Mobility Now

So, the Apple WWDC happened on Monday, and the iPhone 3G was announced, as everyone expected. Many of the predictions came true, some didn’t. One thing is for sure, a lot of confusion remains, and some information is still unknown, or at least only partially known. Here I will try to hopefully dispel any of the misinformation, and remove some of the confusion about what was announced, and what remains to be seen.

First, 3G. The phone has high speed connections, and is now worthy of being called a 21st century phone. It was also a requirement for Apple to sell this phone in many other countries, because let’s face it, many countries expect all their phones to be 3G. One thing to remember obviously is that 3G mostly applies to data, not calls. So that’s mostly useful if you are a heavy web user over the cell network, or want to download videos and such.

Then, there’s GPS. That one was predicted on blogs by many people, but some were skeptical. The main issue people bring up with GPS is battery life. For those who watched the keynote, Steve Jobs showed a slide with the battery life times for talk, data, web browsing, and so on… and then he started talking about GPS. It’s likely that this was intentional, because GPS will probably be a heavy hit on battery life.

The form factor stayed very similar. The phone looks very much like iPhone version 1, except for a few minor details. The back is made of plastic, and that’s probably to improve the reception. It may scratch more easily, but it’s probably a good decision since talk quality is more important in the end. The headphone jack is also fixed so all headphones fit, finally!

Firmware 2.0 is also a big deal. Enterprise support, while it may have seemed boring during the keynote, is actually very important for Apple. The main reason people stay attached to their business phone is because of Microsoft Exchange support. Now the iPhone will be just as wired as any other phone, and that will bring in a lot of new customers. The App Store is also a nice addition, and so is the new Mobile Me service.

The biggest surprise came when Steve announced the price. At $199, it’s a big price drop. The original iPhone started at $599, then dropped to $399, and the iPhone 3G is going to be $199. Now the picture is more complex than that. For example, the contract with AT&T will require a more expensive 3G plan, which if counted over 2 years, will bring the price higher than the original iPhone. However, you do get 3G, so it’s still worth it. Compared with some other AT&T plans, such as the Blackberry ones, it’s cheaper.

Finally, the part where we don’t have all the informations is on how the transition will go for people who have a current iPhone and who want to upgrade. What we do know is you will be able to keep your phone number and SIM card. In fact, AT&T will provide a tool to switch your SIM from the old phone to the new. However, you will have to take a new 2 years contract. We know they will force people to activate phones in the stores, so it’s not known if things like Jailbreak will still work.

In the end, is the new iPhone worth it? It depends. Many current iPhone users will line up on July 11, and buy the new one. Apple will get a lot of new customers too with the new features, both in hardware and in software. I personally won’t be getting one, even if Canada is getting the iPhone (along with 22 countries, 70 before the end of the year) for several reasons. First I’m not a fan of contracts. There are rumors that the phone will be available without a contract, but no one knows in which countries yet (not the US, that’s for sure) and rumors say it will cost $800. Comparatively, my $250 Nokia E51 does everything the iPhone does, albeit it doesn’t look as cool and doesn’t have nearly as big a screen. I’m also not a big fan of on-screen keyboards, but that’s a personal preference. I do admit the iPhone is looking better and better, and Apple is now truly a big contender in the field.

Well the iDay came and went, now that we’re 2 weeks after the launch of the most over-hyped, over-mediatized phone ever, how did it fare? Well it did sell a lot, more than 500,000 just in the first weekend. Reviews came in from every possible source, and it was pretty much exactly as we had expected.

As I thought, many of the negative points got mentioned in the reviews, like the lack of a real keyboard, the price, the non-removable battery, the 2-years contract needed, and the lack of any third party software support. Some new things got found out, like the fact that if you have bad credit, AT&T will actually offer a pre-paid plan. Overall most reviews were positive, and since then people have been actively working on hacking it to enable even more features.

In the end it pleased a lot of phone users, but it’s of little interest to me, other than for the impact it will make on longer term phone development. Apple always has an effect on the industry, by proving that something can be made sleeker, easier to use, so we’re sure to see many more copies in the months to come, and user interfaces for phones in general should take a hint from the iPhone.

As this will probably be the last post on the subject, the reviews all over the web covered every possible feature of this device except one, so I have to ask the ultimate question to end this post: Will it blend?

Every few months that same old rumor comes back up, that Google is about to announce a “Google Phone”. The last in this long series was just yesterday, when the latest LG phone was announced to be bundled with Google applications. With a name so high profile as Google, this is surely not the last time we see that famous phone name in the media.

What many news sources don’t get, is that Google is a software company. They don’t do hardware, and there is no reason for Google to start making a phone. Not only would the cost of going into the phone market be huge, but it would actually restrict their user base. By making Java clients and mobile portals for their services, they ensure that anyone with a cellphone can use Google. That’s always been the way they’ve done things, and there’s no reason to think it will change. There will be no true Google Phone on store selves anytime soon, but you could make your own.

Google is probably the company that’s the most present in the mobile space, which is interesting since they don’t actually produce any mobile hardware. But with their many services, almost all of which now available on the go, any manufacturer, carrier or even mobile user can create a Google Phone. The only requirement for this experiment is to have a handset with Java support where you can access the Internet (unlimited data plan helps) and install third party software. Almost any unlocked phone works.

1. The first application to get is Google Maps for Mobile. From that you can browse maps, get directions, do local searches and get traffic reports.
2. Then get the Google Mail mobile app from your browser to download the Java client to access your email directly from Google’s servers.
3. Now it’s time to connect to the web. If your device has a decent browser, that’s plenty good, or if you want the full web experience download the latest Opera Mini.
4. Change your homepage to http://mobile.google.com so all the Google services appear right away, then you can access the news, your calendar and do searches from there.
5. Lastly, install one of the many Google themes out there such as this one, and put all the applets we installed on the main menu of your phone.

An optional step would be to print out a Google stamp and put it on the front of the phone, for complete and total integration with the online service, and there you go, your very own Google Phone. Next time, we’ll make an iPhone!

Opera Mini 4 Beta has been released this morning. It now provides the full desktop browsing experience. This is a revolutionary product. It’s bigger than the iPhone. Why? Because over one billion people currently use a cellphone, and are restricted to browse only WAP pages because they don’t have a smartphone. Yet the vast majority support Java, and by downloading this simple 200k program, they can now browse the full Internet with a desktop like experience, right now, for free.

But Opera Mini won’t get media coverage, I can guarantee you that. Yet these same media sources will keep running daily iPhone coverage stories, building up hype in the public. It’s not based on how useful it is for people, it’s based on how sleek and sexy looking it is. If it doesn’t come in a shiny box with an Apple logo on it then clearly there’s no reason to cover it.

The new Opera Mini 4 Beta uses a technique similar to the S60 browser to provide both the full screen view and a mini map to allow scrolling. It also brings other new features such as better CSS support and faster download times. An online demo of the new browser is available on the Opera site.

I for one am glad Opera made the transition to the desktop like browsing experience. Now alongside S60 users, any Java phone can have access to the full Internet, the way it was meant to be. But hey, it doesn’t have the Apple logo on it, so who cares, right?

This site has been live for more than a month, and in that time I’ve had a lot of fun updating it and keeping up to date on the high end mobility news. I also had the time to review the traffic reports from over 10,000 users who came here on which stories people read and what topics are of most interest. It seems my original content such as reviews and editorials are by far more popular than the news items. Based on those findings, and the fact that keeping the news section takes 90% of my time, I’ve decided to remove the news items and keep the content people enjoy reading, and that I enjoy writing.

The first iPhone third party web application has apparently been made. It’s called OneTrip and is a shopping cart application. The most interesting thing however, is that it works in Safari (both the Mac and Windows version), but it also works on the S60 browser, although the display can sometimes have glitches depending on the device. However it does not work in Firefox or other non-Safari based browsers.

OneTrip allows you to select items from a list of typical grocery products, or to type in your own items. Then you can return to that list and see what you need to buy, and even mark the items as already bought.

So this may actually be a good thing for Nokia and other smartphone manufacturers, since we all know a bunch of iPhone web apps will pop up in the coming months, and if they all work on the S60 browser, that means they are really web apps for a variety of devices. Of course, the issues with web apps remain, such as the fact that all personal data has to be stored on the remote server, data usage costs and the fact that they all become moot when the connection drops.

Steve Jobs talked to developers today at WWDC 2007 about the iPhone and what developers would be able to do with it. In the past, he said Apple intends to control the device completely to ensure the “security” of the handset by not allowing third party applications. Since then, he was vague saying they were trying to find a way to bring more software in.

Today, he finally put the hammer down and said developers will have to use a web API to get into the iPhone. Basically, using the built-in Safari browser, users will have to access online services that use AJAX and web standards. Jobs said: “And so you can write amazing Web 2.0 and AJAX apps that look and behave exactly like apps on the iPhone, and these apps can integrate perfectly with iPhone services.” So there you have it, the only installed software will be what Apple ships.

And that basically ends the myth about whether or not the iPhone is a smartphone. The core feature of a smartphone is it’s ability to add software. The web may allow for a lot of flexibility, but that uses data, costs money, is restricted to the web browser, and all goes away when the connection drops. The iPhone may be a great phone, but without that third party community of developers, it will never be a true smartphone.

MocoNews reports that the US cellular providers reached over $5 billion in revenues purely from the services sector in Q1 2007. This includes application downloads, ring tones, and other data uses. And this, ladies and gentlemen, is the cash cow of the industry.

Ever wonder why Verizon disables Bluetooth for file transfers on phones? Why Sprint would threaten Google for providing a free Java mapping application? Or why phones who support wi-fi suddenly get their VOIP capabilities disabled? It’s all done for a single reason: To protect the cash cow.

Providers do a lot to try and get people to sign up with them. There are cell phone ads everywhere, more than most other industries other than perhaps cars. They literally give you phones too. All that to get you to sign up for a 2 or 3 years contract, and start filling up the cow. Once locked in, with your crippled phone and legal obligation to stay with them, they nickel and dime all they can. A single ring tone, wallpaper, picture transfer, will cost you. Even worse, now some providers push unwanted ads on devices. And that’s how they make their money. And they do make money.

The crazy thing is that it doesn’t have to be this way. The choice is always the same: Pay more now, but save a lot later; or get a free phone, and be stuck paying through the roof for years. Paying $200, $300 and sometimes up to $750 for a phone right away may seem like a large investment, and it is. But be sure of one thing, every cent the cell phone providers subsidize from a phone, they make back over the contract period. The unbranded phone will allow you to transfer those MP3 ring tones over Bluetooth, will have VOIP available (if the phone supports wi-fi or 3G) and will allow you to pick whatever wallpaper you want without paying your provider each time you change your mind.

I don’t know about you, but I think the cow is big enough. With my unlocked device, and pre-paid card, I pay $10 a month and only pay when I actually browse the Internet, and even then I often use wi-fi in which case I pay nothing. I can use VOIP and not have to pay a dime for calls either. And of course I can change wallpaper, and upload any MP3 that I own to use as a ring tone by using Bluetooth without cashing in either.

Now I do have to say pre-paid isn’t for everyone, and someone who needs to do a large amount of calls each month outside of any wi-fi coverage is probably better served with a contract plan, but there is something to be said for owning a device that isn’t telling you what you can and can’t do with it.

I’ve started this site less than a week ago and we just reached 1,000 unique visitors last night. Thanks to everyone for stopping by! As I’ve been cruising the blogs, news releases and forums, deciding what I found interesting and what I wanted to talk about, I’ve been deciding on what I would focus on here.

This site’s main focus is going to be news and information about the world of mobility, more specifically the trends that wireless technology brings to the world, new cool projects and software, as well as new smartphones, mainly in the world of Symbian, Windows Mobile and Blackberry. I’d love to hear any feedback or comments about the site, I left the comment system freely open and hopefully you’ll decide to visit Mobility Now often!

Mobility Now seemed like an appropriate title. Mobility means many things. Certainly a mobile phone, but true mobility means being able to do things, the things you’re used to be doing, but at any location. Being able to do phone calls while on the road is not new. Early cellphones from the 1980s allowed people to talk while on the road. But that was not true mobility. Phones were huge, they were of low quality, and the calls were restricted to analog signals, and often to specific networks. Every year new features were added. First came SMS messages, where phones would now allow people to type and receive messages. Then technology got better, we saw color screens, and additional functions were added such as a calendar, calculator, a better contact book and much more.

At one point, when connections got fast enough and phones powerful enough, the cellphone world and the Internet world connected for the first time, and this was a revolution. No longer was the cellphone user trapped in the closed world of the network provider. With the early browsers, now all the technologies of the Internet started to open up to mobile users, from web browsing, email and much more. At first this was a very painful experience, because suddenly a device meant to do phone calls was being used to render and display web sites, and accept complex input from the user. More powerful technology, even faster networks, and the introduction of the QWERTY keypad was the second revolution. Phones were powerful enough, input was easy enough, and software was advanced enough to bring raise to the smartphone, not only a phone but one that has all the capacities to be expanded and used for brand new things.

Only a few years ago smartphones were making their entry into the world of mobility, and enthusiasts were seeing the birth of true mobility. Companies were started, web sites appeared, and developers multiplied at a breakneck speed to improve and facilitate this brand new world, a world where anything that can be done on a standard computer was now being translated to the mobile space. Now, we’re in the most exciting era of true mobility. Devices are becoming mature, technologies are being deployed and software developers are out there. Almost every week a new breakthrough appears in the domain. From IM (Instant Messaging) clients, new web browsers, VOIP, 3G, push email, the Internet is full of buzzwords, and interesting solutions are available for all simply by searching for them. This is why I decided to create this site. This is where I will chronicle the changing world of mobility.