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Nokia open up about Symbian

Tuesday, June 24th, 2008

Morning readers, Whatley here, just got this over MSN from a friend of mine at Nokia;

“Hey Whatley, we are buying Symbian and will donate it + S60 to an open source foundation!”

To which my response was a resounding – “Eh?”

You can read the official Nokia press releases here and here

Now, I’m not a developer. I’m ready to admit my knowledge in this area isn’t great. Ewan’s in the Maldives, the rest of the SMSTN Team are (still) sleeping so it’s down to me to make something of this.

Looking around online there is little opinion up yet – however, unsurprisingly, All About Symbian has the news too and Steve Litchfield says that “This is officially HUGE“.

I dropped the news into Twitter just over an hour ago (at the time of publishing) and got few responses back.

One of my followers and all round smart chap, Jof Arnold, emailed over his thoughts, which he’s kindly given me permission to publish here – I for one am interested to find out what this actually means for the industry as a whole and, more importantly, what’s your opinion on this latest Nokia acquistion?

_________________

Over to Jof:

“In practice… well, that all depends on Nokia and I couldn’t possibly comment on their track history of OSS projects – cos I have no idea.

In theory? Potentially an awful lot. Compare to the iPhone and you’ll see why. Remember all those people trying to jail-break the iPhone? Those projects were successful because fundamentally the operating system pissed off many people; cut and paste; closed apps; no file explorer. Now, had apple open-sourced it fully you’d have a situation where the masses would be contributing huge amounts of their time into making the iPhone just how they wanted it… all under apple’s approval of course.

But, apple won’t do that… and developers are annoyed. Which is why any system that allows developed to tinker with the core operating system is going to be attractive to them. All of a sudden, developers haved a connundrum;

  • develop for a locked-down system that is only on 10m handsets yet has a cool app-distribution and revenue-sharing system…. (apple)
  • develop for an open system that has 200m handsets (nokia)
  • develop for some google vapour-ware (android)

Impossible to say what will happen, but developers have always had a soft-spot for Symbian. This is potentially game-changing, but Nokia/Symbian’s got their work cut out; despite all this, Apple is a marketing monster and is hard to resist.”

Jof Arnold
http://www.brainbakery.com
http://twitter.com/jofarnold

_________________

Thanks for those thoughts Jof. There’s a live webcast scheduled in for 11am today.

We’ll have more news, as it breaks.

Thoughts?

Tags: ,
Posted in Anonymous Tips, Mobile, Mobile Development, Whatley Wednesday | Comments

Update on Monstermob rumours

Wednesday, August 29th, 2007

Since my article last week with rumours that Monstermob had gone bust, I’ve had quite a few emails from interested parties asking if I know anything else. As it’s been a long holiday weekend in the UK, I haven’t had a chance to do any further research – however it appears I won’t be needing to. Here’s a statement I’ve got from Miguel Lopez-Quesada, General Manager, Corporate Communications at LaNetro Zed – owner of Monstermob:

“As disclosed in a letter to all shareholders from the Chairman, dated August 16th and published on the Monstermob Group plc website (www.monstermobgrouplc.co.uk), as part of the ongoing process of corporate rationalisation and reorganisation within the Monstermob Group the Board has decided to begin an administration process for three UK subsidiaries, these being Monstermob Ltd and two other companies with limited activity (Phunky Ltd. and Mobiprom Ltd.). This decision has been taken to preserve the rights of the creditors of these subsidiaries. The financial and patrimonial strength of Monstermob Group PLC will not be affected in any material way by these measures.

Monstermob Group plc remains as headquarter of the group, based in Lancaster and operating in absolute normality. The administration process is a normal business practice and is being conducted according to the law and with all the guarantees to the parties”.

(Thanks to Marc at Mantra PR for the information)

Posted in Anonymous Tips, Mobile Services | Comments

Rumours rumours.. Monstermob gone bust?

Friday, August 24th, 2007

Just heard a rumour on the Bango forums (via the Mobile Monday London mailing list) that Monstermob have gone bust. If you’ve got any inside information (anonymous sources will be respected and kept so), drop me an email to alex (at) sms text news (dot) com

Monstermob goes bust. Only months after acquisition of Monstermob by LaNetro Zed, the UK arm of the company has gone into administration.
Rumours abound that LaNetro has asset stripped the UK company and left it with many debts, potentially to content providers and consumers who either supplied or pre-paid for content and that such creditors will claim that LaNetro fraudulently manipulated Monstermob – as shadow directors (from Spain) to enable them to put Monstermob’s woes in one place and cut loose.

Gazettes Online Link

Publication Date: Thursday, 16 August 2007
Notice Code: 2410 Appointment of Administrators

In the High Court of Justice (Chancery Division)
Birmingham District Registry No 4947 of 2007
MONSTERMOB LIMITED
(Company Number 03916609)
Nature of Business: Provision of Mobile Phone Entertainment Services.
In the High Court of Justice (Chancery Division)
Birmingham District Registry No 4948 of 2007
Joint Administrators’ Names and Address: Mark Elijah Thomas Bowen and Nigel Price (IP Nos 8711 and 8778), both of Moore Stephens LLP, Beaufort House, 94-96 Newhall Street, Birmingham B3 1PB.

(326401)

Posted in Anonymous Tips, Mobile Marketing | Comments

Noodles cheap calls cost oodles?

Friday, May 25th, 2007

Link: Noodle for cheap calls

Had a tip in from an SMS Text News reader earlier about a service called Noodle. The concept is quite simple – you get a new number which you use instead of your existing mobile number, and everytime you make or receive a call you earn 2p a minute cash. Is it too good to be true? My source has done a bit of digging..

- – - -

First of all – lets look at the ‘UK’ number range. According to
 
http://www.ofcom.org.uk/telecoms/ioi/numbers/numbers_administered/s7.xls
 
the 07000 range is allocated to Wire9 telecom, based on the Isle of Man.    Wire9 (or Cloud9) offers a portioned soft switch service which allows third parties to basically operate as MVNOs using Wire9’s number range.  As Noodle themselves happy admit (http://www.noodle-oodles.com/question.php), the Noodle service (driven by Wire9) falls under the FM06 interconnect range – lets just say that Three weren’t the only operator managing to extract +15ppm rates from other networks.
 
Now, I’m not quite sure how Ofcom’s latest ruling on interconnect rates affects Wire9, but I believe that they will likely still be extracting 15p+ per minute during peak even though Three has be regulated to 5.9p.
 
So, this explains how Noodle can both provide free international calls AND a rebate on your outgoing and incoming MoU – they receive such high interconnect payments that they can afford to give a little back.
 
What does this mean to you as a mobile punter?
 
You have to check if 077000 numbers are included in your bundle.  I can categorically say that as of last month T-mobile do not consider these numbers as part of a bundle, and you are charged quite a bit for making these calls.  Two example calls:  A 56 second call costing 39.7p and a 105 second call costing 74.5p
 
Now I have heard that other operators are including these calls in their bundles – I fail, however, to see how this can be sustained if the interconnect rates exhibit such asymmetry.
 
So, if you plan on going with noodle
a)  check that your network treats 07000 calls inclusive of your bundle
and
b) Tell your friends to check or else you may very well end up costing them a tonne of money!

- – - -

Interesting. Anyone else use Noodle, or have experience of using their service?

Update: Just signed up for a Noodle account and tried calling it using my office VOIP provider. It couldn’t route the call. Then tried using Skype – the charge came up at 14.4p per minute. Curious..

Posted in Anonymous Tips, Mobile, Mobile Services, Operators, Telephony, Three | Comments

Paypoint and Shop Scan Save bring mobile barcodes to the masses

Monday, May 14th, 2007

Link: Pay Point – PAYPOINT ANNOUNCES EXCLUSIVE PARTNERSHIP WITH SHOP SCAN SAVE®

Got an anonymous tip in about this earlier. Must have missed the press release back in April, or they need a new PR agency, as it didn’t appear on our news story radar. Anyway, better late than never..

Shop Scan Save® is an innovative retail solution that binds together mobile phone technology and EPoS payment systems, so consumers can receive and request money saving deals by text message, as an alternative to tearing out paper coupons.

Shoppers sign up to Shop Scan Save® by texting ‘JOIN” to a standard rate SMS shortcode.  Following the simple registration process, a unique barcode ID is sent to their mobile phone.  Subsequently, Shop Scan Save® members receive regular, personalised SMS offers entitling them to discounts on popular items.  When redeeming coupons, customers simply present their barcode ID, which is then scanned at the till along with the qualifying items to automatically receive the discounts they are entitled to.

It’s due to launch nationwide across the UK this summer – and check this for a response rate:

PayPoint’s involvement with the scheme and planned national rollout follows a successful trial at Sainsbury’s at Jackson’s in Hull.  The trial delivered an average 20% coupon redemption rate: sometimes up to 90% because members were able to request specific offers tailored to their shopping list. Therefore, retailers can expect to see instant benefits in-store.

20% is quite good, but up to 90%? Wow, that’s impressive! Now here’s the interesting thing. A quick browse around the PayPoint site later, and I found my local PayPoint retailers. It’s all relatively small corner shop mini-market ventures – no sign of Sainsbury’s, Asda, Tesco or Morrisons in the list. Wonder how long it’ll take for the big retailers to jump on the mobile voucher bandwagon?

Posted in Anonymous Tips, Mobile Services, SMS | Comments

Everyone’s favourite messaging service looking for a buyer

Friday, March 30th, 2007

A little bird reckons that a mobile related voicemail messaging service close to my heart is up for sale. Interesting.

Posted in Anonymous Tips, Mobile | Comments

Vodafone: Rumour, speculation –

Monday, January 15th, 2007

Just had this in via the anonymous tips form. Perhaps some of those more intimately aware of what’s happening at Vodafone could confirm, deny or rebuke as appropriate?

Word on the street is Vodafone are going to start charging for using their home portal. That’s right.

No more free Vodafone LIVE.

Which is quite frankly ridiculous.

BUT – this is supposed to happen in March which will coincide with their re-release/review of all their data bundles (FINALLY). A T-Mobile-esque bundle is anticipated.

FYI and all that.

Well if Vodafone FINALLY get off their arse with a ‘T-Mobile-esque’ data bundle, that’ll be super news….

Posted in Anonymous Tips, Mobile, Vodafone | Comments

Questions (answered) over the Millionaire Walkway game

Friday, November 24th, 2006
who wants to be a millionaire

who wants to be a millionaire
Originally uploaded by ew4n.

[Update: Njar (see comment) has set us straight: The 07 number simply receives the traffic. The user is sent back a message from a shortcode before being billed the £1 -- as is right and proper.]

I had this sent in this anonymous analysis of the Who Wants To Be A Millionaire premium text competition which invites users to text their answers to a ‘long number’ — a standard looking mobile number. They’re then whacked for a £1 billing message by return.

Not good. Not good at all. When anyone sees a long number, they automatically think it’s ‘free’ or ’standard network rate’.

Have a read of this viewpoint:

I had to endure who wants to be a millionaire the other night, and at an advert break they said if you know the answer to this question, send a text to 07797 808900, in very small print it said ‘texts cost a pound, and you could win a grand.’

This woke me up as I’m sure revenue share on the 07 number range was outlawed by Oftel a few years ago, thus how do you charge a pound on the 07 number range? My first thought was that it was on a fixed fee number – not so! It is a fixed fee per call number run by Jersey Telecom, but 30P a call daytime. More info here — just enter the number.

Doing a Google shows that it is a apparently a reverse premium rate SMS scam, send your message and you will then get a reply from a short code that costs you a quid – very naughty.

Check out the Millionaire competition page and their rules and conditions at the bottom of the page.

Looks like the service is/was provided by Yoomedia who apparently, according to seemingly well informed ‘davidt’ on this discussion board forum will make ‘£10m post tax’ from the Walkway game alone.

Thoughts?

[Update: See Njar's comment response here - all is cleared up.]

Posted in Aggregators, Anonymous Tips, Mobile Services, Operators | Comments

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