Mobilious

JESS3 / The State of The Internet from Jesse Thomas on Vimeo.

“Now that rumors of an Apple tablet have manifested themselves in the iPad, speculation about the next iteration of the iPhone can begin in earnest. In a research note published today, Morgan Stanley (MS) analyst Katy Huberty offers a few thoughts on what a successor to the iPhone 3GS might look like.

“We expect Apple to launch new iPhones in June that offer both a lower total cost of ownership and new functionality, potentially including gesture-based technology,” she wrote in a note to clients today. “As we’ve highlighted in the past, the cost of device + service plan is currently the biggest barrier to incremental demand in both mature markets like the US and emerging markets like China.”

Now, when Apple (AAPL) introduced the 3GS in 2009, it dropped the price of the iPhone 3G to $99, so it seems reasonable to expect the company to follow a similar pattern when it introduces a new iPhone. Might the price of the new device itself also be lower than expected? Perhaps. Certainly the fact that Apple was able to bring the iPad to market at $499 suggests it’s possible.

More intriguing than these ruminations on price, however, is Huberty’s mention of new “gesture-based technology.” The analyst doesn’t offer any details on what this might be, but presumably she’s referring to advances disclosed in some recent Apple patent filings.

Among the possibilities here: A touch-sensitive bezel that would turn the outer edges of the device into intelligent “sense lines” that give users quick and easy access to their favorite applications, and some camera-based swipe controls that offer one-handed control over a variety of iPhone functions.”…

Source

Click for the link for a description of the latter from Patently Apple

If you haven’t already watched a demo video on Google’s Nexus One; which also compares it with Apple’s iPhone; here is a very useful Gadget Video Review! Enjoy!

Click to learn more about the gentleman in the video

Click to visit his website

With the latest update on Facebook for iPhone Application; now you can see new incoming facebook messages as a notification on your screen!

And there is more; you can also sync your facebook contacts with your contacts on your iphone! So all you have to do is go to your App Store on your iPhone; download the update & enjoy!

News Pick ::: “Facebook for iPhone just received an update that contains one of the most sought after missing features, push notifications. It has been a long time coming as most of us hoped for this feature when Facebook 3.0 was released. The only other difference noted in 3.1 is very Android-like, the ability to sync your friends with your address book.”

Source

First heard it from my dear friend www.burak.com

“Large flat-screen TVs were all the rage at the Consumer Electronics Show, but companies like Microvision Inc are putting their bets on image viewing of a much smaller scale: projections from devices as tiny as cellphones.

Microvision showed off a stand-alone projector that looked like a big bar of soap and projected crisp video images using laser technology. Its big hope is to embed the technology in a range of consumer electronics including cameras and phones.

“My feeling is that ultimately the phone is the largest opportunity,” Microvision’s director of communications Matt Nichols said, adding that his company was talking to dozens of potential customers including phone makers.

Nichols sees the first prototypes of gadgets with embedded Microvision pico projectors later this year, and expects the first commercial products some time next year.

After that, he expects the market to explode — in the same way that cameras have quickly become a must-have component in cellphones…”

Source

Website

“The strategic acquisition officially made Apple a mobile advertising player, putting the Californian gadget maker on a collision course with Google.

Apple has acquired the Waltham, Massachusetts-based mobile advertising firm Quattro Wireless for a cool $275 million. The official news came via a note on Quattro’s website early Tuesday, following an exclusive Monday report by the Wall Street Journal’s All Things Digital. As a result of this acquisition, Quattro’s CEO Andy Miller has been named the vice president of Mobile Advertising at Apple.

Venture-backed Quattro Wireless runs the mobile advertising network that includes mobile applications coming from a wide variety of mobile platforms, including iPhone OS and Android programs. Miller wrote the following in a note on Quattro’s website:

Happy New Year from Quattro Wireless!

Apple“

Source

Click to visit Quattro’s Website

Click to read the Opinion Column of Gary Schwartz: Google buys AdMob and Apple takes Quattro bite. Now what?

Hi Mobilious Executives,

Today, whole Mobile World is talking about one thing and one thing only; GOOGLE’s SmartPhone!

Today GOOGLE officially entered the smartphone market wars with the launch of its new smartphone, the NEXUS ONE! With this new gadget; they are aiming to challenge the supremacy of Apple’s iPhone. And going one step further; they will be offering consumers a new way to purchase their mobiles with a webstore to sell it directly to consumers.

Before going to tech specs; here are the Official Link for you to demo it yourself:

NEXUS One; Web Meets Phone!

Size and weight
Height
119mm
Width
59.8mm
Depth
11.5mm
Weight
130 grams w/battery
100g w/o battery

Display
3.7-inch (diagonal) widescreen WVGA AMOLED touchscreen
800 x 480 pixels
100,000:1 typical contrast ratio
1ms typical response rate

Camera & Flash
5 megapixels
Autofocus from 6cm to infinity
2X digital zoom
LED flash
User can include location of photos from phone’s AGPS receiver
Video captured at 720×480 pixels at 20 frames per second or higher, depending on lighting conditions

Cellular & Wireless
UMTS Band 1/4/8 (2100/AWS/900)
HSDPA 7.2Mbps
HSUPA 2Mbps
GSM/EDGE (850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz)
Wi-Fi (802.11b/g/n)
Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR
A2DP stereo Bluetooth

Power and battery
Removable 1400 mAH battery
Charges at 480mA from USB, at 980mA from supplied charger
Talk time
Up to 10 hours on 2G
Up to 7 hours on 3G
Standby time
Up to 290 hours on 2G Up to 250 hours on 3G
Internet use
Up to 5 hours on 3G
Up to 6.5 hours on Wi-Fi
Video playback
Up to 7 hours
Audio playback
Up to 20 hours

Processor
Qualcomm QSD 8250 1 GHz

Operating system
Android Mobile Technology Platform 2.1 (Eclair)

Capacity
512MB Flash
512MB RAM
4GB Micro SD Card (Expandable to 32 GB)

Location
Assisted global positioning system (AGPS) receiver
Cell tower and Wi-Fi positioning
Digital compass
Accelerometer

“The Apple tablet is threatening to approach Yeti status, but here’s an indication that it will turn out to be real: The company has told some of its key developers to prepare versions of their iPhone apps that will work on a device with a larger screen, in time for an event next month.

Add this to the news that Apple has reportedly booked the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts in San Francisco “for several days in late January,” according to the Financial Times, and it’s pretty easy to connect the dots: It’s a very good bet we’re getting a look at this thing within the next 30 days or so.

A mobile industry source tells me developers have been told that while the mystery device will be shown off at the event, it won’t be ready to ship (Dan Frommer at Alley Insider relays the same news).

Announcing a product before launch used to be unusual for Apple (AAPL), but it’s a pattern the company has practiced more recently, notably with the first iPhone. And if Apple is indeed coming out with a new product that will require developers to rethink their approach, it makes a lot of sense.

I’ve asked Apple for comment, but I’m not holding my breath.

My source says Apple’s instructions to developers indicate that the tablet–or at least the thing the company is showing off next month–will be based on the iPhone OS and rely on the same iTunes Store that has moved two billion apps in a couple of years.

If so, it will mean that some people who have been guessing at what Apple is planning may need to go back to the drawing board.

Magazine publisher Condé Nast, for instance, has been working on a digitized version of Wired magazine that would run on Adobe (ADBE) software. But the iPhone’s OS doesn’t work with Adobe’s Flash platform, and if that holds true here, Condé Nast (and Adobe) is going to have to think of something else. Same goes for many Web video distributors who rely on Flash.

But first things first. Let’s take a look at this thing, whatever it is, and see what it actually can and cannot do before we get too far ahead of ourselves….”

This news was picked from AllThingsD.com

“Twitter creator Jack Dorsey Wednesday gave the first public demonstration of his hotly-anticipated latest venture — a device to allow credit card payments by cell phone — and revealed it would be given away for free.

Details of “Square” — a card reader which plugs into the headphone socket of most mobile devices — have been circulating on the Internet since it was announced earlier this month, but little has been known about how it works or who it was aimed at.

However, Dorsey — whose microblogging Web site has proved hugely popular but not hugely profitable since launching in March 2006 — gave no explanation on how he would make money from his new creation, beyond revealing there would be a per-transaction charity donation.

Square, a tiny cube about an inch in length, contains a magnetic strip reader that allows users to swipe and read credit cards, then deduct payment on or offline through a downloaded application that communicates with card issuers in the same way as retailer devices.

Customers then use their finger on the phone’s touch-recognition screen to sign their name to the transaction.

Dorsey, Twitter’s co-founder and chairman, says the device, scheduled for launch on iPhones and iPods in March 2010, was inspired partly by the “immediacy, approachability and transparency” of Twitter and by the global economic crisis which has exposed a need for a radical rethink of the financial sector.”

Source

“GOOGLE search is getting eyes and ears, moving beyond typed key words to let people scour the internet with mobile telephone cameras or spoken words in multiple languages.

Google has unveiled “Goggles” software that lets people search online using pictures taken with cameras in mobile phones based on its Android operating system.

“When you take a mobile phone camera and connect it to the internet, it becomes an eye,” said Vic Gundotra, Google mobile search vice president of engineering, during a demonstration in Mountain View, California.

“Google Goggles lets you take a picture of an item and use the picture as the query.”

An experimental version of Goggles will be available for people at the Google Labs website. Goggles already recognises books, wine labels, CD covers, landmarks and more, according to Mr Gundotra.

He demonstrated by taking a picture of a wine bottle label with a smartphone and almost instantly getting reviews, pictures and other internet data about the vintage in a Google search results web page…”

Click to read more

“Cornell University led by electrical and computer engineering professor Sheila Hemani, has developed prototype devices and is testing them with about 25 American Sign Language (ASL) speakers in the Seattle area.

From the press release:
“We completely take cell phones for granted,” said Sheila Hemami… “Deaf people can text, but if texting were so fabulous, cell phones would never develop. There is a reason that we like to use our cell phones. People prefer to talk.” The technology, Hemami continued, is about much more than convenience. It allows deaf people “untethered communication in their native language” – exactly the same connectivity available to hearing people, she said.

The challenge was to make the phone’s video process enough frames per second for test subjects to have conversations in real-time, despite low bandwidth, while not draining the phone’s battery.

Now the researchers are working to make the phones “as user friendly as possible,” while reducing the cost of integrating mobile ASL software into the devices.”

Source

Imagine the Possibilities!

“The human eye is a perceptual powerhouse. It can see millions of colors, adjust easily to shifting light conditions, and transmit information to the brain at a rate exceeding that of a high-speed Internet connection.

But why stop there?

In the Terminator movies, Arnold Schwarzenegger’s character sees the world with data superimposed on his visual field—virtual captions that enhance the cyborg’s scan of a scene. In stories by the science fiction author Vernor Vinge, characters rely on electronic contact lenses, rather than smartphones or brain implants, for seamless access to information that appears right before their eyes.

These visions (if I may) might seem far-fetched, but a contact lens with simple built-in electronics is already within reach; in fact, my students and I are already producing such devices in small numbers in my laboratory at the University of Washington, in Seattle [see sidebar, "A Twinkle in the Eye"]. These lenses don’t give us the vision of an eagle or the benefit of running subtitles on our surroundings yet. But we have built a lens with one LED, which we’ve powered wirelessly with RF. What we’ve done so far barely hints at what will soon be possible with this technology.”

Click to read more

And here is an interview with the guy behind the scenes:

“An adult app marketplace for smartphone users has opened up shop online, exploiting the open architecture of a new generation of mobile phone handsets.

MiKandi, which claims to be the world’s first adult app store, is only currently servicing devices using Google’s Android operating system, but says the wares in its marketplace will be available on other devices soon.

Unlikely to figure among these, though, is Apple’s popular iPhone platform. The company keeps a tight rein on all applications, and does not distribute adult content through its iTunes store, meaning many users resort to “jailbreaking” their iPhones so they can download non-Apple-approved content.

In spite of its strict approval process, one app that did slip by the iTunes censors was the “passion” app that uses the phone’s built-in accelerometer, microphone and timer to rate a user’s sexual performance. High scores can even be uploaded and compared with those of other iPhone users around the world.

The MiKandi market will work in a similar way to the Android app store in that developers will submit their own free and paid apps for others to download without the approval process required from proprietary systems, but it will not be hosted within Google’s own Android market.

Instead it is offered as a free download to an Android web browser for users aged 18 years or older.”

Source

Only recently, we had a blog post on where the print media is heading

And here, we discover one of recent executions

“Last month, we learned that Esquire was once again going experimental, this time with its December issue featuring augmented reality. The issue is now available, and readers that have it can head to Esquire’s website to check out the special augmented reality features.

In addition to featuring an AR cover, where Robert Downey Jr. introduces you to the issue (and throws in a pitch for his upcoming movie Sherlock Holmes), there are several pieces of bonus content that can be accessed and controlled on Esquire’s website by downloading an app and pointing the AR marker at your webcam…”

“The debate over Droid v. iPhone rages on, but lots more Android surprises are on the way. Get ready for the Google Phone. It’s no longer a myth, it’s real.

The next “super” Android device will almost certainly be a HTC phone that’s much thinner than even the Droid or iPhone – The Dragon/Passion. This is the phone the senior Android guys at Google are now carrying around and testing, at least as of a couple of weeks ago. If you’re willing to give up the Droid’s keyboard, the Dragon/Passion is going to be a really cool phone. It should be fully available very soon.

But it isn’t the Google Phone. Everything up until now has just been a warm up to the Google Phone.

Way more interesting are the rumors we’ve been hearing for months about a pure Google-branded phone. Most of our sources have unconfirmed information, which we describe below. But there are a few things we have absolutely confirmed: Google is building their own branded phone that they’ll sell directly and through retailers. They were long planning to have the phone be available by the holidays, but it has now slipped to early 2010. The phone will be produced by a major phone manufacturer but will only have Google branding (Microsoft did the same thing with their first Zunes, which were built by Toshiba).

There won’t be any negotiation or compromise over the phone’s design of features – Google is dictating every last piece of it. No splintering of the Android OS that makes some applications unusable. Like the iPhone for Apple, this phone will be Google’s pure vision of what a phone should be.

That’s it for confirmed, super-high confidence information, which frankly isn’t a whole lot more than we all heard back in late October. But we also have a few more details as well that we’ve gathered from a number of sources. Everything that follows we still consider to be just well-sourced rumors:

One source told us that HTC, a Taiwanese company, is building the new Google phone, but we think that information is incorrect. We have some fairly good information that suggests Google is working with a Korean phone manufacturer on the Google phone – LG or Samsung (we mentioned this on CrunchGear earlier this week). Samsung has multiple parts in the iPhone and could be pressured by Apple not to work with Google, which says LG is the more likely partner for Google. So rumors like this one may be much more important than they first appear. But either way, the best information we have right now points directly at Korea as the birthplace of the Google Phone.

We’ve also heard from a good source that Google is planning a big advertising push around the device early next year – like January.”

Source

Note: First image on this post does not reflect the actual design; it is one of the concept designs sign from a UK-based gadget Web site called T3.

Today this news came out:
Condé Nast’s Offering for Apple’s Mystery Tablet: Wired Magazine

It’s important news because when Tablet PCs hit the market (sooner than anybody thinks);

Publishers with Print Media will carry their offering to these tablets and will have an additional channel for ad revenue; A channel more interactive & more engaging…

So when you are reading Vogue on your tablet; you will be able to view that dress you like in different colours; check how it looks with different shoes; fill in a form to enter the competition to win the dress etc. etc…

Here is an example of a new tablet PC that has yet to be released to market.

Today, you can already buy GQ (Gentlemen’s Quarterly) Magazine as an app…

Jem R.

[Not so new news for some of us; futuristic for others. As this is an online execution; I will ask you to use your imagination and think about a bunch of kids playing this game with their mobile phones in a couple of years...
Jem R.]

“The Topps card company is now adding augmented reality features to baseball cards in order to bring the staid (OK, dying) business into the 21st century.

Ar_baseball_cardCombining a camera tracking system, any webcam, and image processing software from Total Immersion, tiny cartoonish 3D versions of players are super-imposed onto the real-world, and seen on your PC. Once they’re ‘alive’ (residing on top of their own card), you can play simple games with them using your keyboard, including one where you can whack at slow-moving baseballs.

The AR technology found in the Topps cards is similar to the one we featured last year from Germany’s Metaio. That one superimposed 3D UFOs onto the real world on top of books, and just like the Topps system, the camera’s frame is used to create a perfectly synchronized image overlay. This allows a kid to move the baseball card around without the virtual player falling off the frame.

As you can see in the video below, the games offer nothing more complex than anything in a basic flash-based web app, but it’s interesting to see little avatars appear on the screen next to people, even if they’re not really there.

To play the games, you have to visit Topps’ ToppsTown website and choose the player in your ‘enhanced card.’ “…

Read more at the: Source

Samsung has launched its own mobile operating system, called bada, which means ocean in Korean. Samsung said bada will be an open and “simple” for developers to build on. Samsung is also using Windows Mobile, Java and Symbian. So far, Samsung doesn’t seem to be urging others to use bada with an alliance like Google’s for Android.

There’s another mobile operating system to add to the mix that includes Windows Relevant Products/Services Mobile, Research in Motion’s BlackBerry, Palm’s webOS, Apple’s iPhone, Symbian and Google’s Android. On Tuesday, Samsung Electronics announced the launch of its own open mobile platform Relevant Products/Services, called bada.

The Korean company said the new OS “enables developers to create applications for millions” of Samsung phones, providing a “rich smartphone experience to a wider range of consumers across the world.”

Limitless Variety

Samsung said it chose the name bada, which means ocean in Korean, to “convey the limitless variety of potential applications which can be created using the new platform.”

The company said the new OS will be an open platform, which presumably refers to the open software development kit and the ability of developers to create applications for devices running on bada. Third-party applications are becoming an increasingly important factor in purchasing decisions, with online markets for thousands of applications for phones using operating systems from Apple, Microsoft Relevant Products/Services, Palm, Android and others.

Samsung emphasized that its new platform will be “simple” for developers to build on, including a “groundbreaking” user interface. The company also said the platform will be easy to integrate so wireless operators can offer “unique and differentiated services” to customers.

In addition to bada, Samsung said its mobile application ecosystem includes the Mobile Innovator program, which gives developers access to the company’s Virtual Device Lab, the Application Seller Site, and the Application Store.

This news was picked from and details continue @ http://www.mobile-tech-today.com/story.xhtml?story_id=023000YN2RNF

Google now has three out of four bases covered

Google Inc. has signed a game-changing agreement to acquire mobile ad network AdMob for $750 million in stock in a move that validates mobile advertising as an effective marketing medium.

Google is hoping that this acquisition will enhance its existing expertise and technology in mobile advertising, while also giving advertisers and publishers more choice in this fast-growing area. The deal will help Google in its efforts to develop more effective tools for creating, serving and analyzing emerging mobile ads formats and expand beyond its traditional focus on search advertising.

…

…Google’s acquisition of AdMob ups the ante on mobile advertising

Founded in 1998 by Stanford Ph.D. students Larry Page and Sergey Brin, Google is a top Web property in all major global markets, albeit largely monetarily successful in its search advertising business. It has recently made mobile an increasing focus of its business.

AdMob, San Mateo, CA, is one of the leading mobile ad networks specializing in banner ads for brands such as adidas, MTV, Land Rover and Toshiba that run on publisher sites such as CBS, AccuWeather, Cellufun, MovieTickets.com, Lonely Planet and Stitcher. These ads run across iPhone sites and applications, as well as those based on Google’s Android platform. Founded in 2006, the 140-employee AdMob won $47 million in funding from investors such as venture capital firms Sequoia Capital and Accel Partners.

AdMob and Google share a common investor in Sequoia Capital, a well-known Silicon Valley eminence.

“We’ve been talking about the awesome opportunity that mobile marketing brings to the world,” said Mike Wehrs, president/CEO of the Mobile Marketing Association, New York. “Some people understand that, and this deal shows that the largest and best-known advertising company—Google—understands the awesomeness of the opportunity, and they understand where this is going.

Google’s rationale
Mobile advertising is a rapidly growing and competitive space, and Google and AdMob are currently specializing in different areas.

Though Google offers many forms of mobile advertising, its focus to date has been on mobile search ads, while AdMob’s focus has been mobile display ads and in-application ads.
Google dubbed AdMob the quintessential Silicon Valley startup and claims that it is generating impressive year-on-year revenue growth.

Both companies have approved the transaction, which is subject to customary closing conditions.
As this ecosystem continues to grow, the company expects these new marketing media to offer significant benefits.

Google believes that advertisers will be better able to engage mobile users with AdMob’s ad formats. The deal will bring new innovation and competition to mobile advertising and will lead to more effective tools for creating, serving and analyzing emerging mobile ad formats, per Google….

This news was picked from and details continue @

“Google has acquired AdMob for $750 million, a huge price for an innovative start-up that has pioneered online ads on mobile and now smart phones.”

See the press release below. But before, here’s a video interview with Omar Hamoui, founder and CEO of AdMob, on all this and more, as well as a tour of company’s offices: (interview starts at 1:50)

“Google to Acquire AdMob

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Google Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG) today announced that it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire AdMob, a mobile display ad technology provider, for $750 million in stock. This acquisition will enhance Google’s existing expertise and technology in mobile advertising, while also giving advertisers and publishers more choice in this growing new area.

“Mobile advertising has enormous potential as a marketing medium and while this industry is still in the early stages of development, AdMob has already made exceptional progress in a very short time,” said Susan Wojcicki, Vice President of Product Management at Google. “AdMob is the quintessential Silicon Valley startup–generating impressive year on year revenue growth–and we’re excited to welcome this talented team to Google.”

“I think people underestimate how important ads have been to funding the development of innovative content on the Internet. Our goal all along at AdMob has been to make it possible for developers and publishers to bring their products and ideas to mobile with the same business model,” said Omar Hamoui, Founder and CEO of AdMob. “We’re proud of the progress we’ve made towards accomplishing this goal, and joining Google will only accelerate this process, ultimately leading to very real benefits for end users around the world. As publishers and developers generate more revenue from their mobile products, they will invest more, and their mobile offerings will become richer, more creative and more robust.”

The deal will help Google in its efforts to develop more effective tools for creating, serving and analyzing emerging mobile ads formats. As this ecosystem continues to grow, the company expects these new marketing media to offer significant benefits:

Advertisers will be better able to engage mobile users with AdMob’s ad formats.

Publishers and developers will be able to monetize their content more effectively, which has benefits for the wider mobile ecosystem

Users will see more relevant ads and ultimately get access to more ad-supported content and applications – improving their mobile experience

“Attracting the world’s top engineering talent and people with entrepreneurial vision to Google has always been crucial to our success. AdMob’s proven track record in innovating at speed will help maintain that culture–which is why we are so excited to be working with them,” added Vic Gundotra, Vice President of Engineering at Google.

Both companies have approved the transaction, which is subject to customary closing conditions.”

This news was picked from and