Until now, commercial software has generally been based around the traditional business model of selling a product directly to the user. Piracy is seen as a threat to direct sales, and many commercial publishers have responded to this with various kinds of DRM, but are there alternatives to the model which could make piracy irrelevant? Tzer2 takes a look at some candidates...
Steve Litchfield reports back from a week of family holidays, enlightened by plenty of chances to learn more about using a smartphone productively. Seven days away and seven things learnt! Steve ranges from network connectivity and practicalities of GPS to the terrors of sand.
Nokia has extended the deadline for entries to its Mobile Games Innovation Challenge to the 8th of September. The contest is looking for innovative game concepts (actual code isn't required) for S60, Java or N-Gage, with the top 3 concepts getting money and contracts to actually create the games. The concept can take the form of text, mockup images and optionally video too. It's only open to professional development companies though, private individuals cannot enter.
Bloglines, a popular web-baed feed reader, has been experimenting with a new mobile interface (v3). If you want to try it, bookmark m.beta.bloglines.com/feedtree in Web on your phone. Changes are 'favicons' in the feeds list, a 'pin' system for marking things for later attention, auto-marking-read and breaking up long lists of uread items within a feed into manageable chunks.
In a further sign of consolidation in the wireless semiconductor industry Ericsson and STMicroelectronics have agreed to merge Ericsson Mobile Platforms and ST-NXP Wireless divisions respectively to create a 50/50 joint venture. The new venture should be in a better position to compete with Qualcomm and Texas Instruments and may help drive lower chip costs.
Continuing Steve's series of 'S60 Mac virgin' walkthroughs, he tackles the thorny subject of video, both transferring it to the phone and doing useful editing on footage from the phone. Do any of the Mac video solutions play better with Nseries MP4 video files than the current crop of PC editors? In previous parts, he connected up and synced via Bluetooth, and he transferred media and bookmarks using the USB cable.
When goods are virtually free, why do people pirate software? Developer Cliff Harris took the simple step on his blog... to ask the pirates why they weren't buying his titles. While the Positech titles in question are for the desktop, the principles should apply to mobile games as well.
Two bits of news from RMR Software - if anyone's still using an older Series 80-based Communicator then note that all RMR's software is now reduced by between 45% and 70%. Also, more 'cutting edge' is that RMR has put together what's possibly the first real Style Tap-based app for S60 (i.e. Palm OS app running within Symbian OS). More on this below the break.
Nokia currently has three platforms in development simultaneously, for their smartphones (S60), normal phones (Series 40) and internet tablets (Maemo). They all have their good and bad points, but in this feature krisse looks at how S60 could learn from its two sister-platforms. We would like to hear what you think S60 can learn from Series 40 and Maemo in the comment thread.
Steve has been thinking about the lure of Apple's iPhone to normal users. In this editorial he looks at screens and compares Apple's technology with that found in the N95 8GB. How important, for the average consumer, are screens in the all-important first impression period?
In All About Symbian Insight #36 (AAS Podcast #89) Rafe, and Steve chat about the web as a platform for services and follow on with a discussion on whether Nokia should make its services available on competing hardware. There's also a debate on the relative merits of the N78 and N82 for those looking to make a purchase decision.
Canalys have crunched the numbers and produced some definitive smartphone sales stats for Q2 for EMEA (Europe, Middle East, Africa). Always interesting reading, the highlights this time are that 38% of devices had built-in GPS, 58% had built-in Wi-Fi and 13% had touch-screens. Nokia shipped almost 9 million smartphones in this region alone, with 71% market share - 7% is the share of RIM and HTC, more or less in joint second place. Apple are lumped in with others, but may prove a contender in the future, of course.
Ewan watched Reset Generation's creator at the Edinburgh Interactive Festival and then sat down in a cosy corner to interview him - it turns out that RG is the tip of the iceberg - Scott Foe has a vision where every game will work (and generate income) on every static or mobile device, using piracy as the main means of distribution. Radical stuff.
Do you use Google's chat and sharing site 'orkut'? If that's you and you have a S60 phone then there's a shiny new S60-optimised mobile site at http://m.orkut.com. From Google: "We have added a bunch of new features, including photo uploads, picture galleries, click-to-call and quick friend searches." Screenshots below.
Media sharers on Ovi might like to note that there's a whole new Share on Ovi home page, with much more functionality, plus SMS support and a chance to preview a new Share on Ovi Facebook application. Details below.
