The website of Alex Kinch, live from London
Posts tagged Feature
Skype launch mobile with 3
Oct 29th
Although not officially unveiled until later today, we’ve got all the details of the new Skype mobile – launched in conjunction with mobile operator 3. Ewan will be at the press launch later, so expect pictures soon!
The 3 Skypephone is a fully-featured 3G Internet phone with Skype built-in. In addition to Skype calls the phone makes conventional calls and can be used to access 3′s broad range of other internet services.
The handset was developed by Skype and 3 in partnership with Qualcomm, using Qualcomm’s BREW platform to enable Skype to work with core handset features such as address book and messaging. It’s got 3G, a 2-megapixel camera, mp3 player, mobile TV and internet access.
According to the information available, it’s a “small and shiny” handset, weighing in at a tiny 86 grams, and comes in black or white, with a blue or pink trim. Standby time is 320 hours, with a talk time of 270 minutes or 170 minutes of video calling. The screen is a 176 x 220 2.0″ QCIF 262K colour display, and the handset itself has 16MB of external memory plus room for up to 1GB of microSD memory card (it comes with a 256M card as standard).
Price-wise, the 3 Skypephone will be available from 3Stores or on the web from 2nd November, at £49.99 on pay-as-you-go or free with a contract. You get free Skype to Skype calls included (as expected) as long as you’re on a contract or you top up your credit monthly.
More news as it comes in..
Serious Fraud Office review GMTV evidence
Oct 19th
In this post (Should GMTV executives be tried for fraud?) we asked how GMTV and Opera had managed to get away with ripping so many millions of pounds off viewers – and not be subject to a criminal investigation.
Apparently a few other people have been wondering that too. The BBC are reporting that the Serious Fraud Office (SFO) are reviewing evidence in the scandal. More news soon..
UPDATE: More here
3 launch mix-and-match tariffs
Oct 1st
Mobile network 3 have “called time on ‘one-size-fits-all’ call plans” today, with the announcement of their new customisable tariff concept.
According to the operator, Mix & Match has been designed to be completely flexible and to appeal to both value seekers and fans of the latest handset. For the first time ever, 1 minute is equivalent to 1 text. There are five options in the new tariff range, from £15 a month for 300 minutes and texts, plus 300 minutes of free 3 to 3 mobile calls, to £27 for 1100 minutes and texts per month. You can add an extra 200 minutes/texts to your plan at any time you want for just £3 a month up to a maximum of 1100 minutes/texts, avoiding any hidden, pricey penalties.
Once you’ve tailored your price plan, you match it to your choice of up to 20 handsets – including the rather in demand Nokia N95. You also get free voicemail, 300 free 3-to-3 minutes (including sister networks abroad), and it costs just 12p a minute to any network outside of your allowance.
On the data side, 3 are chucking in free Windows Live or Yahoo! Messenger services, free Skype calling, and free eBay bidding and buying.
GMTV fined £2m by Ofcom
Sep 26th
Just days after their ex-service provider Opera Telecom was slapped with a £250k fine by premium watchdog ICSTIS, the Government’s broadcast regulator Ofcom have handed out a £2m fine to GMTV for their part in the multi-million pound premium rate scam. More >
Truphone demo world’s first VoIP calls on an iPhone
Sep 26th
![VoIP on an iPhone [photo courtesy of Blognation]](http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1065/1442478012_5a772a2875_m.jpg "VoIP on an iPhone [photo courtesy of Blognation]")
Link: blognation USA » Blog Archive » BN Exclusive: TruPhone to Launch VoIP Client on iPhone
Blognation are reporting they’ve witnessed the first ever VoIP phone calls made from an Apple iPhone, courtesy of mobile VoIP provider Truphone. It’s still early days – the demo apparently required a bit of phone hacking – but this could be an important milestone in the iPhone’s early history.
To say the application isn’t yet ready for prime time would be a pretty major understatement as it currently requires the use of terminal on the iPhone to tell the iPhone to use its on-board SIP stack to place the call over WiFi instead of via the SIM card. To use the terminal application, in turn requires that you first Jailbreak the phone using an application like iBrickr or iFuntastic. This is not an application for the inexperienced or the faint of heart.
Interestingly enough, you don’t need to SIM unlock the phone to use another network – it’ll work fine in it’s standard AT&T (and soon to be O2, T-Mobile and Orange) flavour.
Word is Truphone for the iPhone will be available for beta testing in about a month’s time – head on over to this page and register your details if you’re interested in giving it a spin.
Update: Andy Abramson has got a video clip of the Truphone on iPhone demo here
ICSTIS fine Opera £250k over GMTV fiasco
Sep 24th
Link: ICSTIS Consumer – Adjudications
Remember the GMTV fiasco? The TV broadcasters telecoms provider Opera has just been fined £250k by regulator ICSTIS and been issued a ban for running premium services for 12 months (rather sadly suspended for 12 months on condition they ‘clean up their act’) for their part in the scandal
Having had a brief scan of the rather wordy adjudication, a few things are interesting. ICSTIS, given the choice, would have imposed a fine a lot higher than £250k. However, they’re stuck with that cap – and can’t go above it. As well as the fine, and having been well and truely slapped hard by ICSTIS, they’ve been told they can’t run *any* premium services for twelve months – but get this: it’s been suspended on the condition that they play fair from now on, have an audit of procedures, etc etc.
If ICSTIS are trying to persuade consumers to regain confidence in premium telephony and SMS, they should have banished GMTV and Opera from the face of the planet. This is not your ordinary run-of-the-mill minor ‘cock-up’ – it’s a multi-million pound fraud that both parties knew damn well about. Even if they refund everyone concerned (which is highly unlikely, as let’s face it – most consumers aren’t going to bother trying to get their cash back), the damage has been done.
Even now, ICSTIS are concerned about Opera and their future conduct. It remains to see whether they’ll be able to play fair in the future – but for now, in my opinion, they’ve got off lightly.
Breaking news: Blyk goes live today
Sep 24th
Ewan is at the launch of ad-funded mobile network Blyk as we speak – and they’ve just announced they’re going live today!
Here’s what we know so far. First, you have to be aged between 16 and 24 and live in the UK. They’re offering 217 texts and 43 cross-network minutes free each month. Once you go past that, it’s 10p a text and 15p a minute. Pre-pay of course. In return for these freebies Blyk will send you up to six ads per day sent to your mobile via MMS.
Update: Here’s the full price list, gleaned from their website:
Calls: £0.15/min any UK mobile network or landline.
Calls to Blyk voicemail: £0.15/min
Calls to 0845 numbers: £0.15/min
Calls to 0870 numbers: £0.25/min
Calls to premium rate (070 and 09) numbers: £0.20-£2.00/min
Calls to foreign networks: see international price list
Text messages: £0.10 each to UK mobile network.
Texts to premium rate shortcodes: £0.10 each + price of the service
Texts to foreign networks: £0.10
Picture messages (MMS): £0.20 each
Picture messages (MMS) to foreign networks: Not supported
Browsing the Blyk mobile portal: Free
Browsing other web content: £1.00/MBThere’s no roaming, which is a bit of a pain – but hopefully this will change.
That’s about it so far, more information when Ewan gets back from the launch event.
The iPhone UK FAQ
Sep 19th
There’s been so much news flying around about the iPhone I figured it was time to write a brief ‘frequently asked questions’ about yesterday’s UK launch. So here we go..
EXCLUSIVE: ROK launches mobile conferencing beta
Sep 18th
ROK Entertainment Group, the specialist mobile technology and applications developer, today announced ROK Talk, its new and wholly unique mobile conference-calling application, with an invitation for 500 people worldwide to join a BETA trial.
ROK Talk enables simple and affordable group calling, all managed directly from the user’s mobile phone. In just a few seconds, subscribers an instantly create or schedule conference calls with up to 30 people simultaneously using the familiar ‘contacts’ list already on their handset.
The ROK Talk solution manages invitations and introductions on the users behalf, and even allows in-call control of the conference directly from the handset – a first in the industry. Call costs are substantially lower than traditional conferencing solutions – and far more immediately actionable – making the product attractive for personal use. It’s free to receive a ROK Talk call too.
“ROK Talk connects families and other social groups as easily as it connects a businessman with his colleagues around the world. This is our first step into giving businesses and the socially networked generation the tools they need to communicate more effectively, and we believe that there is massive potential here to not only revolutionise group calling, but to make it as seamless and ultimately as ubiquitous as person-to-person calling is now.” said Lawrence Alexander, CEO of ROK.
If you’re interested in joining the free trial of ROK Talk – you;ll need a Symbian 3rd Edition device such as the Nokia N73, E65, E61, E61i – you can register at www.roktalk.com.
The iPhone news we already knew
Sep 18th
(and some we didn’t)
So the Apple announcement has been and gone – and we now know exactly what the plans are for launching the iPhone in the UK.
Surprisingly enough, pretty much everything that was said we’ve already covered – most recently in the predictions by ‘Mystic’ Ben Smith yesterday. Just in case you didn’t read yesterdays article, here’s what we already told you that’s been confirmed this morning:
- The iPhone 8Gb version will retail in the UK for £269
- O2 have got the network gig for the UK
- It’ll be available from Apple, O2 and Carphone Warehouse stores
We predicted a mid-October launch date – the official one is 9th November. One thing that no-one guessed would be it comes with free Wi-fi access, courtesy of hotspot provider The Cloud.
So there you go. Normal service will now resume.. 
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