Sometimes journalists put two and 'x' together to make four, and when they're right, careers are made. This weekend, TechCrunch have tried to make a similar jump and announced that they reckon that "Facebook is Secretly Building A Phone," a claim that Facebook have denied (reported at Mashable and others). With a broader stroke of a brush, I hope the Symbian Foundation is paying attention, because Symbian OS in a short production run of handsets would have made a lot of sense.
Facebook Places has made the jump from 'US Only', to 'UK and US Only', and it’s given us a chance to have a look at the newest location-based game in town. And while it’s a nice first step, the ability to check in on devices and platforms other than the iPhone/iPad is going to be needed for a critical volume of users.
In case you didn't watch the two-plus hour live streaming of the Nokia World 2010 keynotes yesterday, don't worry, for you can watch the best bits at your convenience, below, a special edited version from the Nokia Conversations team. In addition to footage of the main speakers, you also get to see lots of the attendees and their devices - bonus points for picking out any familiar faces! The main speakers featured are Niklas Savander, Anssi Vanjoki and Purnima Kochikar.
Nokia World 2010 starts today and the team is on the ground to bring you live coverage from Nokia's premier event. Over the next two days we'll be bringing you the key news, views and information. This news story contains our live coverage, where you can see the latest images and text updates; you can also interact with the team, asking questions and adding your own thoughts. Alternatively you can keep up to date by following our @aas account on Twitter, where we will be posting text updates and images.
Anssi Vanjoki, Executive Vice President in charge of Mobile Solutions (Symbian and MeeGo devices) and a member of the Nokia Group Executive Board, has resigned. He will work out his six month notice period, will continue in his current tasks for the time being and will be attending Nokia World. Coming just days after the appointment of Stephen Elop as the new CEO of Nokia, it seems very likely that Vanjoki was one of the internal candidates passed over for the job, consequently he has decided to move on.
Having seen All About Symbian get a serious freshening up this week (design, discussions, structure, etc.), today sees The Phones Show also getting the spring clean treatment... in err....the autumn! As of Phones Show 120, released today, the show is 720p HD - and yes, it's still all filmed on phones. In this case the Samsung i8910, but it's appropriate that show 120 covers my verdict on the top 5 720p-shooting smartphones. You might recognise the no. 1 in the list - and you'll also recognise the E5, the subject of my hands-on video review.
Nokia's Board of Directors has appointed Stephen Elop, currently head of Microsoft's Business division, to replace Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo as CEO of Nokia as of September 21st. As a Canadian, he becomes the first non-Finn to lead the company, reflecting Nokia's increasingly global management and work force. The market is responding positively to the news, with Nokia shares up 5% in early trading.
The Nokia N8, the first first Symbian^3 device, is now available for pre-order in Nokia's UK web store. It is priced at £429 SIM-free, with availability scheduled for the end of September. The store is also offering the N8 for free on a £35 18 month contract (Vodafone, T-Mobile and O2). The UK is a key market for Nokia and is expected to be one of the very first countries to get the N8, which is, perhaps, reflected in the pricing being at the upper end of expectations.
One of the things that first aiders are taught is triage – the initial assessment of patients to work out which ones have a genuine problem and need to be looked at as soon as possible; and which ones are shouting loudly because they’ve broken a nail. In the online noise of social media and blogging, that triage skill is just as vital, because the companies making the loudest noises aren’t always telling the whole story.
The Symbian Blog have published an interview with the Klomptek, the developers of Track and Protect. The interview covers the background history of the company, but also gives an insight into the development process and some unusual use cases. The latest version of Track and Protect, 2.08, which was released last week, improves the registration process, adds support for the Nokia N8 (one of the first third party applications to be fully optimised for the new device) and has additional language support.
We’ve been following the Giff Gaff story at All About Symbian with interest since this community supported virtual network launched last year, and they’ve recently announced some price changes suggested and supported by their users. Read on for more information.
EchoEcho is a new cross-platform "where are you?" application and service, using SMS as its communications medium, to ensure compatibility with most phones. Reviewing it seemed like a job for Ewan Spence and he dived into with glee. Although he reckons it's "an answer in search of a question", both of us reckon it has potential. Comments welcome, no matter if you think it's a slice of genius or a complete dud!
There is a great rant over on Mobile Fanatics, about battery life in mobile devices. The author makes the case that poor battery life is down to lack of optimisation by developers, citing Android as the worst offender. Furthermore, he blames mobile platforms being based on the Unix/POSIX/Linux family of operating systems, stating that these systems were never planned to have been run on mobile platforms where energy is at a premium. Read on for commentary.
In All About Symbian Insight 134, we start with news of new, community created Samsung i8910 firmware, which leads to a discussion of Samsung's mobile platform choices. Rafe discusses the Ovi Files closure and talks about how the thinking behind Nokia's Ovi service strategy has evolved. David shares his PixelPipe Send and Share experiences, before bringing news of UK operator Orange's HD Voice service. Ewan talks about Swype, an alternative text input entry system, which is now available in beta. Finally, Steve gives his first opinion on the Nokia E5.
