Categories
Facebook Mobile Mobile Internet

Facebook On A Sim Card

Last week INQ released two smartphones that were facebook oriented. But, now Gemalto has managed to put facebook on to a SIM card. Although no match to the latest generation of smartphones, these SIM devices which were developed in collaboration with facebook allows users to poke, send friend requests and look at statuses of friends. The sim is compatible with any GSM enabled handset. All that the user needs is a GSM SIM toolkit which is of course part of any GSM handset. The toolkit allows one to enable facebook menus, updates and other facebook related basic features.

Gemalto provides security solutions like smart cards, sim cards, e-passports and additional software applications to various enterprises like banks, wireless operators and the Government. So, there is now no need to possess a real smartphone in order to stay connected with friends.

Categories
android Blackberry Gadgets Mobile Mobile Internet Motorola RIM Samsung

Adobe Flash Player 10.2 For Android 3.0

Android’s growing popularity is making everyone design products for the OS now. Adobe is planning to do a mobile compatible flash player for Android 3.0 based tablets. Flash Player 10.2 – the mobile version of the flash will be integrated into the hardware allowing it to decode the video which would save the battery power by a fair margin when compared to the software doing the decoding.

Also, Blackberry devices are also expected to get the Flash Player 10.2. At the moment, the version is being tested intensively on the Motorola Xoom, various other netbooks and the Blackberry PlayBook. As of now, this version of the flash is going to be released for the above mentioned devices, while the other devices have some compatibility issues which will be dealt with accordingly.

Adobe has already mentioned that Android users across the world have downloaded the flash version for their devices 20 million times in the six months after the launch.

Categories
Mobile Mobile Internet Samsung

Samsung's Galaxy Indulge on MetroPCS

The Samsung Galaxy Indulge, the new smartphone from Samsung which supports the latest 4G-LTE feature is being released by Samsung through MetroPCS. This new smartphone would be an extension to Samsung Craft that was released last year. Indulge apparently possesses several multimedia oriented features that is sure to keep its users indulged into it. Along with multimedia, the phone also comes with several other features like oraganisational tools and various entertainments. Despite possessing so many features, the phone runs at lightning speed, thanks to its 1GHz Hummingbird processor. Also, the 4G-LTE service that is going to be provided by MetroPCS is ure to improve the browsing experience of users.

The smartphone which was launched a couple of days ago, runs on Android 2.2, possesses a 3.5 inches HVGA screen, a 3.0 megapixel camera along with the alrerady mentioned Samsung’s Hummingbird processor.

Categories
Mobile Internet Verizon

Verizon Data Speeds To Be Affected

A document posted on Verizon’s website states that the data speeds of customers who browse through heavy loads of data would be brought down. This move by Verizon is to guarantee all the customers a fair and satisfactory speed on their 3G devices. Verizon has also stated that not many customers of theirs would get affected by this, although the ones who have been using data in large quantities are sure to be penalised. The document states the following-

If you use an extraordinary amount of data and fall within the top 5 percent of Verizon Wireless data users we may reduce your data throughput speeds periodically for the remainder of your then current and immediately following billing cycle to ensure high quality network performance for other users at locations and times of peak demand“.

The document although fails to state what is the threshold data at which it is going to penalise the 5 percent customers.

Categories
Blackberry Mobile Mobile Internet RIM

Blackberry Phones To Go Visual With Voicemail

The Mobile World Congress being held in Barcelona from the 14th of February to the 17th will see the launch of the application Visual Voice Mail (VVM) for Blackberry phones. The VVM application is being developed by Communology, a specialist mobile phones’ s application developer. VVM is an app which is being developed for the blackberry phones and can convert the voice into text format on the phone.

VVM comes with a user interface that is visual and allows users to process voicemails into text just with the push of a button. The app also allows users to store the voicemail in text format for as long as the user wishes to just like a text message or an email. Other smartphone users can use the VMM widget that is available online can access the basic functions of VMM.

Categories
Mobile Internet

Mobile Video Revenue Forecast From Subscription & Advertising

Till sometime back, nobody, even the great Google did not have a clue about effectively monetizing online video. The problem compounded with the advent of 3G and the subsequent proliferation of mobile videos. Advertising has always been the last resort for companies looking to monetize their traffic and according to a recent study by eMarketer, nearly one-sixth of mobile video revenues in USA are expected to be from advertisements by 2014. So where does a majority of revenue come from? The study notes that though subscription based models are normally frowned upon, they continue to deliver the most revenues – at least in the case of mobile videos. $413 million of the total $548 million that mobile videos are expected to make this year in the US are from subscriptions alone.

Total Revenues from Mobile Videos – Estimate
2008 : $340.8 million
2009 : $436 million
2010 : $548.3 million
2011 : $719.2 million
2012 : $925.9 million
2013 : $1128.6 million
2014 : $1342.2 million

Revenues from Advertising
2008 : $12.2 million
2009 : $20.0 million
2010 : $35.1 million
2011 : $58.7 million
2012 : $92.6 million
2013 : $142.3 million
2014 : $206.3 million

Revenues from Subscription
2008 : $273.8 million
2009 : $344.3 million
2010 : $413.4 million
2011 : $524.4 million
2012 : $669.1 million
2013 : $786.4 million
2014 : $901.2 million

Categories
Mobile Internet

USA Mobile Phone Ownership By Race/Ethnicity

Pew Internet & American Life Project has published a fresh study that looks into the mobile phone adoption and usage trends among Americans. The study has concluded that non-Hispanics continue to be the race that is least likely to own a mobile phone. Their penetration lies at 80%.

Close to 60% of Americans now use the mobile web. Young adults in the 18-29 age group lead the pack in mobile web usage while the 30-49 group are more likely to use the basic functions like sending text message.

The study measures the mobile phone ownership penetration among adult Americans as follows

Non-Hispanic Blacks : 87%
Non-Hispanic White : 80%
Hispanic : 87%

All adults : 82%

Categories
Mobile Internet

Wireless Broadband Internet Growth In Europe

Gothenberg, Sweden based Berg Institute has published a new report that looks into the wireless broadband internet growth via HSPA & LTE networks in Europe.

According to their study, the European market is growing faster than North American market in terms of wireless broadband. Austria is the country with highest penetration at 15%. Other countries that have 10% or more users accessing internet via wireless networks are Sweden, Denmark, Norway, Ireland and Portugal. On the other hand, Belgium, Netherlands and Greece have less than 3% wireless internet penetration.

Here are some interesting numbers

Total number of wireless broadband internet connections : 25.0 million (end of 2009)
Year-on-Year growth : 71%
Share of wireless broadband internet connections : 17.3%
Estimated number of wireless broadband connections by 2015 : 81 million (CAGR of 21.6%)

Categories
Mobile Internet

Global Mobile TV Revenue Growth Estimate

A recent study published by ABI research claims that the revenues from mobile TV are set to accelerate from 2012. According to this study, the revenues this year have not been substantial – only hovering around the $2.5 billion mark. While the growth in percentage terms is likely to be substantial in the next two years, actual growth in this segment is only likely to happen post-2012.

The ABI research study forecasts that the revenues from mobile TV will reach $20 billion by 2015. Do note that these projections are for a global audience.

Here is the projected growth in revenues

2010 : $2.5 billion
2011 : $3.0 billion
2012 : $7.0 billion
2013 : $10.0 billion
2014 : $15.0 billion
2015 : $20.0 billion

Primary growth in this segment is expected to happen in Japan and South Korea. Lack of free and simulcast national TV programs as a primer for fee-based television content is seen to be a great hindrance in adoption of mobile TV outside these countries.

Categories
Mobile Internet

Mobile Ad Requests : Top US Cities

According to a new report by Millennial media, Android ad requests grew 77% month over month in April, while Apple saw an 8% decline and RIM saw a marginal 3% increase. However, the report points out to an interesting fact that Silicon Valley and San Francisco in general are no where in the top 5 when it comes to mobile web browsing – at least based on the ad-requests metric.

Here are the top five American cities in terms of mobile ad requests

1. Los Angeles
2. Dallas
3. Houston
4. New York
5. Chicago