Posts Tagged ‘Google’

Nokia purchases Plazes, a location-based social networking service

by Daniel Langendorf

June 23rd, 2008 | Posted in Comms, Mobile | Comments1 Comment

plazes logoBuried in Bob Iannucci’s discussion at Supernova 2008 last week was this comment: “Connecting people only through voice communications is limited,” the Nokia chief technical officer said.

To me, that sums up everything Nokia is doing, including today’s announcement. Nokia, the world’s largest handset manufacturer, is purchasing Plazes, the location-based social networking service that’s based in Berlin with all of 13 employees.

Plazes, founded in 2005, lets people alert their friends about what they are doing and where they are — sort of Twitter and Loopt rolled into one. Users can subscribe to their friends, a group of friends, or to specific locations known as “Plazes.”

Updates can be done via plazes.com, by mobile phone and text messaging, or by a number of third-party applications using the Plazes’ API. And, we can expect, Plazes will be on millions of Nokia phones worldwide as soon as possible.

nokia logo“Nokia is a perfect partner for us because they share our product vision and have the muscle to bring locative presence to hundreds of millions of people all over the world,” the Plazes team writes on its blog. “What better partner than Nokia for exploring innovative ways of connecting people?”

With Plazes and other recent acquisitions, Nokia is clearly connecting people through location-based services, maps, music communities, gaming, and — almost forgot — voice.

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No surprise, Gphone reportedly delayed

by Steve O'Hear

June 23rd, 2008 | Posted in Mobile | Comments1 Comment

According to the Wall Street Journal, mobile phones powered by the Google-led Android platform – the so-called GPhone – are unlikely to see the light of day until the fourth quarter of this year at the earliest or, more likely, early next year. Perhaps not all that surprising considering that Google elected not to build its own hardware, and instead is working with over 30 partners to bring Android-based handsets to market.

The reasons given for the delay are plenty:

  • The operating system is still a ‘work in progress’, with the various partners continually lobbying for additional features. “This is where the pain happens,” says Android chief Andy Rubin.
  • Carriers need time to customize Android with their own branded services and User Interface, rather than sticking with Google’s own suite of applications.
  • At the same time, developers are complaining that it’s difficult to write for Android since Google has yet to lock down its own development.
  • China Mobile is said to be having trouble translating the Android software from Roman characters into Chinese.
  • Additionally, it’s claimed that, in a push to help T-Mobile deliver on its promise of getting an Android-powered phone out the door before the year is up, Google has been unable to provide the needed resources to competing networks.

All of the above paints a pretty bumpy road ahead for the GPhone, at least in the short term.

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@Supernova: Evidence developers are just as interested in Blackberry as they are iPhone, Android

by Daniel Langendorf

June 18th, 2008 | Posted in Comms, Mobile | CommentsNo Comments

While the Supernova conference is mostly about the future of the network, a part of that network is mobile. And if you listen to most attendees, the two most important mobile players right now are Apple and the iPhone and Google and Android.

Oddly, it’s as if two other established players — Nokia and Research in Motion — have been relegated to the sideline as also-rans. One conference attendee even asked during a discussion about the future of mobile, “Is Blackberry dead?”

Hardly.

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Interview: zintin CEO talks iPhone, Android and mobile future

by Steve O'Hear

June 6th, 2008 | Posted in Mobile | Comments2 Comments

Interview: Zintin CEO talks iPhone, Android and mobile future“Smartphones have historically been oriented towards business users. The iPhone is more of an entertainment platform”, notes John Jersin, CEO of mobile startup zintin. “Its not that there won’t be serious business applications on the iPhone, but the apps will have exposure to a different audience, and developers are very aware of that fact”, he says.

The brainchild of three Stanford computer science graduates, Silicon Valley-based zintin, like hundreds of other new startups, is exploring the new Internet frontier: Mobile. Described as a mix of social networking, media sharing and location awareness, zintin will debut first on the iPhone later this summer, while at the same time the company has already began porting the application to Android, Google’s open-source mobile operating system.

In an email exchange with last100, Jersin talked about the opportunities for developers that both iPhone and Android represent, how the two platforms differ in their approach to openness, and what the mobile landscape may look like in 12-18 months time.

Excerpts from our Q&A edited for space and clarity, follow after the jump…

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Will Apple develop MobileMe as my own personal cloud?

by Daniel Langendorf

June 4th, 2008 | Posted in Other | Comments1 Comment

dot mac logo smA lot is being made of cloud computing these days, especially in light of Microsoft’s Mesh initiative and the various online products and strategies cooked up by Google.

With the rumored changes coming to Apple’s .Mac product, could a revamped MobileMe or Me.com — whatever it is ultimately called — eventually become my personal cloud?

I hope so. My digital life needs one, whether supplied by Microsoft, Google, or Apple, it doesn’t matter.

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Android, it's the browser stupid

by Steve O'Hear

June 1st, 2008 | Posted in Mobile | Comments2 Comments

Android at a crossroadsIt’s hard not to be impressed by the latest demonstration of Android, Google’s soon-to-be-released open-source mobile OS. While my colleague Dan Langendorf is reserving judgment until a killer application and real handsets emerge, I’m already sold on Android’s User Interface, which looks to have borrowed just enough from Apple’s iPhone, as well as some of the design Zen of the original Palm OS, to more than satisfy my needs.

Of course, the biggest promise of Android isn’t its UI but its openness, and it’s here where comparisons to the iPhone are also inevitable. On the one hand Google wants us to believe that Android isn’t a direct response to Apple’s own offering (which, chronologically, may well be true), but at the same time is keen to remind developers that in contrast to the iPhone they won’t need to get Android applications certified by anyone, nor will there be any hidden APIs (application programming interfaces) accessible only to handset makers or mobile operators — another dig at Apple.

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Google demos Android again; it's full of promise, but we're still waiting for the real deal

by Daniel Langendorf

May 29th, 2008 | Posted in Comms, Mobile | Comments2 Comments

android ioGoogle demonstrated its Android operating system again, this time at the I/O conference in San Francisco. And, well, it’s still full of promise, just in case you were wondering.

As you would expect from the company that brings you search and Google Maps, Android handles information delivery, location and navigation extremely well — or so we think. There’s still no actual Android phones to play with.

The coolest feature shown was a “compass” tool that automatically roams with the phone while a user looks at photos of a city map.

But the rest of what was shown was, well, underwhelming or just plain expected.

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Google prepping more iPhone-native apps

by Steve O'Hear

May 19th, 2008 | Posted in Mobile | Comments4 Comments

Google prepping more iPhone-native appsWith Apple set to roll out the next major software update for the iPhone, and with it official support for third-party applications, it will come as no surprise that Google is busy prepping some new wares. “We expect to have applications at Day One”, Google’s vice president of engineering, Vic Gundotra, tells Macworld.

Even before the publicly available Software Development Kit (SDK) announced in March, Google had partnered with Apple to produce two of the iPhone’s flagship applications: Google Maps and a native YouTube client.

So what can we expect next from Google? While Gundotra didn’t give many clues, he did say that the company is eager to take advantage of native access to Apple’s device.

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Mobile OS wars heat up as Verizon joins LiMo Foundation, a Google-Android rival

by Daniel Langendorf

May 14th, 2008 | Posted in Comms, Mobile | Comments1 Comment

VerizonHere’s an interesting jab at Google and its mobile operating system Android: Verizon, the No. 2 U.S. carrier, is joining the LiMo Foundation because it has software and phones available, Google does not.

LiMo FoundationThe LiMo Foundation, representing Linux Mobile, is the lesser known of the mobile operating systems. There’s Microsoft’s Windows Mobile, supplying many makers of smart phones; Symbian, supplier mostly to Nokia; Qualcomm, supplier mostly to Verizon; upstart Google, and Apple. Then there’s Linux Mobile, slowly creeping along by adding devices mostly in Europe and Asia.

The LiMo (Linux Mobile) Foundation is a consortium of companies well vested in the mobile industry: Motorola, Samsung, LG Electronics, Vodaphone, NTT DoCoMo, and many others. Verizon is the first U.S. carrier to join the LiMo initiative, which now has 40 members worldwide.

The idea behind LiMo is to build a standardized, Linux-based mobile platform, which members can customize to meet their needs. For the most part, Linux Mobile is a competitor to Android, which is not yet available on any handsets. Linux Mobile is showing up on phones from Motorola, NEC, Panasonic, Samsung, and LG.

Kyle Malady, vice president of network for Verizon, said in a conference call today that he expects Verizon to sell both regular devices and smart phones using mobile Linux next year.

“We expect that Linux Mobile will rapidly become our preferred operating system,” Malady said to The Associated Press [via The New York Times] . “As the development community looks at how best to bring new applications to the marketplace, they should check out LiMo and Linux Mobile first.”

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It's like Christmas in July: Google announces winners of Android Developers Challenge

by Daniel Langendorf

May 13th, 2008 | Posted in Mobile | Comments1 Comment

androidscannerSeeing the results of the Google Android Developer Challenge today was like being told what you’re getting for Christmas … in July. Worse yet, what’s under the tree is mostly socks and underwear.

Google announced the 50 round-one winners in the worldwide search for the best Android-developed applications. For using Google’s open-source mobile operating system, each winner will receive $25,000 to further fund their apps.

Also see: Android Developer Challenge I Winners Announced: Our Picks (ReadWriteWeb)

For a list of the winners, you can go to several places on the Web:

It’s not that the winners are unworthy and their applications unimaginative and useless. Quite to the contrary. These point to the future of mobile applications.

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