Ricky talks to James about his experiences as a ‘company blogger’ and midway through the conversation, James gets on to the subject of me, SMS Text News.

Link: Chatting With The Guru: Episode 3 – James Whatley aka Whatleydude

This episode, my guest is James Whatley, aka Whatleydude, and we talk about corporate blogging, among other things. Definitely a good conversation. James currently works at Spinvox, but his views here are entirely personal and in no way represent the views of Spinvox. So sit back, grab a coffee, and listen in.

That link above will take you directly there to listen.

I wanted to take time to talk to lots of 16-24 year olds and other demographics to gauge perspective. In addition, I wanted to document the actual experience, not just the basic facts that we’ve already reported.

So here we go. It was absolutely chucking it down. I was awoken by torrential rain — London in the rain, in September, isn’t always good news. The roads are packed, the puddles are everywhere to the extent that as you’re walking down the streets you sometimes have to turn your umbrella horizontal to prevent the spray from bus running through huge puddles completely soaking you. I had to do this twice as I negotiated the streets to the launch. Not necessarily the nicest day for a launch. Turns out, however, that yesterday was the first day of Fresher’s Week — the perfect marketing opportunity for the country’s 16-24 year olds. Ahh….

The good news was that the launch was taking place in the West End. Poland Street. Relatively easy for most people — me included — to get to. The curveball? The entry was actually a record shop. Different.

I was wondering if there enough room in the record shop when a polite lady asked if I was ‘here for Blyk’. I nodded and she pointed out the way. A few stairs later I had entered into a big tall white gallery space filled with people. Art on the walls, Blyk logos in evidence, a slideshow ready to rock, food being served by an army of waiters and lots of suits. Good. I was decked out in my usual pinstripes (meetings later on). Sometimes it’s a bit inconvenient turning up to places when everyone is wearing black GAP T-Shirts and sporting Nikes.

Almost immediately, I spotted Geoff Morley, Blyk’s Director of Strategy & Relationships. I snapped a pic.

I’ve known Geoff quite a while from his work at Mindmatics in particular, so I was delighted when he came striding over to say hi.

“We’re live today,” he said, grinning.

“Right, when’s the launch though?” I asked.

“Now! Today!” Geoff responded — the energy and excitement was shooting out of him.

“I thought you were announcing the launch — you know, sometime in November or something?” I queried.

Geoff smiled, before explaining “No, we’ll be live in about 60 minutes”. Right. I whipped out the E61i and whacked a mail to Alex with the news. I, like a lot of folk, had thought Blyk were somehow going to announce an announcement. Not actually go live. I spotted Rax Lakhani and grabbed his hand. He’d been keeping me updated with all he could publicly do so about Blyk for a while.

Then, as I gazed round the studio looking at all the Blyk branding and market research posters, I took a step back when Giles of Texperts entered my field of vision.

“GILES! How are you doing?” I hadn’t expected to meet anyone from Texperts at the Blyk launch. Then, the hot lady herself, Sarah McVittie joined us. I was about to launch into a ‘guess what, I was texperting-with-a-guy-from-the-Guardian-on-the-Thames-last-week’ story when a chap with a good microphone bellowed for everyone to gather away from the croissants and orange juice — the presentation was about to begin.

I snapped a pic of Sarah and Giles:

Almost immediately, a lady in front of me started writing furiously into her pad. Ahh. A journalist. You know, an ‘oldie’. A mainstreamer, I thought. (Later on she asked a question and identified herself as a reporter from the Wall Street Journal). For a moment I considered snapping a picture over her shoulder of the notes she was making. Then I thought better. Just as I was surveying the room and the Blyk team were setting up their presentation, I caught sight of… is that… was that… yeah, sure it’s Justin? Justin from BuddyPing / Ninety Ten. Wicked! I wasn’t sure because he was poised with pen in hand. What was he doing at the Blyk launch, I wondered?

Here he is:

Turns out he’s got some big news. Hugely exciting news. Not publishable at this time though. More, I hope, on that later.

Meanwhile Pekka Ala-Pietilä and Antti Öhrling had got up on stage and the presentation was ready. They were both sporting uber sexy wireless headset microphones so they could have their hands free.

“Shit,” I thought, “Are they going to do a Steve Jobs?” — I was wondering if they were going to talk off-the-cuff. Gosh. Yup. Very impressive indeed. No reading of briefing notes prepared by some PR lackey. As the chaps began their presentation, it became clear to me that they were clearly living Blyk. They were emotionally invested — to the point that they could easily deliver the forthcoming set of slides without a lectern and pages of notes.

Here’s Pekka in full flow:

I then resolved to snap a shot of each slide.

We start with ‘Open’. Confirmation that they were going live today.

Then: What is Blyk? The first mobile network for 16-24s funded by advertising. Blyk links young people with brands they like and gives free text and minutes every month.

It became clear that Blyk is only for 16-24s… I could see a lot of the journalists scribbling madly at this point.

Pekka then announced that Blyk was invitation only.

“You what?” I thought, followed by, “Ahhh, smart, I like it. Make it exclusive.”

Pekka explained that you could get an invitation by texting ‘FRESH’ to 82595. Two points on this from SMS Text News readers: Dan Lane pointed out that the keyword ‘Fresh’ is also the name of an ultra rubbish MNVO run by Carphone Warehouse (Scroll down to the bottom of this page to see what I think of Fresh). I thought the same when I saw this slide. Possibly confusing for anyone who’s been in a Carphone Warehouse and been hawked a Fresh Mobile sim recently. Reader njar pointed out that the Blyk shortcode, 82595, stands for 8BLYK. Very sexy indeed.

Pekka went on to discuss that Blyk will ask qualifying ‘members’ (not subscribers or users) to describe their interests online.

Then you get sent out a sim pack which looks rather smart:

Then they send out the Blyk settings (wap, internet, voicemail and so on) to your handset:

It’s at this point that it becomes clear that Blyk isn’t going to be handset-led. Instead, members will be encouraged to use their existing handsets (that will need to be unlocked). The only provisio is that they must be MMS capable. Why? Because Blyk’s first version of advertising/interaction is heavily based around that medium (coupled with text messaging). (Blyk will actually sell you a handset, much the same as the likes of Virgin Mobile will do)

At this point I walked around the gallery and almost fell over Stuart Dredge from Tech Digest.

He was busy liveblogging away. I wondered if he was using a 3UK GSM modem so I pointed my camera down and snapped a shot.

Nope, it’s a Vodafone one. And he had a signal even in the depths of the building. Very cool.

The slide changed.

No contract, no phone bill, for up to 4.5 million young people in the UK.

“How are they going to control that?”, I thought, “What happens if everyone wants to be on Blyk?”

Quite simply, you’re not getting it. If you’re not between the ages of 16 and 24, you’re name’s not on the list. You can’t come in. I like it. Obviously I’d like to be able to be part of the game, but I’m quite far beyond 24 now. Interesting strategy.

And they’re not playing about. The next slide demonstrates that Blyk didn’t just turn up in the UK, grab hold of a “So you’d like to do an MVNO with Orange” standard contract and sign on the bottom line. No, Sir…

The entire infrastructure is theirs, end to end, with the exception of the mobile connectivity which is provided by Orange. This enables Blyk to take substantial control over the end-user experience, from internet browsing to messaging delivery.

The next slide pointed this out:

“End to end — complete control of our network, user experience and ad products.”

Then Antti took the spotlight to explain just how Blyk intends delivering advertising value.

“Messaging is the simple dominant behaviour for 16-24 year olds. This will be the dominant design for mobile advertising.”

Cool. I think most of the audience were nodding — we’ve heard this kind of thing before from everyone from exciting mobile industry executives to mobile advertising agencies trying to get folk to spend money on shortcodes and text messages. What’s new, Antti?

Lots, actually. Antti began to get more and more animated.

Wherever you see the ^ sign (incidentally, the same sign used in the Blyk logo), that will signify that you, as a Blyk member, can interact with a brand. For free. No cost, whether you’re sending a text to them or browsing some mobile pages. So totally ‘free’ interaction with a brand. You’re not paying standard network rates for every message, nor are you spunking money to peruse advertiser messages on the mobile web. That’s got a certain appeal.

But it’s useless if the message — the communication from the advertiser — is useless. And let’s face it, we’ve all seen some absolute rubbish presented by a lot of big brands trying to experiment with mobile. I think the audience was liking Antti’s message but still keeping a skeptical viewpoint just in case …

“Let’s look at some example interactions,” says Antti.

The first example is interaction between a member and L’Oreal. These ain’t rubbish brands, at all. L’Oreal? My eyebrows were raising. They do mean business.

Antti showed this slide:

The member is asked to chose which celebrity they reckon they’re most like:

The audience was asked to believe that a 16-24 year old, upon receiving this kind of communication, would leap to respond. There was still a little bit of inherent skepticism in the weathered audience, I reckoned. But I was starting to believe. Put yourself in the mind of a media savvy 16-24 year old and think just how they’d respond to this kind of challenge. And it’s free to reply. If you’re sat stuck on the bus on the way to Uni, you’d definitely play along. To do so, the instructions are there in the message. ” ^1/2/3/4/5 ” means you simply reply with a number corresponding to the celebrity.

Antti was in full flow, describing this process — backed up by 18 months of in-depth research.

Whack back your response:

And uber-quickly, the member is sent this reply back:

The text reads, “Then you’d suit Eva’s shade of Color Riche Star Secrets, Caramel”, complete with a product picture and bigger Celeb shot.

Ok, I like it.

I get that. And boy it does look good — full screen MMS. I need to look into that more.

Antti moved quickly on to another interaction example. You’ve previously described that you’re a student — so you’re sent a text question from StepStone Recruitment asking if you need a job.

If you’re up for it, you reply with what you’re looking for.

Blyk responds, asking if you’re up for part time or full time…

You’re then invited to subscribe to StepStone’s text alerts.

The concept behind this being that it’s naturally a lot better to engage in dialogue with the member rather than just whack a blanket text to every Blyk member. How effective will this be? Well, that remains to be seen.

Antti then went on to highlight message tagging:

… You actually get an advert in messages sent to you from your friends. In this example, your friend is texting you to say that they’re going to be 15 minutes late. The rest of the message contains a call-to-action for STA Travel’s hot deals.

I’m wondering just how effective this will be. I don’t know. I’d like to think it will be rather cool. It could potentially be quite annoying. But on the other hand, provided it’s semi customised (i.e. I have checked the box saying I’m up for travel deals), it may well be extremely welcome. Plus it’s free to browse the link sent in the message.

Antti finished by shocking us with the fact that Blyk has over 40 brands on board for launch.

“Forty-Five,” called Jonathan, their head of advertising. Shit. That’s good.

Then Antti began flicking through the brands. We’re not talking your local shop. Big multinationals flashed up on screen. Journalist pens flew across their notebooks recording the brand names.

I got hold of the final slide with all 40 odd brands:

Acuvue, Adidas, AQA, Boots, Borders, BSM, Buena/Disney… Coke, Colgate, NatWest, Mastercard, Sky, McDonalds,……….

Huge. Huge, huge brands delivering a stunning amount of credibility. But why wouldn’t they want to be involved? Blyk’s audience is exactly the one they’d like to reach.

AQA popped up on screen and I did a double-take. “Hold on,” I thought, “Didn’t I just see Sarah from Texperts?” Seems like AQA got there first.

Quickly, it was on to questions from the audience.

How much for data browsing? £0.99/meg. Hmm. Quite expensive. But then again this is Orange, we’re talking about, not exactly famed for their healthy data price plans.

How many free minutes do members get?
43 minutes? You what? 43? Not 42? Not 44? Why exactly 43 minutes? Strange.

And free text messages?
217. 7.2 texts every 30 days. Again, slightly strange. Pekka wasn’t having a laugh though, explaining that they’ve gone to market with this offering supported by their mountains of research.

Me? Well, I do think it’s a wee bit silly picking such apparently arbitrary numbers. It certainly sets Blyk out against the existing MNO/MNVO offerings.

If you go over the free usage, you’ll be billed 10p per text and 15p per minute to any number in the UK (irrespective of whether it’s mobile or landline). Simple and clear pricing.

What happens if someone over the age of 25 applies for Blyk? No deal. Pekka explains that they’ve implemented quite a lot of unified information databases to ensure that only those aged 16-24 can sign up. If you’re aged 24 right now, that’s fine, you can join the club and stay a member when you become 25. But if you’re 25 now, hard luck. I do like the exclusivity this brings.

I do also like the tagline, “Blyk is the new mobile network for 16-24 year olds” — I think that will appeal to the target audience.

The presentation came to an end and I surveyed the room. I think it’s a hard audience — seasoned tech hacks who are accustomed to going along to launches and being romanced with free devices and samples — who aren’t going to be entirely impressed at being told they’re too old to use Blyk. Heh. I kept an open mind as I wandered back to pack my camera away.

Geoff came bounding over, “Here, can I show you that Miss Selfridge demo?” he asked. I smiled and took out my camera. Geoff was bursting with excitement as he flipped open his E65, “Just wait ’til you see this.”

He proceeded to show me a sample interaction aimed, I imagine, at a young fashion-conscious girl. In the example, the member is sent a full-screen MMS, asking them to guess the cost of a jacket/dress:

Send off your (free) answer and the system replies right-away with a follow-up question. No joke, it was lightning fast in the demo Geoff showed me.

Geoff guessed the price correctly and got this back:

Spot on! Guess the price of the next two items from Miss Selfridge.com to earn yourself a fantastic discount.

Oh interesting, very interesting.

Geoff was on a roll, correctly guessing the price of the bag:

“You’re on a roll,” the text reply said.

The final question arrived:

Geoff got that right and then was sent this text by reply:

Congratulations! You have a great eye for fashion and for a bargain too. Enter this code at the checkout at Miss Selfridge.com to get your 20% discount.

Now that might not seem that big a deal for a mobile industry analyst on a hundred grand a year. But for your average 17 year old, this would be a big, big deal. I know. I checked.

I walked straight out of the Blyk launch and started making some calls to my younger brother’s friends. They’re exactly the Blyk target. They have to pay their own phone bills, they have to buy their own handsets. How do they react to this kind of offering?

Well, anecdotally, the response was phenomenal. I spoke to a load of 17-19 year olds who I reckoned fit the Blyk profile almost exactly. Each one of them has gone off to sign up after my description.

Let’s, then, take a step back. Is Blyk poised for success?

Yes. I think so. I’d like to think so. I’ve spoken to a lot of people across the industry since yesterday to garner opinion. A lot are a little suspect. Some are downright cynical. Many were reeling off ‘showstopper’ issues such as lack of access to unlocked handsets, demographic apathy and so on. ‘It’ll fizzle out in a few months’ someone said, whilst another reckoned it was a huge waste of money.

I think Blyk have a lot of challenges. They’ve got a super, super team of people though and I think they deserve the benefit of the doubt from a highly skeptical and slightly wearied UK industry — and they also deserve a fair wind.

The Blyk chaps I spoke to yesterday were overflowing with energy, commitment and pure excitement (Something I’ve only ever witnessed now and again from the likes of 3UK).

I think their advertising funded model could work — can work. I think the market is ready for this kind of service and I think that there’s a large segment of the student audience in this country that will snap it up.

If you’re sat there with your arms folded not entirely convinced then let’s you and I agree to wait and see. Let’s track Blyk and their performance over the next six months and see how they get on.

Every success to the team!

‘Er, where are you Ewan?’ asked Alex, SMS Text News blogger. He was calling from Number3Bar, just off Regent Street — the venue for last night’s Unlimited Drinks.

“I’m, right, I’m getting some labels,” I replied, my N95 thrust against my cheek as I strode purposefully across the Euston Station concourse.

“Ok,” I heard Alex say, “It’s just — well there’s 12 people here already.”

Shit. It was 5.55pm — the event was due to begin in five minutes. Everything else was pretty well planned. The venue was ready and waiting, my cash was smoking gently, already sat in the venue’s bank account, the SMS Text News roller-banner was collected and, particularly important, I had got my hair cut. Right on.

I explained to Alex that I was in Euston (I heard him start with an “Errrrrr” and explained I was jumping in a cab shortly). I bombed it across to the WH Smiths and picked up some labels. Sticky ones. That was the only thing I had negated to fix for the evening.

I arrived at 6.10pm and promptly setup the roller-banner. That was an idea I had on Tuesday. I thought it would be rather cool to have a big poster proudly displaying SMS Text News to everyone who arrived — so you knew where you were. It was a bit of an arse to unravel, but with Alex and Hetty helping me out, we managed to get the poster setup.

Then I quickly hit the bar and got a beer, said hi to the early lot in a haze of hello-hello-hello then fixed myself to the front of venue at the door to welcome people. Alex stood next to me, guest list in hand. I was confident that although 130 people had squeezed their way on to the list, the 120 capacity of Number3Bar wouldn’t be sorely tested.

The first problem: Labels.

So 14 people were already in the venue availing themselves of the fair use policy unlimited drinks. Do I go round and demand they put on labels? Just then, Stephen Wadeley, Wholesale Telecoms Sales for AQL rocked up. Screw labels, I thought, I need to greet people. Instead of demanding Stephen write out a label, I instead shook his hand, introduced him to Alex — and then we began what became a running theme across the evening: The business card shakedown.

My memory is brilliant in some cases but it doesn’t perform incredibly well I need it to. Therefore I was asking everyone who arrived if they had a card.

A few people were a bit shocked, initially thinking I was demanding to see their invitation card. Difficult, you see, as no one had an invitation card. Their minds were, I think, put at rest by Alex brandishing SMS Text News business cards. Quickly I swapped to greeting people at the door, then asking them if they had a business card.

I am not entirely sure if this was the appropriate strategy since it meant that the poor folk arriving looked like they were being shaken down by me, as they patted their pockets, dug into their purses and generally hunted for their business cards.

It was all for a good cause though. Because I will shortly present a who’s who of the evening. This won’t necessarily feature people whose card I didn’t get due to memory issues. If you should be in this list and you’re not currently, it is entirely an oversight by me and I need your help — I asked one or two people to email me to say hi this morning so I’d remember to include them. If you’re not there, mail me, so I can update the list.

Kudos, by the way, to the collection of people tried out the ‘o2 data rates suck’ secret password on the doorman. Unfortunately he (and she) weren’t quite playing ball and looked eminently confused when I tried to explain.

Stephen Wadeley of AQL was at the top of the business card pack when I extracted them from my pocket. You all know AQL, right?

Richard Hyndman of Refresh Mobile was standing tall and accompanied by the Whately Dude — that is, James Whatley — also of Refresh Mobile (but shortly joining SpinVox). Richard graciously allowed James to take a screenshot of their new service, Mippin, so I could blog it here. Mippin is definitely looking fascinating:

I met quite a few Ed’s last night and proceeded to confuse them. First up was Ed Cave, Head of Mobile Products for ipiarko limited or information mobile.

A shit-hot-smartly-dressed Adam Bird of Esendex presented his credentials to me. Adam is Managing Director of the mobile services company who are, incidentally, based in Nottingham. Nice one for coming down Adam. I’ve been reading Adam’s blog and following Esendex for quite some time now.

Just then, a crowd of good looking people flowed in through the door headed by Lauren of Sonus PR with her talented comedian/actor boyfriend who, … yes… screw it, I can’t remember his name. But he’s a wicked guy. The rest of the Sonus team followed, resonating friendliness and enthusiasm. I said hi to Chevan, James and Helen just as Benedict Evans of NBC Universal popped by.

Benedict used to work in strategy at Orange and had some rather illuminating points about the way the media industry and the mobile industry view each other. He’s planning and commercial development manager for NBC Universal’s Digital Assets section.

Andrew Grill of Seeker Wireless didn’t have a card but brilliantly agreed to email me to remind me. They’ve developed some really neat stuff – essentially (and I’ll blog more on this) they’ve got a small java applet that sits on the sim card that, when installed in an Operator’s network, delivers extremely accurate and reliable HomeZone detection. So they can charge/route calls appropriately — and, as a result, offer some compelling location based possibilities. They’ve won some huge deals but alas, not publishable yet.

I then remember connecting briefly with Alex Meisl, Chairman of Sponge Group (“from concept to handset”) — I had a ton of questions for Alex about Sponge but the crowd was surging and more and more arrived so Alex graciously let me continue welcoming. I made a mental note to take Alex for lunch. At some point. Especially as they’re at number 11 Charlotte Mews, not far from my favourite Pizza Express on Charlotte Street.

Martyn Davies of Faberooney handed me one of the sexiest mini-business cards I’ve ever seen (with chillies pictured on the back). His card also had a link to his blog. Very swish.

Nick Ris, top guy — at least, it seems that way to me — at MX Telecom, arrived looking dapper in a wicked shirt — the dapperness was enhanced but the funky umbrella he was sporting. If you ever meet Nick, do ask him for a business card. He’ll flop out these half-sized cards at you… but it’s not the card that deserves the attention, it’s the content. He puts his mobile on the card, that’s fine. What I found fascinating was the line on the bottom saying ‘Find me on linkedin/facebook…’ along with an extensive list of other social media services. Smart.

I need to do that.

“I’m Ewan. Find me on Google.”

I might even put that on a business card. Heh.

Right!

Leanne Rose, Marketing Coordinator of Mobyko (“Your mobile home”) arrived with her colleague whose name, annoyingly, I can’t quite remember. I’m just rubbish. I thought of writing it down on Leanne’s card but I reckoned that might make me look a bit psycho.

In quick succession I welcomed Andy Ashburner, wicked designer at Caffeinehit. Charlotte Browne, freelance TV producer and corporate video genius arrived straight after Andy. Charlotte has made the videos for no less than two of my recent companies (see one at www.neoone-impulse.com and the other at www.dcmi.co.uk). I wasn’t sure if she was going to be able to make it as she’s been spending weeks sorting out some work for the BBC.

Speaking of BBC, I spotted Sarah Prag, Head of all things Podcasting for the BBC, arriving in through the door. I am a huge fan of the BBC’s brilliant range of podcasts and Sarah listens really patiently as I run through my list of likes. My favourite right now? Today in Parliament (well, it’ll be back on shortly) and the Scott Mills Daily.

Fiona Goldsworthy of Lewis PR arrived shortly after, with her colleague Ceiri O’Driscoll of Slice PR. At this point I really was feeling quite self conscious about asking for business cards from people who had literally just stepped one foot inside the bar. Fiona and Ceiri were very gracious. Thanks ladies. I was beginning to develop a ‘thing’ asking for cards. I felt like I was doing inverted doorstepping. Still, it helps with the memory.

Patrick Smith, Roberta and James of Sonus PR appeared at the doorway — with Patrick wearing a really swish Sonus PR tshirt (and brandishing one for me, right on Patrick!). Patrick, as a sponsor of the event, rightly joined me at the door with Alex for a little while to help me welcome people in — and to make my business card shakedown look a little bit more…er… welcoming.

I turned and saw Hetty, (She runs one of our companies, Eventscope, which provides online networking services for conferences and events). Hetty was striding up toward me demanding to know where the food was.

Ah.

Yes.

There was a wardrobe malfunction with the food. Or a food malfunction. Or a miscommunication. Whatever — the reality was that, standing at the door, I saw zero food. Nothing. Nada. I was reliably informed that others around the bar and the inner sanctum of the venue were regularly plied with all sorts of super delicacies. She strode off hunting for the manager to verify this — I’m indebted to Hetty for helping me finalise the event details.

Ian Price, Managing Director of Broca Plc had, it appears, come all the way from Lancashire — although I didn’t get time to ask him if Broca had an office down south. Like everybody I met, I wanted to talk more to Ian, but I didn’t get a chance as the crowd was thickening fast. I took his card and dashed off to greet Darren King Senior Consultant at Redbox Telecoms Group. Darren was sporting a nicely cut suit — “Where’s the Ameo?” I asked, surveying his torso and not seeing any large bulges in his jacket pockets.

“Don’t have that one any more,” Darren explained — which, is good news. It’s a rather well specified HTC device, the Ameo, just, not good storing in your suit pocket.

Mark Gibson, Commercial Manager for Advanced Telecom Services also gave me his card — I’d been checking out their site a few days prior and typically (it was becoming a bit of an arse now) I didn’t have much time at all to ask Mark more about his company. Another time.

Just as well. I was managing to say hi to everyone briefly before another person arrived.

Nick Shadbolt shot in through the door. Senior Account Executive at Incentivated, I immediately liked Nick’s confident approach and smart style. I took him aside for a moment (the door was curiously empty at this point) and congratulated him and the team at Incentivated for a) doing really good work in the mobile marketing industry and b) for doing good work at getting the message out. I find it infinitely depressing meeting companies who are doing some phenomenally exciting things in mobile, but don’t talk about it. Or, for some reason, don’t think anyone’s interested (Cue a cut to me hopping up and down on the spot frustrated). The team at Skywrite Communications — principally Elena — do a good job of keeping the communication flow active at Incentivated.

I caught sight of the delightful Kersti Klami peering in the door and went over to welcome her. Kersti, Client Executive at Fuse PR was joined by colleague and Client Director, Alex Lacey. I bid them welcome and insisted that we had to meet up soon before I spotted Mark Tynan at the door.

Mark Tynan is Chief Executive at ShopQwik, SMS Text News sponsor (although, due to a design malfunction, that is, a new site layout, ShopQwik aren’t quite on the site at the moment … but will be). With ShopQwik, you can book a hotel or a flight, almost anywhere in the world, within 60 seconds, using your mobile. It’s a brilliant service and I was pleased to see Mark had brought along some ShopQwik flyers and, with colleague Paul, a good few devices to demonstrate the service to all and sundry. Mark’s a class act. I love the ShopQwik concept and service.

Ben Harvey arrived looking dapper in a pinstripe jacket and jeans. He’d travelled all the way from deepest, darkest Hampshire to be with us, so I was delighted to see him. Ben is our Friday-afternoon-at-3pm columnist and normob (that is, normal mobile user) however there won’t be a column today on account of his harrowing train journey back to Winchester. Watch out for one next week though.

Darren Cockburn has not yet got his Channel4 business cards but, thoughtfully, had grabbed a load of compliments slips. I’ve known and worked withth Darren for a long time — he was previously at Disney and now, well, I can’t quite recall his exact job title but it’s words to the effect of ‘buys and invests in companies for Channel4′. I think that’s reasonably accurate. He was on good form and looking well. I got a compliments slip from him with his email autographed on.

I bumped into Amir Azulay, Managing Director of Skillworks Interactive and his colleague Peter Broido, Director. Again I really wanted to take a bit of time to learn more about their company — a clue, perhaps, on the back of their business card: “Where people play people”.

Darryl Ashing, my frequent saviour, drifted calmly in about then. Darryl is partner at accountancy firm, Ashings, who specialise in accountancy and financial services for the high tech industry. If you’re looking for funding, he’s also got a good base of angels and early stage investors in his address book. He’s been my accountant for years. If you’d like an intro, just let me know.

I caught up with Sally Everitt of RFMO. Her company specialises in bespoke handset application development across Java, Symbian and Windows Mobile for organisations such as Nokia and Orange. Perhaps I should talk to Sally about getting a decent mobile blogging application written for my E61i?

Although I might not have my Nokia E61i for long after a chat with Claire Jones from Hotwire PR. Claire’s team represent companies such as Blackberry, MBlox and Acision. I collared Claire about Blackberry (Blackberry, she told me, just did their first billion dollar quarter) and asked her if she’d help Alex and I do a ‘Blackberry Week’ on SMS Text News. More on that later, hopefully.

It’s been a while since I saw Jeremy Freeman in the flesh. Although he’s worked on the web for years, his new company might not strike you as mobile related. It isn’t quite. The Bubble Shop sells all things bubble related! From bubble toys to champagne, bath products and fancy lighting. But Jeremy also still does a ton on the web and mobile. I didn’t get a chance to introduce Jeremy to Mark Tynan of ShopQwik — I did go hunting for Mark but couldn’t find him.

Alan Wood from Abraxas arrived and I got his card. As Managing Consultant, Search & Selection, for Abraxas, Alan had unfortunately not been retained to headhunt a leading mobile industry blogger whose name begins with the letter E. Shame However if you’re looking for a position in and around mobile, or if you’re looking to hire in the industry, it might be a good idea to talk to Alan.

I was pleased to see Hutchison (or 3UK) represented in the form of Gilad Novik and Elmer Zinkhann. I welcomed them in with open arms and pointed to the fair-use-policy free bar. There were quite a few 3UK fans in the house and I counted a good amount of 3-branded N95s and E65s. Good news.

I saw Dan Illet grinning at the door and sped over to extend my hand. As well as a noted freelance journalist (Claire from Hotwire PR: “Oh are you DAN ILETT?” — he’s famous), Dan is editor and founder of Greenbang.com. Greenbang covers information technology in the ‘green’ arena. We pick up quite a lot of news from them when they cover green mobile related issues.

Richard Walker, Director of Ragtime bounded into the bar and grasped my hand. Alas, I just didn’t get time to talk to him either. Another mental note: Find Richard, take him for lunch, find out more about Ragtime.

At this point I noticed a distinct increase in the volume of the music. The bar was push-room-only and packed with people and I guess it’s this point that venue staff like to put on thumping music. I’m not sure why, though it is almost certainly a pavlovian response to lots-of-people. I suddenly found myself beginning to shout and disengaged myself from conversation and hunted for the nearest barman. I got him to turn the music down. There’s nothing worse than having to scream HELLLOOOOOOOO at people. With the music stopped, the volume didn’t really go down much. It was still quite noisy with people talking — but that’s no bad thing. It’s when the DJ puts the volume up to 11 so that you can hear the music over the noise of people talking, that I begin to get annoyed.

I noticed food flying around. My one key issue for the next event is food. Focus on the food. It wasn’t good enough. The quality was, I think you’ll agree, ok. Not brilliant. The service – the delivery, well, I felt that wasn’t quite right. Apologies if anyone felt hungry. Whenever a waiter came out brandishing food they were set upon like pirañas. So 3 x 10 pizza deliveries across the evening is the way to go. Or something like that.

Relaxed about the music, I tipped my virtual hat to Alex Kerr of PhoneThing. I’ve seen Alex around (virtually) for ages — I know he’s been a reader for a lonnnng time. It was good to put a name to a face but, alas, I need more time to talk to him. And to everyone else.

But I had to focus on my host responsibilities.

“You’re shitting me?” I asked Geoff Wright as he arrived.
“No?” He said, handing me a business card as proof.
“You’re from BLYK? BLYK-Blyk? The free-operator Blyk? YOU WORK FOR BLYK?”
He nodded.

Geoff Wright is Campaign Producer at newbie operator, Blyk. They are, obviously, not quite operational as yet but they’re coming. Soon. I’ve been reading about them for ages. Now and again people drop the odd rumour (“They launch tomorrow” – you know, that sort of rumour, only, that was months ago), so I am delighted to hear they are still functioning and still healthy. I pleaded with Geoff for some sort of indication. I’ll need to get hold of the PR from Blyk and shoot them some questions.

Hollie Young of WebitPR flew past me occasionally until I managed to grab her and say hello.

“Do you realise your blogger Ben Harvey and I went to college together?” she asked.

Well I never. That’s pretty nifty. What are the chances of that? I’ve been getting emails daily from Hollie with anything telecom and mobile related — finally I met the girl-behind-the-name.

I managed to chat briefly with her colleague Jonathan before I was drawn away by the arrival of Vinny Hayes from Hotxt. They’ve got some rather interesting stuff cooking — I hope to blog more about that later on. Vinny heads up business development for Europe so he’s the guy to talk with if you’ve got some ideas about working with them.

Described by many, in the know, as one of the world’s foremost mobile developer geniuses (along with his colleague Jay — who is in France at the moment), Dan Lane arrived, soaked down one side of his jacket.

“I got shot, just for you,” he explained, describing how he’d come out of his apartment with his supersoaker fully loaded, only to have been caught by a waiting assassin. He’s been playing Streetwars — is that what it’s called? I think that’s it. It was brilliant to see Dan, not least so I could use his party trick on other unsuspecting SMS Text News readers.

Think you’re a tech geek? Well Dan Lane has nothing on you. Not unless you ALSO have an RFID chip embedded in your left arm. Yup. He wired up his old house so that the door opened when he waved his hand at the lock. That is seeeeeriously cool.

Dan works with Ed Hodges who arrived shortly after he did. Ed wasn’t soaken, instead he was slightly dazed, having just completed a track day at Silverstone, whacking his bike round corners at 200mph.

Robin Dhara arrived in a whirlwind of energy sporting a pinstripe jacket over a red jumper. I confessed to him that I’d never had the balls to do that, instead opting for the full pinstripe suit.

“Drinks at Ronnie Scotts later?” he asked, as I shook his hand.
What an arse. I had to get up early for a train the next morning so I had to decline, not before I gave him a slap on the back for coming up with a brilliant name for his PR company — Red Robin. I’ll need to find the link.

He pointed over at Stephen Holmes of design house, BloodyBigSpider, “It’s all his work,” Robin explained. I know Stephen of old. He’s done the branding and look and feel of a number of my companies now and he’s my go-to-guy for that sort of thing, so I was keen to get his impression on the new SMS Text News design completed by the chaps at Forty Media.

I glanced around and Ronald Cummings-John and his colleague, both of Hearmyspace were deep in conversation with Robin.

Before I could grab Stephen for a chat though, I bumped into Ben and Ed from Masabi who have tons moving, particularly in the area of mobile security. I spoke for a moment to Ben — I need to sit down with them for a little while soon and blog what they’re doing.

Tee Banwait, founder of Metracks popped in and was promptly surrounded by folk wanting to know more about his music upload and streaming service which is now mobile enabled and shortly to be enabled across all popular mobile platforms.

I should have introduced Tee to Liam Westley of Tigernews but Liam had to depart quickly. I first met Liam years ago in a shiny conference room. He was developing a moderation system for a live interactive chat service. He’s a shit hot .net developer. Sheeeet hot. I thought Liam and Tee should maybe speak about Windows Mobile and .net.

Richard Percy of Liquid Media was a ubiquitous figure across the evening — I got his card but unfortunately not his web address so I’ve nothing to link to… yet.

If you’re into bio-diverse networking, you should have a chat to Richard Lander and the team at Locustworld. I only managed to briefly say hi last night.

Anthony D’Alton of Parys Communications joined Giles Adams, Marketing Director of Texperts to arrive at the same time. Only a week had passed since we were all sat in a funky Golf driving round London at 4am in the morning for the Texperts launch. I pointed them straight to the bar as I caught up with Oleg Podsechin of ION Square (“power on start-up”) together with the Pitch chaps.

I managed to get the card of their java developer, Andrew McMillan whilst I explained that I really, really liked how they’d implemented the service on wap/mobile web. I’m going to try and have lunch with Pitch’s Mark Tunnicliffe next week to find out more about what they’re up to.

Now, if I’ve missed you out, it’s because you didn’t give me a business card so please shoot me an email so I can get you up.

Once again, thank you to everyone who took the time to come along. It was most appreciated and I’d love to do it again soon — and maybe try and get a bit more time to speak to everyone individually.

And now for a few pictures:

Link: Whatleydude’s Blog

Tomorrow – Aug 24th marks my last day at Refresh Mobile. Over the past 13mths I’ve worn many hats and gone through many job titles… so here goes – Ahem – SO – I am leaving the role(s) of:

Mobizines Manager, Customer Champion, Chief of Blogger Relations, Content Merchandiser, Blogger, Product Manager, Quality Control Manager and Service Evangelisist…!

(breathe)

…at Refresh Mobile.

Phew… and where am I off to? Well…I’m off to go and be the new Product Marketing and
Digital Manager over at the voice-to-text specialists… SpinVox.

Working alongside another new(ish) recruit – James Scroggs – to help them expand the Spinvox brand and products across the digital world and throughout the entire universe!

James will be at SMS Text News Unlimited Drinks tonight showing off Refresh Mobile’s Mippin service — so if you catch him, do give him a pat on the back and your best wishes. Every success at SpinVox, James!

Refresh Mobile are looking for open and honest, London-based mobile phone users to test their new version of Mobizines and are willing to pay £10 (in either Virgin or Amazon vouchers) to anyone who is willing to help.

Anyone who wants to volunteer needs to be free to spend 45-60mins at the Refresh Mobile offices based in Fulham Broadway, London any time between Mon-Fri, 9am – 6:30pm before June 12th 2007.

Interested? Email james@refreshmobile.com for more details.

Nice to see you here, by the way.

Pull up a chair.

I’m always surprised to meet, talk and interact with SMS Text News readers. It’s phenomenally exciting. Do you remember Whatleydude? You will. If you’ve been reading around the blog comments now and again you’ll have seen his comments. A lot of the time I talk with people and I don’t really know who they are or what they do as a day job or occupation. So I hadn’t actually engaged with Whatleydude (James) as to his background or profession, we’d just been knocking about some mails. I thought it would be good to get him to answer the standard SMS Text News interview questions and see where it went.

Well. Oooh it’s an interesting one. Have a read.

Without further ado, James….

1. What was your first mobile handset?
I honestly don’t know.
It was a horrific piece of machinery that I got given for Christmas in 1997!
All I remember about is that it had an extendable aerial (which I broke off pretty sharpish – whoops), no caller ID and a ‘design your own ringtone function!’

It was on Vodafone and it was PAYG. Shocking…

The same applies to the phone after that one – no idea what make -

But I can however tell you that my first memorable handset was the Nokia 3210 – ahh… the wonders of Snake!
And T9!

w00t!

But yeah – started off on Vodafone – dilly dallied with Orange and Three – but always came back to VF. Also – I’ve pretty much the same mobile number now for 12 years! That’s gotta be a record surely?!

2. What is your current mobile strategy? (i.e. Handsets, devices, networks)
My current mobile strategy?
Eh?
You what?

*emails Ewan*

Ah… I see!

I’ve got an N73 currently – I play around with a lot of handsets – on my desk right now for instance I have an N95, a Nokia 6680, N80 and another N73.
I really need a Java handset though – maybe if I steal someone’s K800i… Hmm.
Sorry!

Getting distracted!

Why do I have all these phones on my desk?

Well – I guess I’ll come to that later on in this Questionnaire!

My next handset will probably be the N95.. and I’m giving serious thought to moving Operator too.
Although VF have got ’til March (apparently – ahem) to sort out their data etc…

(I’m a Nokia fiend – always have been – although I once tried those NEC phones that launched with H3G – lets not talk about that though eh?)

3. What price plan are you using right now?
I’m on something stupid like 3000 mins pcm + STC
(I discovered yesterday that I’m on an 18mth contract – I am not amused)

*runs off to check*

Anytime 3000 3G STC 50 VC + 40Pds 3G Extras Pack for 34Pds – whatever that means… I know I know – I should pay attention – but I really don’t.

4. What’s your background?
I’m a fellow Essex boy like yourself chap – Canvey Island born and (in)bred.
What? Webbed feet are handy?!
Hahah – moved to London in my 20s to have a crack at working in the city.
I worked for LWT, GMTV, The Storm Trooper’s Gazette (sorry – The Daily Mail)

And then an amazing thing happened…

Bear with me – life story time!

I was tinkering along at The Mail enjoying life etc and – via a mobile forum http://www.talk3g.com – I discovered the BBC had a mobile service which was supposed to be better than WAP. So I thought I’d give it a go on my (then) N70.

I couldn’t get it to work.

So I emailed the BBC and told them it was rubbish and they were too (in as many words).

I got an email back from a guy called Kevin Cunnington at Refresh Mobile telling me that he could fix it and that the N70 was capable of the BBC (Mobizines!) Service and that I should try this.. and try that and and… etc etc.. but no matter what – I couldnt get the bloody thing to work!

Anywhoo – the long and short of it is – I ended up getting it working one weekend after lots of fiddling and playing with various settings – so I Kevin emailed back to let him know that a) I had got it working and b) How much I enjoyed the service.

So yeah – he emails me back and offers me a ‘mystery prize’ from their website (I’d give you the link but they’ve since taken it down), this website had all sorts of things on it – generally boys toys and various other firebox kinda stuff y’know?

At the very bottom of this website it said something along the lines of:

“Or – spend a day in the office and meet the team! If we like you – we may even give you a job – Refresh Mobile is always looking for fresh ideas from innovative people…”

So. You can see where this is going can’t you?

I went along – met the CEO, Scott Beaumont – had a really long (and kinda geeky) conversation about the mobile industry and the Mobizines product and where it was and where it was going and yeah – all was well.
Unfortunately I was doing accounts at the time (YES – ACCOUNTS – AARGH) and Refresh Mobile wasn’t looking for any accountants…
Hmph.

Three months later I decide to start looking for a new job – figured I’d drop Refresh a bell, see how they were getting on – Scott & Kevin were both pleased to hear from me and invited me in for another chat.

That was the evening of Wednesday 8th June 2006.

By Friday lunchtime I’d quit my job at the Mail and signed the contract with Refresh.

I am now currently ‘Mobizines Manager’ at Refresh Mobile – working on various projects such as WAP, CRM, Quality Testing, Product Marketing and general Product Management…

However – now here’s the big ‘revelation’ – my name is James Whatley – I have an online tag – it’s Whatleydude.

Go on – Google ‘Mobizines’ & ‘Whatleydude’ – have a look what you get…

Yup – that’ll be me – ‘posing’ as a user evangelising the service!

So yeah – time to come clean – I work for Refresh Mobile and I work on the Mobizines Service.

Thing is – I REALLY believe in this service and I think everyone should have it – so in my defence – I was bigging up the service before they hired me! So the use of the word ‘posing’ is kinda wrong really. I AM a user of the service – I’ve just been kinda neglecting to mention that I work for Mobizines..

*whistles innocently*

So yeah – I guess they hired one of their biggest fans – I’m a paid user!

…I hope no one hates me! I know I’ve been a surreptitious about my evangelising – but now it’s all out in the open I can be honest about who I am, what I do and who I work for.

Sorry – didn’t mean to go off on one – but I’ve been needing to get that off my chest for a while.

I spoke with my CEO about it this morning and he gave me the ok – I mean Whatleydude is my tag – so I need to reclaim it as it were y’know?
I’ve been blogging since March (www.myspace.com/whatleydude is my main one – but I have others) last year (when I buggered off to Thailand for two weeks and checked myself into a detox spa – http://www.spasamui.com – everyone should go!) …and I’ve had an online presence for around 10yrs now (as that tag).

I also run a gaming forum http://s8.invisionfree.com/ThePGF – gaming being my initial interest that brought me online in the first place… that has now developed to Mobile!

I think I now look at more mobile sites than I do gaming…!

*spots next question*

Ah ha!

5. What sites do you regularly read to keep up to date with mobile?
OBVIOUSLY smstextnews – but also

http://biskero.org
http://talk3g.co.uk
http://ringnokia.com
http://darlamack.blogs.com/darlamack (sometimes)
http://technokitten.blogspot.com
http://www.flash-lite.de

But I also read/use (not entirely mobile)

The Register – we all know this one
Talk3g.co.uk – that mobile forum
IGN.com – for films and sometimes gaming
spoNg – gaming news
http://www.rogerandjames.blogspot.com – comedy blog by me and my mate Roger
http://www.alondonsingtonwrites.blogspot.com – the dating scene in London (written by a buddy of mine – again makes me laugh)

Oh and obviously my own forum (which has a phone section!) The PGF – http://s8.invisionfree.com/ThePGF – where the main chat at the moment is all things Wii related.

I love my Wii – ahem.

I *think* that’s it – although I’m sure I’ve missed some…

6. What was your mobile bill last month? What do you think is a fair amount to pay for your mobile service each month?
I HONESTLY don’t want to say – it was a bit hideous – the good thing is I get my data charges back on expenses BUT – you do the math.

It’s three figures…

I’m kicking off at Vodafone at the moment because MMS is no longer part of my bundle – which, quite frankly is ridiculous… But yeah – I’m giving them two months.

7. Pick 3 people that you admire and rate in the mobile industry and give us 2-3 lines about each.
Personally – I guess Scott Beaumont for a start, (no corporate sucking up here – seriously) Mobizines was born out of a management buy-out at T-Mobile which he personally headed up.

And to give me a job based purely on my passion for the product and the mobile industry is something that I will for ever be in his debt for!

Secondly – I’m a big fan of most (if not all) mobile bloggers – there’s no real one that stands out for me but that whole ‘community’ (of which I hope to eventually be a part of) is growing. And people are sitting up and taking notice. The example being: Bloggers being invited to the big Mobile Industry events around the world. Nokia/Motorola/SE etc want YOU to use their product and enjoy it and then they want you to blog about it.

Over the past 6mths I’ve read a lot of articles regarding ‘How to get bloggers to blog about your product’ or in most cases ‘How NOT to get bloggers to blog about your product’ – its a tough one.

I guess that’s why I’ve come clean about who I am and what I do etc as I know eventually I would’ve been found out/discovered – which doesn’t do ANYONE any favours!

Thirdly?
I haven’t got one – I’m hoping to go to 3GSM next month – so maybe someone will impress me there!
)

8. Do you have any pets?
Nope. It’s a bit annoying really – I love dogs and I used to have one – but I’ve recently discovered I have a potentially fatal allergy to all kinds of animal fur.

I spend my time with my Wii.

Brilliant.

I s’pose I could get a tortoise..

OOO!
just remembered!
I’ve got a Nintendog called Bruno!
lol

9. What one issue or technological advancement would you like to see with the mobile industry? What are you looking forward to?
I must admit – I am intrigued about the iPhone. I’m itching to see if it will have the massive impact a lot of people think it will.. Now the dust has settled things are becoming clearer about the product.

The UI looks pretty special – but other than that – *shrug* – d’ya know what I mean?
I am a big fan of convergence – I recently filled in a Nokia survey in regards to the N73 and in doing so I gave away the fact that I only carry my phone. No Blackberry, no MP3 player/iPod, no PDA/Organiser, no Diary etc etc..

More convergence – that’s what I want.

Oh – and that thing they did in Japan? With the move to standardise every phone charger?!
WHY ISNT THAT WORLDWIDE?!

NOKIA! Please STOP changing EVERYTHING. Memory cards & Chargers being my key example…

Grr..

10. What’s your ringtone?
The Killers – When you were young
My phone only rings briefly as I pick it up sharpish – so that opening guitar is fine by me.

Message wise I had the ‘woo dini’ of a Jawa up until about two days ago – right now I’m experimenting with the ’3D Tones’ – we’ll see eh?
Incidentally – I upgraded my N73 from standard to Internet Edition thanks to Stefan’s instructions over at Ring Nokia..
Good work fella.

11. What’s the last movie you saw at the cinema?
Casino Royale.

If you’ve seen it – ’nuff said.
If you’ve not – hit ctrl T and book your ticket now!

12. What services do you most use on your handset?
Obviously Mobizines first – I must admit that I HAVE to as part of my job but I actually READ it if you know what I mean?
Ok – so I might not read Shoewawa – but Pocket-lint for instance – I read everyday.

What else?

Agile Messenger – can’t be without this one.
Yahoo Go! – Great App.
MP3 player – I go spare if ever I forget my earphones.
Opera Mini – (although I use Safari sometimes)

My active standby is: Mobizines/Contacts/Calendar/Agile/Bluetooth/MP3 player.

13. What’s the hottest mobile service to catch your eye recently?
Yahoo GO 2.0 on Java – it’s about time they caught up with the Java users. Reporo & Widsets are doing well also – its good to have a bit of competition! Sky Mobile is also a very good idea – and that’s the kind of convergence I’m talking about. Setting your Sky+ to record from your mobile? Brilliant stuff.

14. When did you last send a picture / video message — and who was it to?
*check sent items*

I sent an MMS of me pulling various stupid faces to a friend of mine who I knew was feeling down. It made her laugh. Job done.

Before that – I sent a pic of my new cowboy boots (I love them) to a friend of mine… No really.

15. What new mobile companies have caught your attention this year?
Pass. I keep an eye on Widsets and Reporo (who’ve done well with their CPW deal). But that’s about it – I need to improve this area of my knowledge base…

16. What is the best thing and the worst thing about the mobile industry?
Worst – Data charges & unclear tariffs.
T-Mobile Web n Walk/X-Series on Three – THATS the way forward.
There’s your answer.

Saying that – something that me seethe recently – my mate’s Dad, been with T-Mobile for yonks – on an old one2one contract(!) his last bill was for something like £160-odd quid and he’d used 270mins and sent 10 sms’.

Ok – so he’s 65yrs old and isn’t that savvy.
BUT – T-Mobile should’ve seen this and recommended a new contract to him.

THAT really annoyed me.

Thank you James! Thanks for taking the time!

Just got a text message from Fresh Mobile asking me to top up my phone account.  I haven’t made a
call in 70 days, you see, and shortly they’ll deactivate my number.

The reason I haven’t made a call is because I can’t top up online.  Every SINGLE time I try, it fails. Just tried again tonight with a whole array of different credit and debit cards just to check it wasn’t just me.

So another operator bites the dust. 

I’ve been trying to spread around my mobile usage with different operators to suppor the underdogs a bit.  I’ll just stay with T-Mobile….

Woops.  It’s actually www.freshmobile.co.uk.  The .com site is one of those google-adsense-cash-pages.  You’d think Carphone Warehouse would have got off their arse and found out who owned the site and chucked them some money, don’t you? 

How many customers — like me — are automatically typing in www.freshmobile.COM and wondering what the hell they’re looking at?

Anyway, next problem: If you recall I’ve been trying half heartedly to put some credit on my Fresh Mobile handset.  That’s the number you see currently on the SMS Text News blog.  So pity help you if you text me.  If you call me — and I answer — you’re ok.  But if you text me, there’s no way you’re getting a reply at the moment as there’s no credit left.

I’ve been trying to login and sort it out.  Every time I’ve done so it’s spewed some security error.  Tonight I tried logging in and the system is down.  Totally useless.

Their suggestion is that I go to a Carphone Warehouse store or phone their long winded automated credit card line.  That’s the one where you’re kept on the phone for ages laboriously typing in 16 digit card numbers over and over. 

It’s not good enough.  When people want to pay you, you should make it reeeeeeeeeeeeally simple for them to do so.

Ergo, my Fresh Mobile number is dead. 

It’s dead to me!   

Dramatic, eh?

My new SMS Text News mobile number shall henceforth by my much better looking Vodafone number: +44 7733 200 113.  So if you’d like to call me, feel free.  And if you want to send me a text, I will be able to reply    In fact, if you’ve nothing better to do, send me a text and say hi, because I’ve got 1,000 free ones to use up. 

And I cannot be bothered to make a trip to a Carphone Warehouse to do a top up.  OR type in my credit card details over the phone ONLY to have your system say ‘There has been a problem with a security check on your account’. 

Why are you making this my problem?   The fact YOUR system’s security protocols are screwed up is absolutely no concern of mine.  I don’t care, I’m trying to give you money.  T-Mobile’s taking my cash fine.

Sometimes the Fresh Mobile online payment thing works. Sometimes it doesn’t.  For the last 2 months or so it hasn’t worked at all.  All I wanted to do was put on a few quid so I could respond to texts. 

Surely if someone wants to GIVE you money, you should make it easy.  Their system should have flagged up that I’ve been trying to add credit to the account for months.  Someone should have phoned me right away to sort it out.  Cashflow, man. Cashflow. 

This is a good reason why so many people get annoyed with their service providers.  Me? Well… T-mobile launched their unlimited data plan and now I only use my Fresh mobile for incoming calls. 

Coulda-been-a-contender.

If you haven’t checked out Holymoly.co.uk recently, it’s definitely worth a look. Think Popbitch, then multiply by Victoria Beckham’s bank balance. It’s not for the faint hearted.

I reckon this is a good move by Holymoly. They produce a totally refreshing and addictive range of daily content much, much, much more compelling and interesting (read: bitchy, actionable gossip) than your average pile of crap from the high street magazines.

I think they will be able to build a big audience of mobile readers quickly, particularly if their audience spreads the word. Anyone attracted to the blend of gossip and bitchiness that is the trademark of Holymoly will be, I think it’s safe to assume, keen to keep up to date with their gossip. Ergo the automatic daily update of content offered by the Refresh Mobile service should be popular. It’ll certainly be useful for when you’re on the bus or the train and hunting for a bit of edgy entertainment.

Well, it looks like HM is here to brighten your day because you can now get a DAILY piece of HM direct to your phone.
Five bloody days of the week. For FREE! How good is that?
Very bloody good that’s what. Not only will you get HILARIOUS * news before everyone else, you’ll also be guaranteed to get at least one text a day for five whole days of the week.
*subject to change

Expect to see scathing wit, rules to live your life by, twats ridiculed, not to mention EXCLUSIVE competitions and HM! wallpapers for FREE! You know it makes sense.

Getting this amazing service is easier than Jodie Marsh after half a shandy. Just look… Text MOBI MOLY to 63333.