Posts Tagged ‘iPhone’
Thursday, September 25th, 2008
T-Mobile UK have already put up their own ‘Get it first’ button on their site in the UK.
Reports have already stated that it will be free with £40 a month tariffs. It will be interesting to see if their are lower tariffs offered, what you’ll pay for the phone with those or whether there are any contracts offered shorter than 18 months.
Below are the O2 UK tariffs for pay monthly customers on the iPhone for comparison. I’d guess that, like the $179 price tag for the G1 in the US, T-Mo are going to try to pitch the G1just a bit cheaper than these prices…
O2 Pay Monthly Tariffs for iPhone
Choose from one of our four Pay Monthly tariffs for iPhone.
| Monthly Charge |
£30 |
£35 |
£45 |
£75 |
| Cost of 8GB iPhone |
£99 |
£99 |
Free |
Free |
| Cost of 16GB iPhone |
£159 |
£159 |
£59 |
Free |
| Minutes |
75 |
600 |
1200 |
3000 |
| Texts |
125 |
500 |
500 |
500 |
| Unlimited Data & Wi-Fi |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
| Visual Voicemail |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
| Reduced Roaming Rates |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
Yes |
| Minimum contract length |
18 months |
18 months |
18 months |
18 months |
As mentioned before, I wonder how soon before people will be unlocking these phones both from the US and the UK. I’d give it about 2 weeks from release.
Tags: Android, G1, Google Android, HTC Dream, iPhone, O2, T-Mobile, tarriff, UK, unlock
Posted in G1, GPhone, O2, T-Mobile, UK, iPhone | No Comments »
Wednesday, September 17th, 2008
Great article here about how Apple has approached applications that are competitive or ‘too silly’. If this proves to be the thin end of the wedge then this approach could prove too dictatorial for even the biggest iPhone fanboy. The fact that even Microsoft’s ‘Mr. Mobile’ – Jason Langridge is pointing to this as a step too far is a worrying sign. At least Microsoft treats its app developers ‘fairly’ by producing a similar product, including it for free and then using its weight to market the hell out of it – thus crushing the competition slowly..
This is an area where Google hopes that Android’s ‘openness’ will shine. The idea being that the Google marketplace will be a democracy rather than the App Store’s dictatorship. It could be argued that this will lead to a lower quality threshold but hopefully the voting system on the market place will help wade through some of the rubbish. I would forsee that users could also access applications via other sites and will not be restricted to just the Google market site.
Tags: Android, App Store, Apple, competition, Google Android, iPhone, Jason Langridge, Market, Microsoft
Posted in Market, SDK, Uncategorized, Windows Mobile, iPhone | No Comments »
Monday, September 15th, 2008
Worth heading over to Slashgear to see Vincent Nguyen like a kid in a toyshop with a pre-release Android phone from Qualcomm. The videos are a little frustrating as he doesn’t always ask the questions or tap the menus I’d like to see. For example when the guy is about to show him the ‘double tap to zoom’ function but he asks to make a phone call instead. However, it is a great scoop so congrats to them and to androidcommunity.com .
What comes across on this particular device is that Android is running really quickly on a hi-res screen. On the less positive side, the interface doesn’t seem that intuitive. I know that Android is the underlying platform and therefore is not the phone and is not the interface either. However, it does still reflect badly on the prospects for the interface on the first phones.
Where the iPhone excels is by being so simple that your granny could use it. I don’t wish to pre-judge how others may have designed their interface for Android but I hope that it is more simple than what is shown here. It is particularly surprising that the browser came across as complicated given that it is based on the almost over-simplistic Google Chrome.
P.S. Demo shows Google Gears running on the Android browser so that’s yet more proof that the web is full of more false rumours than a BBC documentary. I previously reported there would be no Google Gears on early versions, I was clearly wrong (oh, the shame).
Tags: Android, Android Community, Browser, Chrome, Gears, Google Android, Google Gears, GUI, Hi Res, Interface, iPhone, Qualcomm, Slashgear, UI, Vincent Nguyen
Posted in Chrome, Dream, Qualcomm, iPhone | No Comments »
Wednesday, September 10th, 2008
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’.
Tags: Ads, Adverts, Android, Blackberry, Diamond, E71, Google Android, Google Maps, HTC, HTC Dream, iPhone, Microsoft, Nokia, September, T-Mobile, Windows Mobile
Posted in Blackberry, Dream, RIM, T-Mobile, Windows Mobile, iPhone | No Comments »
Tuesday, September 9th, 2008
Good article over on phandroid.com (if a little lengthy) pointing out that some analysts don’t seem to be able to separate the Android platform from the hardware on which it happens to be running. It seems inevitable that when the first Android phone is released there will be a flurry of articles pointing out why the iPhone is better and how Android has failed to live up to the hype.
There is no doubt that the iPhone is excellent and has raised the bar sustantially. Apple also has the advantage of owning their hardware and so having complete control over how it behaves. Android will suffer from manufacturers producing hardware that isn’t high quality in the same way Windows will run like (even more of) a dog on a poor spec PC. However, Android offers the opportunity of a wide choice of devices and a wider choice of software to run on it. Longer term manufacturers will also hopefully be able to produce these phones at lower cost due to not having to pay for the OS.
Tags: analysts, Android, Google Android, hardware, iPhone, phandoid.com
Posted in Dream, iPhone | No Comments »
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.
Tags: Android, Google Android, HTC Dream, iPhone, Sidekick, T-Mobile, Telegraph, UK
Posted in Dream, T-Mobile, UK, iPhone | No Comments »
Tuesday, September 2nd, 2008
Google Android’s security team have asked security experts to ‘ethically hack’ their platform and report back privately on what they find. I think this is a smart approach but how they’ll get much of what they find resolved in time for the upcoming HTC Dream release will be interesting.
I think that it will be interesting to compare security on the different platforms given the the ‘openness’ of Android relative to closed platforms such as the iPhone, Blackberry, Windows Mobile and Symbian. Although the iPhone is a closed platform it is generally not considered secure enough for most enterprises to embrace it yet. This is perhaps reinforced by the simplicity of the latest password hack for the iPhone.
Blackberry is generally considered secure (if you enforce the appropriate policies) with the occasional hiccup(!). Windows Mobile is becoming more security conscious with each release and at least has the concept of signing applications as does Symbian.
Tags: Android, Application, Blackberry, Enterprise, Google Android, Hack, HTC Dream, iPhone, RIM, Security, Signing, Symbian, Windows Mobile
Posted in Blackberry, RIM, Security, Symbian, Uncategorized, Windows Mobile, iPhone | No Comments »
Thursday, August 21st, 2008
I believe one of the key factors that will determine the success or failure of the first android phones is how simple it is to enter text. Some of the early videos coming out on YouTube show devices with qwerty keyboards. However, I was also interested to see one of the winners of the first round of the ADC was ‘Writing Pad’ from Shapewriter . Shapewriter is already available for the iPhone and seems to be getting some good feedback.
If you really want to know how it works there is even a paper from one of the co-creators of shapewriter on the technology behind it called SHARK2 (or “SHorthand Aided Rapid Keyboarding Squared” !) here .
Tags: Android, Google Android, Input, iPhone, Shapewriter, SHARK, SHARK2, Text, Writing Pad
Posted in ADC, Input, iPhone | 1 Comment »
