Some interesting numbers over at the Online Journalism Blog on mobile web uptake in the UK. Looking through the internet section of the latest Ofcom report, they’ve found the significance of mobile access, with 23% of the UK population using a mobile browser to access the web.
Following on from the previous articles in his series looking at the sub £100 smartphone (namely the Symbian powered Nokia 5230 and the Android fuelled ZTE Racer), Ewan here turns his eye to the other major parts of the built in software - namely, PIM apps, music and media. How do the two budget smartphones fare against each other?
Here’s a quick example on how the open nature of Symbian OS and the mechanisms put in place by the Symbian Foundation actually work. Sebastian Brannstorm submitted his request to alter the UI of the app launcher (namely a long tap on an icon would bring up an option to remove/delete the application). That feature has now been prototyped and is likely to make it into handsets. More links below.
29% of developers support Symbian, says Millennial Media, with 100% of them supporting iOS. While that sounds like a bad statistic for Symbian, it’s worth examining the data to conclude that this is healthy for a huge number of mobile operating systems. More below...
Nokia today announced that it plans to acquire Motally Inc., a privately held US company, which provides analytics services for mobile websites and applications. In addition to basic tracking and demographic reporting, Motally's main product offers the ability to track user behaviour within applications.
Here's a common scenario. You've acquired a spare battery for your smartphone, either by buying one on purpose or by inheriting one from another device. Yet, in order to charge each, you've got to power the device down and swap cells, effectively using the phone itself as the charger. If, like me, you juggle more than one phone and more than one battery for each, this can get very tiresome. Enter this latest mains battery charger from Mobile Fun, compatible with nearly every Nokia smartphone battery from the last few years and reviewed right here. Summary? It's a slam dunk.
Nokia Conversations recently ran a poll asking what's more important than battery life? Yesterday, they published their results with the largest segment of users, 38%, voting for the 'Nothing' option. The runner-up choice was Connectivity, with 25% of the vote. Multimedia capabilities took third place with 17% of the vote. Read on for more commentary.
Continuing his budget smartphone review mini-series, which is looking at the £100 ZTE Racer (powered by Android) when compared to Nokia's similarly priced 5230 (Symbian powered), Ewan evaluates the respective device's email and web browsing functionality. He finds that there's balance with plus and minus points on both sides. In part one of the series Ewan compared the relative merits of base hardware specifications of each device.
In All About Symbian Insight 131, we start with new of a firmware update for the 5800 and 5530, which leads to a discussion on firmware change logs. Ewan talks about his recent Android experience, with the ZTE Racer (Rafe chips in with details of the Vodafone 845), which leads to a general discussion of Android in the low end. In the final part of the podcast David continues his C6 briefing, with details of the phone's multimedia capabilities. You can listen to AAS Insight 131 here or, if you wish to subscribe, here's the RSS feed.
In a followup to his previous introduction to this review mini-series, looking at the £100 ZTE Racer (powered by Android) when compared to Nokia's similarly priced 5230, Ewan looks at the base specifications of each. Which comes out on top and do specs even matter in this target market?
In All About Symbian Insight 130, we start with an update on the ongoing Conspiracy for Good transmedia project. David Gilson then talks us through his first impressions of the Nokia C6. Rafe reports back from Nokia's N8 Developer Day in London, including details of the new Ovi Store client, which is expected to debut on the N8. Finally Steve leads a discussion on Q2's mobile device shipment numbers. You can listen to AAS Insight 130 here or, if you wish to subscribe, here's the RSS feed.
For all the talk of N8's, iPhone 4 and Galaxy S smartphones, there's another much more important battle happening. At the low end of the market, cheap footsoldiers such as the Symbian-powered Nokia 5230 are gearing up for a fight with Android devices like the ZTE Racer. Can Android provide as much of a success as S60 5th Edition in the £100-and-under market? And why could it be regarded as the key battleground for market share? Read on for my thoughts...
From AAS's department of the bleedin' obvious come comments from me after looking into data from the last ten years in the Symbian world, looking at screen sizes across a range of form factors and interfaces (including Series 80 and UIQ). Yes, form factors are gradually converging, and yes, screens are getting larger. No real surprise there then, but I thought you might be interested in the charts themselves below...
David Gilson has a theory. It concerns correlating the aspect ratio of a smartphone's virtual or physical qwerty keyboard with text entry speed, on the grounds that one's thumbs have more (or less) work to do, depending on form factor. Read on for his data and the theory in detail - and see if you can help produce more data points with your own device(s).
Nokia's social media outreach initiatives continue apace. Today, from 6 pm (UK time), Niklas Savander, who recently became Nokia's head of sales and marketing, will be answering questions submitted to his Twitter account @NiklasatNokia. The Nokia Conversations Blog has invited everyone to ask any Nokia related questions they may have. Answers will come back via Twitter or via video.
