The Nokia Messaging Service, announced this morning at Nokia World in Barcelona, will open up popular email and instant messaging services and make them easily accessible both on your handset and via the Ovi web site. The on-device version of the Mail on Ovi service is due to go into beta before the end of 2008, with the web based version to follow in early 2009. Update; now with added YouTube demo video.
Store Number 12 for the Nokia Music service has gone live, and it's a first for the Middle East as the Finns bring their store to the United Arab Emirates (reports Marktoob Business). Alongside the Big 4 music labels of Universal, Sony BMG, Warners and EMI will be regional publisher Rotana and content aggregator Qanawat.
Nokia's NW 2008 home page is filling out nicely, with video slots, a live video feed and a discussion board. Most intriguingly, the 'Countdown' link is attached a panel branded 'Nseries 2009' - surely this means that there's an Nseries device about to be launched? I was half expecting something in the Eseries line, but maybe Nokia is about to surprise everybody! Am I reading too much into this?
No, that's not a misprint for 5mp (i.e. 5 megapixels), it's SMP - Symmetric Multiprocessing. You may remember that Nokia's flagships, the N95 and N82, both have dual CPUs? This didn't really have as much effect on performance as their (also unique) graphics acceleration, but every little helps. However, SMP seems to be a technology that will make a bigger difference in the future, according to an interesting interview with Symbian's Jason Parker, over at SymbianOne.
Carnival of the Mobilists 152 is over at another of my stomping grounds, All About iPhone (no relation!). Leading off with a few homegrown AAS pieces, there are also some thought provoking items from other Carnival newcomers and regulars.
As usual for such events, there are a number of online resources with which to follow Nokia World 2008. The main landing page links to a Tangler discussion group, plus there's a link to any press releases and live video will appear from 8.15am (GMT / UTC) on Tuesday. If you need reminding to 'tune in', there's even a countdown timer and automated email system. Rafe will be reporting live from Barcelona - watch this space.
Dennis Bournique has done a great job here of writing a full critical review of the new Skyfire browser for S60. It seems that, despite still being in beta, it's the best for viewing web video, but that there are still some day to day usability problems that need addressing.
If you're a Python tinkerer like me then you'll be interested in a summary post over at Forum Nokia by Daniel Crocha, talking about possible reasons why Python for S60 doesn't often make for easy development of full, commercial (read polished) applications. He also links to a possible solution for making building all-in SIS install files easier.
Nokia will be demonstrating their Home Control Centre at the upcoming Nokia World event (which All About Symbian will be attending). Geared towards networking your home services and equipment so they can be controlled by a PC or smartphone, either locally or remotely. It is expected to be commercially available in the second half of 2009.
Good to see some response from Nokia's Friend View team, fielding questions about map caching, lack of Nokia Maps compatibility and GPS/battery efficiency. Sounds like they're serious about this particular Beta Labs project after all...
The new edition of Greenpeace's Greener Electronics Guide has ranked major electronics manufacturers according to environmental friendliness, and Nokia has remained the clear leader scoring 6.9 out of 10. Fellow Symbian manufacturers Samsung and Sony Ericsson were both in second place with 5.9 out of 10, but most companies didn't fare so well (Nintendo is by far the worst with just 0.8 out of 10).
Our friends at Mobile Industry Review our holding a Christmas draw /raffle in aid of two charities: Childline and the UN Foundation. There are a number of prizes on offer including two Nokia 6650s, a netbook computer, various feature phones and a number of accessories. It's a great chance to get yourself an early Christmas present. The full details are available on the MIR website.
Tucked away on Nokia's press release page is the announcement of the 6260 Slide, a non-smart phone based on the latest 6th Edition version of their proprietary Series 40 platform. What's remarkable though are the 6260's tech specs: 480x320 screen resolution, WebKit web browser (same engine as S60 and Safari), 5 megapixel Carl Zeiss autofocus camera, built-in GPS, Wi-Fi and tri-band 3.5G HSDPA/HSUPA. Would the average phone buyer really see any difference between this and an S60 device when they're deciding what to buy?
Nokia's supposed Sports Tracker replacement, viNe, is now available to all, it seems. It geotags photos and videos and lets you plot them later on the viNe web site. More on this later, I suspect. What do you think of Nokia viNe? The jury's still out chez Litchfield.... (via CJ)
Tim O'Reilly has posted some interesting thoughts on the use of voice in the mobile interface, sparked by Google's recent voice powered search application for the iPhone. His first idea, that an easily accessible and usable mobile device will put people closer to 'the cloud' is one worth thinking of, especially when you consider how much faster accessing your online data would be when using speech recognition.
