatley — the Whatley Dude, as he is known around London mobile industry circles, has moved to Spinvox. He was previously … well… quite a lot of hats at Refresh Mobile.

Link: Whatleydude’s Moblog - Whatleydude’s Blog on Vox

Tomorrow - Aug 24th marks my last day at Refresh Mobile. Over the past 13mths I’ve worn many hats and gone through many job titles… so here goes - Ahem - SO - I am leaving the role(s) of:

Mobizines
Manager, Customer Champion, Chief of Blogger Relations, Content
Merchandiser, Blogger, Product Manager, Quality Control Manager and Service Evangelisist… (breathe)
…at Refresh Mobile.

Phew… and where am I off to? Well…I’m off to go and be the new Product Marketing and
Digital Manager over at the voice-to-screen specialists…  Spinvox.

Working alongside another new(ish) recruit - James Scroggs - to help them expand the Spinvox brand and products across the world and throughout the entire universe! ;o)

James will be at SMS Text News Unlimited Drinks tonight showing off Refresh Mobile’s Mippin service — so if you catch him, do give him a pat on the back and your best wishes. Every success at Spinvox, James!

We recently caught up with Ed, Product Manager for the hot new service Txt2Lock and asked if he would like to answer some of SMS Text News’ probing interview questions! Here’s what Ed had to say…

Motorola MR201 Orange Pay as you go

What was your first exposure to working with the mobile industry?

I based my degree around Mobile Phones and 3G technology but my first experience was a Market Research job for NQuire. NQuire are Mobile Number Portability experts and asked me to produce an analysis on European Markets they were targeting to see whether it would be financially beneficial.

What do you think has been the one biggest technological advance that has revolutionized the mobile industry?

Tricky question as there are quite a few. I would say simply the size of handsets coincided with improved screen resolution has to be the main one. The fact you can actually fit a phone in your pocket now (rather than carry a brief case) and see the screen has been the basis for widespread take up in my opinion.

What gave you the inspiration to start Txt2Lock?

Being a victim of Phone theft! Although I cancelled my sim card I was still left liable for some expensive calls to the Middle East. Also my main concern was my contacts, pictures and the fact someone was actually routing through my life by reading my texts, emails and calendar. A couple of my friends also had similar experiences and along with the growth in ID theft that’s when I decided to propose the idea to my colleagues.

What’s next on the horizon for you and the team at Information Mobile?

We have had some very good interest in Txt2Lock in a short amount of time and we are focusing on selling and covering a wider range of handsets in the near future. We also have some interesting projects in the pipeline involving developing specific applications for clients. The most exciting, in my opinion, is getting involved in proximity marketing for a project involving a Media company.

What is your current mobile strategy?

Our current strategy is to simply provide an easy and attractive user experience to any subscribers and users of our products including installing the application as well as using it. (Although I think we could do with some help from Nokia on the installing part……)

If you could only have one mobile phone for the rest of your life, what would it be? Why?

Probably the trickiest question on the list considering I change phones every 4-6 months. For old times sake the Nokia 6110.

What was the last movie you saw? Worth it?

Transformers. Without a doubt!

What mobile services can you not live without?

Apart from the basic calling and SMS has to be Widsets. Suits my day-to-day needs perfectly.

What is your current ringtone?

Rather dull but a preinstalled one called Clerk on my Nokia E65.

Do you have any pets?

No!

What company in the mobile industry has currently caught your eye?

There isn’t really one. There are a few services like Jaiku and Truphone which I think are good. I also like the new service coming out soon by Refresh Mobile, they have really picked up on user experience and what the user wants. I’m also looking forward to testing Taptu once I get my invite which is a mobile search and share service. I find it so hard to search the mobile web and believe there must be more sites out there for me to use.

Most used feature on your handset?

SMS

What sites do you read regularly to keep up with the industry?

Apart from SMS Text News you mean? Er, The Register, Pocket Picks, All About Symbian and Mac Sis are probably the most read but I do have about 25 others in my RSS feeder.

What University/College did you go to? What did you take?

I was at the University or Northumbria in Newcastle up until 3 years ago where I studied Information and Communication Management. Passed with a 2:1.

What was your mobile bill last month? Do you think it’s a fair price to pay for your mobile service?

£67.05p. Far too much if you ask me. Bills should never be more than £50. When will Data charges come down???

Complete this sentence. The iPhone is…

Going to be a flop but I am still going to buy one.

What’s your favourite type of music?

I like Indie, Alternative and Rock music. Stuff like Radiohead, Oasis, The Verve, Stone Roses, The Shins, Beck to name a few off the top of my head. Last album I bought was We Were Dead Before The Ship Even Sank by Modest Mouse.

What’s good and bad about the mobile industry?

Being involved in the application development side of things the thing that annoys me most is that every handset is different in terms of operating system and that Symbian 3rd Edition means very little in terms of development. It is so hard to make a universal application without testing and tweaking on all handsets. Also the Symbian Signing process could do with an overhaul. Otherwise Data Charges are another of my pet hates.

The good thing is that there is always something new. New handsets, new online services, new applications etc it is forever changing and never stands still there always some new gadget/service to use.

Intelligent SMS routing experts Telsis have today announced two key appointments to the board as it prepares for a major development and expansion programme.

Simon Brown, chief executive officer and Pax Andersson, group sales director, join with extensive experience of growing high-technology companies.

UK headquartered Telsis invented and was first to market with Intelligent SMS routing (ISR) - which is (as they say) “the next generation messaging system that lets operators grow text revenues with unprecedented throughput and advanced applications”. In simple terms, ISR removes the bottleneck normally seen around the operators short message service centre (SMSC) and makes things shift a lot faster. If you’re an O2 or Vodafone UK customer you’ve probably already used ISR technology without even noticing.

Anyhow.. back to the appointments. Simon Brown has more than 20 years’ experience in sales and operations management in the telecommunications industry. Prior to joining Telsis, Brown was chief executive of Neustar Next Generation Messaging following senior EMEA and APAC roles at Nokia and others.

Pax Andersson was previously general manager of 3-Com EMEA and over his 35-year career has held senior posts at IBM, Network365 and Timeplex.

News in from interactive mobile specialists Dialogue. They’ve just appointed ex-Orange UK Head of Support Operations Steve Lovell to the team as Head of Technical Servies.

Steve, 35, from Leeds, was responsible for multimedia technical operations and services. More recently, at BT his role as Service Operations Centre Manager, involved overseeing technical support teams responsible for all live NHS
services provided by BT.

“I am really looking forward to working with a team of people that already have an excellent reputation in the mobile arena,” said Steve. “One of my main objectives is to further develop Dialogue’s technical infrastructure and procedures, in order to continue to improve platform and service reliability. My other main focus is to provide the best possible customer service to new and existing customers as well as meeting and forming good relationships with Dialogue customers.”

Hugh Spear, Dialogue’s Managing Director is excited to have Steve on board: “We are all very excited about Steve joining our management team and he will be an integral part of helping drive the business forward. Steve’s technical knowledge and expertise will help continue to improve Dialogue’s reliable platform, and ensure we continue to provide a great service to our customers.”

Of course you shouldn’t confuse this Steve Lovell with the Aberdeen football striker, who’s career has included stints at Bournemouth, Exeter City, Sheffield United, QPR, Portsmouth and Dundee. Although the Steve Lovell from our industry achieved 100% uptime of his remit during his time at Orange, it’s unknown whether he also scored 34 goals in 84 appearances like the footie Steve did at Dundee.

Link: webitpr | Nokia Executive rejoins TynTec for growth drive

Mobile messaging services provider TynTec today announces that Ralph Eric Kunz, an original cofounder of the business, has resigned his senior role at Nokia to focus on his entrepreneurial role with the company.

Previously Nokia’s head of mapping, navigation and search, Kunz will be focusing on his existing role as Chairman of TynTec to identify additional strategic growth options and to accelerate TynTec’s business growth.  In particular, he will be driving forward product innovations developing on TynTec’s core SS7 connected infrastructure. TynTec is a cash rich company that is looking at both organic and non-organic growth scenarios.

Welcome aboard and every success Ralph! You can check out TynTec at www.tyntec.com.

Link: BBC NEWS | Politics | Blair gets to grips with mobiles

Former UK prime minister Tony Blair has taken one of the biggest steps in his new career since leaving office last month - by learning how to use text messaging.

Speaking to a Labour Party fundraising events, he admitted he’s only just got the hang of texting, having only bought his first mobile phone last October - and his first message got a reply back asking: “Who are you?”

(Thanks to Krystal for spotting this one!)

Sean has joined Cubic Telecom as Chief Commercial Officer. Congratulations to both Sean and Pat (who runs Cubic Telecom). You can read more on Roam4Free.

Sean, a Norwich City fan, was most recently Product Manager for Mobile at Jajah. Safe to say, he knows his stuff.
Link: Everything SKO…: My new gig…

Today is July 1st, Canada Day.

It’s also the day I start my new gig. I’m joining Pat Phelan and his amazing team over at Cubic Telecom in Cork, Ireland. A lot of you might know Pat, he is very well known in the VoIP space and is the person behind AllFreeCalls (Yak4Ever), Roam4Free and the very widely read blog by the same name.

If you’d like to know more about Sean and his background — it is seriously impressive — check out his About Me.

I’ve heard a lot about James Scroggs, from a lot of disperate people including Mr Networker himself, Oli Barrett. When Oli’s talking about someone — and actually takes the time to call you up to discuss the person, you know it’s good news.

So here we have it officially. James, formerly VP of Marketing at MTV Networks UK & Ireland, is joining SpinVox — one of my all time uber-brilliant favourite services.

He’s an interesting chap. Have a read of this:

Scroggs joined MTV Networks UK & Ireland in 2002 and as VP of Marketing Scroggs spearheaded its brand strategy and activation. MTV has been voted the Worlds Most Valuable Media Brand by Interbrand/Business Week. He was responsible for all advertising, digital, events, products, brand experiences and corporate social responsibility initiatives. He launched a multitude of key brand initiatives and TV franchises, including Pimp My Ride and the BOOM education programme and was the key spokesperson for MTV’s 25th Anniversary celebrations.

Scroggs started work in advertising in 1993, firstly as a Graduate Recruit at DMB&B and as the Account Manager on the Mars Bar ‘Work, Rest and Play’ and Budweiser ‘Genuine Article‘ campaigns. He then joined Lowe Howard-Spink as the Account Director on Stella Artois. He was the anchorman of the consistently award-winning Stella Artois ‘Reassuringly Expensive’ campaign, including the famed Stella Bottle campaign, which won a Cannes Grand Prix, and the launch of the multi-award winning ‘Stella Screen’ film programme, all of which contributed to Stella becoming the UK’s most valuable beer brand.

He’s the guy who anchored the Reassuringly Expensive one, eh? He’s also the one to thank for the wicked Channel4 movies brought to you by Stella. See. It does work, brand building. I remember’em.

He then moved on to the ill-fated ONdigital as Senior Brand Manager, drove its relaunch as ITV Digital with the genesis of the still famous ‘Al & Monkey’ campaign, recently redeployed for PG Tips, before joining MTV. He is on the Board of the Institute of Contemporary Arts, Director of Robin Wight’s ‘Ideas Foundation’ and patron of a high profile Mental Health charity CALM - Campaign Against Living Miserably.

I’m really excited to see what he cooks up at SpinVox. Kudos to them for hiring him.

Just in case you’re on the hunt for a SpinVox primer:

SpinVox launched the world’s first voicemail-to-text service in 2004 in the UK and this year has launched its service in North America with further deployments scheduled for South Africa and Canada in the coming months. The company expects to go live with 12 deals in 2007, reaching an initial potential customer base of six million.

SpinVox services enable both Wireless 2.0 and Web 2.0 businesses with its range of voice-to-screen products which convert any voice to text and deliver it to any screen – mobile, computer or PDA. The most recent SpinVox deals include its launch with leading blog provider Six Apart to provide its 12 million LiveJournal customers with voice-powered blogging and the launch of its voicemail-to-text service with Cincinnati Bell in the U.S.

Go ahead and get yourself a test account at spinvox.com. It’s pure brilliance, the service.

Link: Netimperative - 3 brings in new head of communication

Alan joins from brand and marketing consultancy Egghead Ltd where he was managing director.  Previously he was a general manager for VW Group, Luxury Cars and also worked as the company’s head of communications. Prior to that, he was head of consumer marketing for Yellow Pages with BT Group

Welcome Alan and congratulations!

I’m looking forward to see what Alan adds to the team there.

If you’re remotely interested in following the business of environment and technology, I thoroughly recommend adding Greenbang to your feeds. It’s been going for quite a while and launched officially today.

The Chief Greenbang blogger is Dan Ilett, a journalist by trade with publications such as ZDnet and Silicon.com.

Link: Greenbang » Greenbang explodes onto the web - tracking the explosion of environmental business

I’ve talked and talked about this for so long, but we’re officially launching today and from now on will be tracking the news on the business of environment and technology.

I’m hoping to try and get his perspective on mobile technology and the environment shortly. My experience in that area is limited to understanding that you can recycle your handsets…

More on Adam’s page — initially he thought he was to blame, but on further investigation, Andrew Bud reckons it was the Hotxt founder, David Whitewood.

Link: Adam Bird: Heckled by the Man from Hotxt

Mike also said that Andrew Bud, mBlox, had mentioned to him about being heckled by the man from Hotxt

I wonder what the heckling was about, eh? Interesting, interesting.

I almost did some heckling at the NokiaWorld conference last year.

Stefan Constantinescu, formerly of Ringnokia.com, has joined the team over at uber-gorgeous mobile news and reviews site, IntoMobile — definitely worth a read and even more so now Stefan’s involved.

Congratulations Stefan!

I’m off to Flirtomatic on Monday. I’m popping into see Flirter in Chief, Lauren, and no doubt, a good amount of other Flirters. I hope to knock up an overview blog with their latest public gossip. They’ve been rocketing away of late, with huge rises in traffic over the months.

More on Monday… or Tuesday, weather permitting.

It’s voting time — so reckons Technokitten:
Link: Musings of a mobile marketer: Vote George Kidd NOW!!

It’s dead easy to vote for George so there’s no excuse. You just text NMA 4 (there’s a space between NMA and the 4) and send it to 83338. Get your votes in before the 1st June. Winner announced on the 28th June at the NMA Awards at the Grosvenor House Hotel

Yes, that’s right, you can cast your vote in the New Media Age awards.

I just did. It was a bit annoying having to type out NMA. It isn’t in your T9, you see. I’d have chosen MEDIA as the keyword, or maybe NEW. But that’s because I’m often picky like that.

I got a text straight back acknowledging my vote. I presume it wasn’t a premium one

I sat next to George once at a meal — a very nice chap.

I have, incidentally, got over my personal boycott of New Media Age. Last year I was trying to link to one of their articles only to find out that they were still arsing around with passwords and user accounts on their website. That all appears to have gone now. Excellent.

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?

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!

I invited Nate, founder of free texting service, TxtDrop.com if he’d like to do an SMS Text News Q&A. I always find it massively exciting to see how people answer these questions as it gives an excellent insight as to what mobile industry entrepreneurs (Nate, in this case) are thinking.

So let’s begin!

1. What was your first mobile handset?
It was an old Motorola. I actually can’t remember the model, but I remember that it was to big to fit in my pocket!

2. What is your current mobile strategy? (i.e. Handsets, devices, networks)
Right now I’m using RIM’s Blackberry 8703e with Verizon Wireless. It has everything I’m looking for right now in one device - email, voice, and data.

3. What price plan are you using right now?
I don’t remember exactly, but it’s usually around $100 a month. I have a pretty basic voice plan, along with an unlimited data plan and a tethering option, so I can connect my Blackberry to my laptop for private high speed internet access when I need it.

4. What’s your background?
I’m fascinated by technology and the internet. Always have been. I became interested in telephony around 2000 or 2001, when I started testing services like Net2Phone, which at the time, was so cool to me. I eventually became more and more interested in all aspects of telephony, especially VoIP, Open Source PBXs, and of course mobile phones and mobile technologies like SMS and MMS. I created my first successful mobile website, TxtDrop.com, in September 2005 because I really wanted a free text messaging application for my own use.

5. What sites do you regularly read to keep up to date with mobile?
Textually, SMS Text News, Ringtonia, press releases at PRWeb.com, and Jeff Pulver’s blog (http://pulverblog.pulver.com) is one of my favorites because he’s always talking about the next big thing. He blogs a lot about his traveling and what technologies the US is missing out on!

6. What was your mobile bill last month? What do you think is a fair amount to pay for your mobile service each month?
$130. I think my bill should really be under $100 a month.

7. Pick 3 people that you admire and rate in the mobile industry and give us 2-3 lines about each.
I really don’t know that many people in the mobile industry, so my list is limited, but here goes:

Jeff Pulver - Jeff has a great blog, which isn’t specifically related to the mobile industry, but nonetheless, has introduced me to a lot of next generation communications companies and technologies. He’s one of the most influential people in the telecommunications industry, in my opinion. It’s amazing that he even has time to blog as much, and as in depth, as he does! I really admire all he’s done in the VoIP industry (he was even a co-founder of Vonage).

Steve Jobs - Breaking into the mobile industry and trying to compete against companies like Motorola, LG, RIM and Nokia isn’t an easy task! Especially when your used to making computers and music players. But Steve Jobs seems to have put in a lot of time and effort into the iPhone and it looks like it will pay off for Apple.

Emily From Textually - Emily has a great site, Textually.org, which keeps me in touch with the mobile industry. I’ve been a frequent Textually reader for over 2 years now and it’s also how I found SMS Text News. Don’t know what I’d do without it!

8. Do you have any pets?
A cat.

9. What one issue or technological advancement would you like to see with the mobile industry? What are you looking forward to?
I’d like my Blackberry 8703e to have a camera! I’d like to see high speed networks rolled out in more cities, especially smaller ones, across the United States. I live in a very small state, and we ALWAYS get things last! It kills me.

I’m really looking forward to video calls, whether it’s with another mobile phone user or someone at their computer. Also, I’m looking forward to better video playback support on mobile phones, like the day when your able to play YouTube videos as well as Quicktime videos on the same mobile handset.

10. What’s your ringtone?
The CTU ringtone from ‘24′.

11. What’s the last movie you saw at the cinema?
300.

12. What services do you most use on your handset?
Email, the web, and SMS.

13. What’s the hottest mobile service to catch your eye recently?
Radvision’s PC-to-Mobile 3G video calls! Wow.

14. When did you last send a picture / video message — and who was it to?
About a month ago when I was testing out a picture messaging service I’m creating. The message was to myself. I’ve never sent a video message.

15. What new mobile companies have caught your attention this year?
Radvision and Loopt.

16. What is the best thing and the worst thing about the mobile industry?
The best thing about the mobile industry is that it keeps evolving, getting better and more sophisticated

The worst things about the mobile industry, in my opinion, are the closed nature of most mobile applications and the competing technologies in the US that are not compatible with each other, such as EVDO and EDGE, as well as CDMA and GSM. Also, it’s terrible when mobile carriers intentionally disable certain features or don’t plan to support features on the phones they offer!

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Nate, thank you for taking the time to do this! Fascinating!

If you’d like to do an SMS Text News Q&A, drop me a note.

Link: Texting may sabotage women’s chances of finding love

The immediacy of SMS and email can also make us look overly keen - a guaranteed turn-off for blokes.

Dye cites the case of a woman who texted her boyfriend, and didn’t receive a reply for a day. “By the evening she had convinced herself he was having an affair, the relationship was over, and she was a single girl again,” she says.

When he called the next day he couldn’t understand the drama. His only problem was a flat battery.

I do agree with the points in this article. Worth a look if it’s at all of interest.

The immediacy of the medium really can screw things up, especially in a relationship’s infancy. Then again, if you’re both on the same page, it can very exciting. The moment someone has to go into an 8 hour meeting though, the fun ends … at least temporarily.

I’m a big fan of love letters. Given today’s email environment, I reckon they’re far more important and meaningful than they ever were.

When’s the last time you sent a love letter?

Right! Get your pen out!

“Dear Ewan…” and continue…