Today it’s time for MIR in Rome, Part Two. In this episode we have a look at the iPhone language assistance applications (How do you ask ‘Where is the toilet in a foreign country?’) and we put Nokia and Google Maps head to head to help us locate the Spanish Steps. Which app do you think worked? 
Here’s the video:
Back in January, Ben, Dan and me (that’s Ewan) hopped on a very early flight to Rome, Italy, to check out the mobile scene there and to film two MIR TV episodes from the city.
In today’s Part One, we talk about the technology we’ve brought, we visit some landmarks and spot-the-handset, we try making a video call to James back in London and we discuss the merits of cameras on handsets.
Here’s the video:
Part Two is coming soon!
In a bid to retain UK customers in the pre-pay market – something notoriously difficult to do – O2 have launched their ‘Surprises’ campaign this week. Customers topping up are given a code which guarantees a prize when entered at the campaign’s online ‘hook a duck’ fairground-game themed site – prizes range from free texts messages to TVs, laptops and even race day and spa experiences.
Backed by a £5.5m promotional spend on television, print and online media, O2 are hoping to make their 11.8m pre-pay subscribers feel special… and it wouldn’t hurt if customers of other networks noticed they weren’t getting prizes for topping up either.
…and whilst I’m looking forward to seeing the water-filled bus-stop panels with real rubber ducks, intended to ‘quack’ as people pass (we make our own fun ’round here), one of the most interesting aspects of this campaign is that it’s being powered by Italian-firm Buongiorno’s web system – a company we made contact with recently after our trip to Rome (preview here, watch out for the full videos soon). We’ve fired them some questions over and will be publishing an introduction to this Italian power-house behind mobile entertainment projects in 53 countries and 100 network operators.
We’re still getting to grips with this international-bloggers-of-mystery concept here at the Mobile Industry Review Show.
Instead of bringing you updates, perspective and on-the-road tests from somewhere in London, we decided to take the MIR Show on the road. The first stop, of course, was Rome.
We flew out on the 730am British Airways flight to Rome and arrived on schedule at Leonardo da Vinci airport. We hit the hotel, dumped most of the non-essential kit and headed off to the Colosseum to begin the filming.
We used both Google Maps and Nokia Maps to get about the place. Central Rome is mostly walkable. The massive FAIL that is Nokia Maps (I thought it would be at least ‘ok’) came as a complete surprise.
Also, the G1 handset roamed perfectly… except for Google Maps — which spent the day displaying an error to an increasingly frustrated Ben Smith. (Ben was also trying to demonstrate Nokia Maps).
Dan Lane decided to stick with his iPhone 3G. Lucky he did. We were able to navigate around Rome thanks to Google Maps and the iPhone.
I really thought the Italians would be ultra hip — both in their fashion sense and their handset selection. Instead most of the locals around Rome were wearing relaxed garb. And when they weren’t kissing each other passionately (it is, yes, a very romantic place), they were talking on their Motorola RAZRs.
This, I think, is one of the biggest misconceptions I had about Italians and their mobile handsets: I thought they’d be up to date. I thought they’d be big into data. I thought there would be handsets all over the place. Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong.
The best handsets we saw in use? Seriously: Motorola RAZRs. Or the odd three year old Sony Ericcson.
Once or twice I saw an iPhone — and then realised it belonged to someone from the UK.
This, despite the fact that Vodafone Italy retails both the Blackberry Storm AND the iPhone 3G.
Perhaps Saturday and Sunday were the wrong days to go and do some normob watching in the capital city? Maybe most people were out in the provinces, leaving the city centre to the proles on their RAZRs?
I wonder if Italians really DO care more about talking? Rather than texting and twittering? From what we observed over the weekend I’d say that looks to be the case. The city locals were very clearly carrying about MOBILE TELEPHONES — RAZRs and ultra slim 2-3 year old Sony Ericssons and using them to talk on. The only folk using data services on their handsets appeared to be us.
Anyway we filmed a lot of content and all things being equal, we’ll be publishing two MIR Shows from Italy soon.
Fancy a few pics meantime?
Here’s Dan on the phone to his other half, reveling in the fact that his 3-Like-Home service didn’t cost him anything extra to phone home from Rome:
Here’s Ben Smith getting more and more agitated by his N82 with Nokia Maps. Dan had already plotted the location to the Spanish Steps within 10 seconds whilst we waited for the Nokia to get on the same page:
We did some filming at most of the major landmarks. This one is Il Vittoriano:
Next stop? I’m thinking Prague. Or Marrakech.
On the last Saturday of every month, we’re taking the Mobile Industry Review Show to a different city across Europe.
Starting this Saturday with Rome, Italy.
The model for each destination on the MIR Show schedule is simple:
1. We’re taking the crew — that is Dan Lane, Ben Smith and James Whatley — to do some on-location filming.
2. We’ll produce two MIR Shows from the city, so that every Monday fortnight on-going, we’ll bring you some fairly decent informed entertainment.
3. The Shows will most certainly include ‘Ben’s Facts’ — a real favourite amongst regular viewers, this time expanded to give you a perspective on the destination.
4. We’ll be contacting local MIR readers and shining the light on the mobile activities of their companies and discovering how they ‘mobile’.
5. We’re going to try doing a normob walk-about (that is, shove the camera in the faces of unsuspecting yet English-speaking locals and demand to see what phone they’re using). That might need a bit of work. But James Whatley, purveyor of normob-walkabouts for MIR, is well up for it.
6. The roaming and equipment dilemmas are going to be priceless. Italy, of course, is covered by 3’s 3-Like-Home deal whereby if you’re a UK customer, you can roam free on their sister Italian network and use your minutes like you would at home (and data, too). But when we’re off elsewhere… well, that’s going to be interesting.
8. We’ll do the filming during Saturday and in the evening, we’ll be hosting a relaxed meetup for anyone who’s interested in the evening, along with, I suspect a bit of proper Italian pizza.
9. We aim to fly early on Saturday morning — and back into London on Sunday morning. So a literal flying visit for each city.
This Saturday, I’m joined by Dan Lane and Ben Smith. (James Whatley unfortunately had a schedule conflict for this one, but we’ve got him for the rest).
Rome Recommendations
We’d like to try a bit of crowd-sourcing rather than turning up in Rome and finding the nearest rubbish tourist restaurant. Thus we’re looking for recommendations on the following:
* Your suggestions for where we should film [Backgrounds to where we hold conversations about news and so on.]
* Restaurants for lunch
* Bars & restaurants for dinner
* Things we should do and see
* Stuff you’d like us to capture on film
* People & companies you recommend we hook up with
* Mobile related services you think we should check out — either IN Rome or services/hardware you’d like us to test while we’re there
If you’ve got any ideas, either mail me or comment below.
All things being equal, look-out for the first MIR Show from Rome this coming Monday.
(Colosseum image via Wikipedia).
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