Apparently it’s going to be a hot summer here as far as the latest smartphones go. I have been putting off getting a new phone until July. Lots of exciting news circulating about RIM’s Blackberry 9000 (Bold) and it’s direct competition to the iPhone. The more I hear about this phone the more I am liking. I have not actually seen one yet but judging from the photos it looks to be the ‘dogs b****cks’ in style, and the reviews on its functionality have all been positive.
The Blackberry Bold has all the usual features such as push-deliver technology, multiple email account integration allowing the user to have up to ten personal and business mail accounts. Instant messenging with Blackberry Messenger, and support for Google Talk, Yahoo Messenger, IBM Sametime, Lotus, and AOL.
Not to be outdone by it’s competitors who have been clamoring on-board the social networking bandwagon, Blackberry takes the 9000 Bold to the next level of of accessing personal social network sites like Facebook, and business /social network sites like myJournal, with messaging, and image uploading directly to your profile, or blog. Of course there is much more to this phone, and no doubt when it arrives in the UK, the hands-on reviews will start. Everywhere I have looked I have not seen any dates as of yet, but from what I hear it will be released during the latter part of the Summer. No doubt O2 (I’m hoping) will carry it here in the UK on their business tariffs.
It remains to be seen if the Blackberry will stand up to its competitors, with tis anouncement of updated features, style, and looks, it should be a worthy competitor if not better than the current smartphones on the market.
Other new phones set for release this year are the Nokia N96, next generation iPhone, and the HTC Diamond.
It’s that time again where I am getting restless and wanting a change of mobile phone. Once again I find myself trawling through the phone reviews on the various mobile phone review sites. I’m finding myself torn between giving up some of the functions of the Blackberry Pearl and moving to a different brand. I went downtown Bournemouth today and ahd a look at some fo the newer phones that Blackberry had to offer. I can’t I was that impressed, anything of interest such as the Curve or the 8800 series, I didn’t like the wideness of them. Why couldn’t Blackberry have upgraded the Pearl, made it a little deeper and enhanced its functions. Will I wait for the much hyped iPhone, I doubt it, I am curious but not that curious. It seems all play and no business from what I have I heard, and then the debate over which network in the UK will it partner with!
I am being swayed by the HTC Touch, not only is it a stylish looking phone, it has a neat array of functions for business use. I had the Hermes before which I didn’t really enjoy, but this one seems a bit more compact. It is minus 3G though and that is a downside. Most reviews I have found on the HTC Touch have been fairly positive. I have thrown out of the equation the Nokia N95 after reading MobilePhones UK that it’s sluggish even though it has some great features such as that 5 megapix camera. I’m not hip enough to carry a LG Prada and think that touch screen only feature would soon get annoying. So what’s left besides the HTC Touch?
It’s almost half a year since I started using the Blackberry and have grown to like it. Beside some of its short-comings as in speed of opening applications and available third-party apps of any real use, I do like the phone and am already thinking of upgrading to one of the newer global models on the market, unless I hold-out and wait for the release of the much hyped Apple iPhone.
What I would like to see is a way of remotely controlling the Blackberry from a desktop. Using it for work as I do, I don’t want to be fiddling with it when I need to use it. I would rather just handle all day-to-day operations directly from my desktop and use the Blackberry when I’m on the move. The post at the new Blackberry forum says it all:
As a front-end web developer and SEO, I work all day with my Blackberry in its
cradle near my PC. I am constantly in need of it to speak with clients and
speak with contractors via text and BB Messenger. If there was a way this could
flash up on the screen instead and not have to use the phone itself while working
it would be quite handy. Remotely Operate Blackberry from Desktop >>
I have looked at a couple of applications that may do this but have had no real luck as most of them allow you to control the desktop from the Blackberry but not the other way around. More upsetting there is available software for other phones such as Sony P series and Nokia.
It was only a couple of days I was in a discussion with the Search and Go Development Team about its upcoming release of it’s ‘long awaited home page’ (ahem), yes, they finally are out of the prototype stage and will start releasing the final stages of build 2 in the next few weeks. One of the main areas discussed was the mobile build that is sitting on a private server getting a daily tweak to its code and content in preparation for its launch (I think the mobile side will be in two months), the discussion was about delivering interactive advertising in the content of the mobile pages and best way forward for delivery of these ads.
While still no definitive agreement on how this will be approached, we are avid users of the mobile web and all share a common agreement - we don’t want it in our faces. All of us agreed that we wanted fast and speedy information and search results served up super-speed with no flaffing around. This mean we did not want to be confronted by ads spilling into our surf time when all we really want is to find the address of the nearest restaurant or the latest weather. Having pop-ups or flash driven ads blocking the view of your results is going to cost with time and money. So how are ads to be delivered? One way we agreed is for the Search and Go weather results to be sponsored by a company. For example you might have:
View the Latest Weather Results for the UK on a Blackberry!
Sitting next to this would be the company logo and a link to the company mobile landing page or mobile web ready site. Another idea that would suit Search and Go would be for them to have their info not only subtly sponsored by advertisers, also the ads placed in strategic areas of their content. I was told this could be confusing for consumers. I am not so sure though - if the ads were relevant to the content and were placed between paragraphs it should work quite well. This si where brand-awareness plays a strong part and should be a real breeze for companies with recognizable brands. Your on the mobile phone and looking for a hotel in London and you arrive at a information site and the recognizable branding of the Hilton is sitting right their in the middle of the content with call now for reservation - then yes - the chances are your going to click and go to the Hilton.
Marketing execs and developers on the mobile web platform need to take into account the needs of the average mobile web surfer. I am seeing a number of mobile ready sites lately that have been placing clunky ads or the pop-up text links onto their mobile ready sites, in several phones and browsers I tested these sites only to have some of them crash the phone and at times completely freeze the device. I can imagine this making consumers very unhappy and never to return to the offending site - which amounts to a loss of revenue and sales.
It’s all very well to put up your mobile ready website, but pay attention to how you are delivering those ads especially in size, and ignore the strategic placement rules they very well may not be the revenue generator you expected.
For those eager to start developing for the Blackberry Pearl. Plazmic announced today they have released the Content Developer’s Kit v4.2 for BlackBerry. The kit will allow for developers to create interactive content such as themes and comes bundled with the Plazmic Composer and some cool examples. The kit and release notes can be downloaded here: Content Developer’s Kit for Blackberry >>
