Archive for the ‘T-Mobile’ Category

Bulls*** bingo for today’s press reviews of the G1

Tuesday, September 23rd, 2008

Feel free to print off and cut out our free ‘T-Mobile G1 Launch Special Edition’ Bu***hit Bingo padtm (below) and see how high each review of the new T-Mobile G1 ‘scores’.

The rules are simple… if a press review mentions a word in one of the boxes then cross it out. You get one point for each box crossed, 3 points for a completed row or column, 5 points for one of the two diagonals and 10 points for some obscure pattern that looks like that bit at the start of the Beijing Olympics…

Good Luck!

IPHONE* OPEN UGLY TRACKBALL SMARTPHONE
CHROME HTC KEYBOARD LARGE T-MOBILE
APP STORE SECURITY** GMAIL KILLER*** QUALCOMM
CONTRACT SMS SYMBIAN RESPONSIVE MAPS
STREET VIEW GPS BIG BROTHER BIG IN JAPAN SIM

* This should be accompanied by phrases such as ‘no match for’, ‘lacks the interface of’, etc.
** Extra point if it is accompanied by some random quote from Jack Gold
*** this should ideally be accompanied by words such as iPhone, Windows Mobile or RIM/Blackberry (e.g. “this is not the iPhone killer that many hoped it would be”)

Win a G1 smartphone with AndroidCommunity.com

Tuesday, September 23rd, 2008

As the title says :-) . No idea if it will work outside the U.S. but you could still try your luck! See the link here.

T-Mobile G1 ready to preview in US and UK

Monday, September 22nd, 2008

Pictures of the T-Mobile G1 (official name for the HTC Dream) have appeared briefly on the T-Mobile site in anticipation of its preview / marketing launch tomorrow in New York. This has been reported in various articles but I first saw it here (mentioned more as a footnote).

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Telegraph exclusive (again!)

Tuesday, September 16th, 2008

[edited] The UK’s daily Telegraph is (again) on the bleeding edge in terms of revealing HTC’s plans for the Dream in Europe. Well, either that or they have again got confused between T-Mobile in the UK and the US.

They state again that it will be available exclusively to T-Mobile UK and on the shelves in November. However, the fact that they show the image below with the alt text as “The Google HTC Android phone” (it’s not, it’s the Touch HD) perhaps indicates they are not quite on the pulse.

Meanwhile the WSJ announced that HTC expects to ship more Dreams than most analysts reckon they are likely too. HTC apparently reckon they could ship up to 700,000 devices.

It’s not all doom and gloom for Android

Saturday, September 13th, 2008

Great article over at VentureBeat.com that is a more upbeat commentary than we’ve seen of late on the future of Google Android. I agree with a lot of the article although I also agree with some of the comments on the article that the work estimate table (below) is a little bit too vague.

The article describes how operators are moving away from walled gardens to try to provide users with more choice. It also mentions the T-Mobile App Store equivalent, although interestingly T-Mo have said that they won’t be supporting Android with their first iteration of their App ‘program’. This presumably won’t be too big an issue as Google plans to have its own Android Market.

HTC Dream to launch 23rd September

Wednesday, September 10th, 2008

Reuters Logo

Reuters has reported the T-Mo in the U.S. will launch the HTC Dream G1 on the 23rd September (2008!)

If this proves to be true then this gives them a decent run up to Christmas. Obviously, everyone has already written off Android as a lame duck which is probably great as such low expectations have been set.

I’m sure Google want it to be a success but equally they don’t seem to be set on setting the world alight and destroying the competition (Microsoft take note!). As long as they have some of their apps and their search available on other platforms they probably don’t care too much what device you buy. Google maps runs great on the Nokia E71, HTC Diamond Pro and Blackberry Bold alike with ‘subtle’ ads creeping in to newer versions.

One thing you can be sure of, every review/preview around the 23rd September will contain the word ‘iPhone’.

Telegraph predicts Android in UK soon

Monday, September 8th, 2008

The Telegraph yesterday published an article saying that the HTC Dream would be available in the UK on T-Mobile as early as November. This is either a real scoop by the Telegraph (who don’t mention their source) or a confusion about T-Mo in the US.

If it is true then I believe T-Mobile UK is a slightly unusual choice for launching the first Google phone. Sure, they were one of the first (excluding ’3′) to launch ‘all you can eat’ tarriffs but I question how much of Android’s target audience they can reach. T-Mobile must be hoping that users will move across to their network in order to get their hands on the first phones. However, I would speculate many will wait for unlocked phones to become available so they can stick with their current provider.

I hope that T-Mo don’t try to use the new phone as an excuse for extortionate monthly subscriptions and lengthy contracts. I have a feeling the first Google phone is going to get a tough ride in terms of comparisons to the iPhone, especially as the Dream looks very much like a rehash of the Sidekick. It would be unfortunate if it was further burdened by pricey contracts.

FCC Approves HTC Dream

Monday, August 18th, 2008

Lots of reports out there about the FCC approving the HTC Dream for use on T-Mobile in the US. Probably the best report is from engadget. Suggestion is that this was the last barrier to its release in September. The sooner the better I reckon.

I wonder what the market will be like for getting unlocked HTC Dream’s over to Europe. I would imagine that unlocking software will be even simpler to write for Android than it is for OS X Mobile due to it being a more “hackable” platform.