O2 must be checking the batteries in their profit calculators. The uk network reckons that four times as many people had registered an interest in the new & improved iPhone than for the original device.
O2 claims that over 130,000 people have registered via their website compared to 36,000 at the same point in the iPhone 1.0 launch.
The new pricing scheme means that many more people are able to upgrade to the new iPhone without a prohibitively expensive contract and there is even scope for (legal) PAYG users this time around. By this time next year it might be easier to count the people who don’t have an iPhone.
O2 chief executive Ronan Dunne also pointed out that iPhone users typically spend 30% on their bills than non-iPhone users. Ker-ching!
You love scuba diving but can’t bring yourself to be parted with your iPhone/N95/G810 etc. It’s a conundrum and no mistake, if only you could combine the two.
Oh but you can dear reader, all you need is the help of the Overboard Waterproof Gadget Case which we just spotted over on the fring blog. Granted you won’t be able to actually talk on your phone while scuba diving without sounding like you are trying to eat a live octopus, and using the camera will probably be a bit difficult seeing as only one side of the case is transparent, but it’s nice to have options.
Could be useful if you are paranoid someone is going to steal your handset from your beach bag while you are taking a dip in the big drink. They work up to 19 feet deep too, so not bad for $25 (about 13 quid).
If this has made a light go off in your head, you can find the Overboard Waterproof Gadget Case over at ThinkGeek.
The Met Office supplies meteorological data for news agencies and other content providers to repackage and pass on to consumers. Later this week Met Office Media will announce a new studio in Millbank that will enable it to publish its own tailored weather content directly to mobile phones and portable video devices, reports the Financial Times.
Through a deal with MobiTV, the Met Office has been producing static 2D-weather charts for use on mobile phones, but the new studio - plus some innovative 3G video technology - will allow 3D ‘fly through’ weather graphics similar to those seen on TV weather forecasts to be sent directly to handsets.
Although there is no shortage of mobile weather services, Met Office spokesman Phil Johnson stressed that the Met Office had an edge, “customers want much more clarity and information around weather, and they want an authoritative voice.”
The Met Office earns around £6- 7 million from broadcasters every year.
Motorola has patented a new Bluetooth headset that can gather medical data about the wearer.
The device works like a standard headset but, in addition to the microphone and earpiece, alsohas an array of sensors that can monitor the wearer’s heart rate, blood pressure, temperature, etc.
The data is relayed to a phone handset where it can be analysed in situ or transmitted to a server for further processing.
Clearly, there are a number of practical uses that this tech could be put to - something like Nokia Sports Tracker could take on a whole new dimension if it could monitor more than just your footfalls and GPS location. You might even find it directing you to jog to the nearest A&E department if it judges you to be particularly unfit.
On the flipside, though, I’m not sure I would want my medical data flying around in the ether unless I was 100% sure about how secure the network was. If you think v1@gra spam is annoying, wait until you start geting ads for drugs tailored to your metabolism and offers of treatment for medical conditions you thought were private..
You know what would be great? Multi-touch on the Nokia N95! Yeah, stick that in your pipe and smoke it, Apple!
And here it is - sort of. Multitouch is clearly going to be a big ask on the N95, what with it not having a touchscreen and all.
Developer Sittiphol Phanvilai has taken a standard Nokia N95 with a TV out and combined it with a couple of UV lightpens, a large flat-screen monitor, a strip of UV-filtering film and some ninja programming skills. It’s not the kind of thing you would want to cart around with you but it does show the power of the platform - and that with the right extra hardware Nokia could easily come up with a workable solution.
Here is a video of Sittiphol explaining all :
The planned WiMax rollout in the UK could be delayed due to objections by O2 and T-Mobile.
OfCom had originally planned to auction the 2.6Ghz spectrum for WiMax in July, but has announced that the auction could be delayed until at least September due to legal action by the two operators.
O2 & T-Mobile’s complaints centre on them not being able to adequately value to WiMax spectrum. OfCom is also planning to re-auction some of the 900MHz GSM spectrum. Until the exact details of this ‘re-farming’ are revealed, say O2 & T-Mobile, they can’t tell how valuable the new WiMax spectrum is going to be and cannot therefore place a sensible bid.
Some industry commentators have pointed out, however, that it would be to established operators advantage to see the auction delayed as this would prevent a new WiMax operator from gaining a foothold before they were ready to roll out their Long Term Evolution (LTE) network - seen as the successor to 3G.
Either way - no WiMax for a while, which is a shame. OfCom does seem eager to get tihngs moving though. “We are seeking an expedited timeframe for the legal action to be heard,” said a spokesperson.
With most decent phones coming with contracts to the tune of 18 to 24 months these days, you have to be pretty damn sure that it’s definitely the N95 and not the iPhone you want when it comes to signing on that dotted line. Not however, if you are a US government official it seems.
It looks like the rule is, if you are a member of Joe/Jane public then an early termination fee is coming your way if you want to end that contract but if you are a US government official, you need not worry about it. That’s the line Sprint-Nextel is taking anyway, issuing the blunt statement that it has “ultimately decided against charging the fees to the government even though it charges the same fees to consumers and businesses.”
The Boy Genius Report is reporting that the decision was born of an investigation that started in 2004, back when the company was simply known as Nextel, about whether government contracts that ended before their pre-determined termination date were liable for early termination fees (ETFs). Nextel’s VP of marketing at the time hypothesized that “the government will never, never accept such penalty amounts”. Talk about your self fulfilling prophecies.
There’s been no real justification given for the decision making it all the less savory. Perhaps the US Government offered Sprint-Nextel Hawaii or something.
CNET, the techie and gadget reviews site, has launched a table that details the specific radiation levels emitted by mobile phones according to make and model.
The scale rates what’s known as specific absorption rate, or SAR for short, which is a measure of the quantity of radiofrequency (RF) energy that is absorbed by the body. The FCC won’t allow phone’s with an SAR higher than 1.6W/kg (watts per kilogram) to pass certification in the US or Canada. In Europe, the level is capped slightly higher at 2W/kg.
The table, which details individual model SARs, is bad news for Motorola which accounts for six of the top ten worst offenders in the US with the Motorola V195s claiming the dubious accolade of being the mobile with the highest SAR. The Blackberry Curve 8330 is no angel either and crackberry addicts ought to beware as the device is nestling in two spots out of the top ten on different networks. The safest model available is the LG KG800 and redeeming itself at the favorable end of the scale is also the Motorola Razr V3x.
Even if there has been no concrete evidence (that the scientific community at large can agree upon) that mobile phone radiation is harmful, the FCC does have caps on this sort of thing for a reason and these tables make for very interesting reading.
Firefox has been steadily increasing its market share of the web browser market on PCs and Macs, at the expense of Internet Explorer (on the former, at least). It’s been known for some time that it’s going mobile too, but Mozilla Labs’ Aza Raskin has just given us a sneak peek at how Firefox Mobile might work, in a video demo. It’s a working prototype, so may well change before us punters get our hands on it. But the browser is designed for touchscreen handsets, and has iPhone-esque scrolling and zooming, as well as the tabbed browsing approach you’d expect from Firefox. In short, it looks really, really nice. Check the demo out by clicking here. Whatever they do with it, Firefox Mobile will face stiff competition from rivals such as Opera Mini, which is also coming out with a touchscreen-enhanced edition.
That’s what analyst firm Piper Jaffray is estimating. I’d like some of whatever they’re smoking. However, Fortune magazine has been comparing all the analyst forecasts, which go as low as 10 million. The conclusion seems to be that Apple will probably sell around 22 million iPhones next year. Not bad, eh? Bear in mind that everyone is just guessing wildly, of course. Actually, Piper Jaffray has gone further, and claimed that iPhone applications will be a $1bn market in 2009, as those 45 million iPhone owners rush to buy apps on iTunes. Again, this is pure (albeit informed) speculation, and the company admits it’s their most aggressive guess. However, there is a concrete benefit to all these big numbers being bandied about. It’ll certainly mean a lot of developers diving into the iPhone app market, hoping for millions of users who’ll be keen to buy their apps. And while that will certainly result in a lot of rubbish, it also increases the chances of finding some truly innovative stuff too.
Recent Comments