I’ve been using my Android G1 a lot since I arrived in America because, conveniently, my US T-Mobile sim works perfectly with it (even though it’s a UK device). I didn’t have to do any configuration since HTC thoughtfully included the T-Mobile US web settings on the device already.

So I’ve been taking pictures.

As you do in a city as nice and as varied as San Francisco.

I’d like to send them directly to Flickr. Since there’s no ShoZu service on Android at the moment (and I haven’t re-installed Pixelpipe yet) I thought I’d have a look around the Marketplace on Android.

Unlike others, I take it upon myself to buy as many applications as possible. I did a certain amount of evaluation on ‘Flickr Upload’ when I came across it. From memory it was $0.99. Or perhaps less.

I scrolled down to the comments.

On the 28th of April, ‘Matthew’ commented:

Works wonderfully. Well integrated.

.. and he gave it five stars.

I suspect Matthew is referring to the share option. When you take a photo on Android, there’s a button that pops up called ‘Share’. Click on that and you get the choice of sharing by Email, by Google Mail or — to Flickr (enabled by this application). Smart. I was warming to the concept.

I noted that it’s had between 100-500 downloads. Ok. Not a brilliant well-trodden path. I continued with the comment review.

On the 21st of April, ‘z0mbix’ commented:

Will not authorise with flickr on t-mobile/G1. Can’t get any reply from the developers em[ail]…

Er.

I’d gone off it right away.

The final comment on the app’s frontpage was a day before z0mbix’s one from Benjamin:

Exactly what I was looking for works perfectly

Hmmm.

Z0mbix’s comment put me right off. But I reasoned there must be a reason, maybe he/she didn’t know what they were doing? Afterall if Benjamin and Matthew each had a good experience, I should be ok?

Right?

As I walked out of the Westfield Mall in downtown San Francisco I spotted an advert I wanted to write about. I decided to download Flickr Upload there and then, configure it and get moving.

I paid the money, the app downloaded and within seconds I’d got to the main prompt, asking me to authorise my Flickr account to work with it. Fair enough.

I typed in my Yahoo account username and password and hit ‘login’.

Nothing happened.

Nothing.

The screen went blank.

Er.

‘I’ve just paid a dollar for this,’ I thought, rather disappointed. I was experiencing the pain of fellow user, z0mbix.

I tried again. Maybe I typed my details wrong?

Again it failed. The app just sat on a blank screen like this:

Rubbish!

I ended up sending the photo to my email account and walked home, rather annoyed with myself.

I was annoyed because I thought I’d obviously got my Yahoo password wrong.

What self respecting developer would allow an application to go live — a chargeable application at that — which doesn’t actually work?

Then I reasoned that it must be a Yahoo screw-up and spent a good few blocks cursing them in my mind.

I got back to my desktop and immediately changed my Yahoo password to check I had it correct.

Again I tried authorising the app.

Nothing. Nada.

I’ve bought a dud.

I don’t know who is responsible. It COULD be Yahoo, entirely. But one assumes that the two other recent commenters on Android Marketplace aren’t lying and they got it to work.

I’ve tried a few times over the past few days to activate it to no avail.

So I looked up the developer online.

They’re called Macrospecs and they’re a privately-owned startup in the bay area.

Ah hah! They’ll have a GetSatisfaction page, right? Or a forum or something?

No.

Nothing!

It’s a one-page website and — ultra annoyingly — the ‘contact’ page goes straight through to their email address.

Confusingly there is absolutely no reference to the Flickr Upload application on their site.

I then had a look back on the Android Marketplace and saw that the ‘developer site’ is listed as FaceofMobile.com/Flickr. Ah hah!

No, hold your excitement.

This is the entire site:

Yup… it’s one page. It consists of three screenshots and a macrospecs logo, with no link. No contact details. No support option. Nothing.

In fairness to the developer, one wouldn’t expect that many support enquiries from an application that simply sends a photo to a Flickr account. It’s not rocket science and there’s hardly any failure points.

Except the authorisation process.

And, of course, macrospecs don’t control that, Yahoo do.

Tough luck for me and z0mbix, right? If it ain’t working, you can try contacting macrospecs but it’s rather clear they don’t want to know — and are not expecting to support any enquiries.

I hunted around and I found a support forum for macrospecs’ Face of Mobile application, a $1.99 Windows Mobile Facebook app.

I suppose I could try posting there.

But I’m not feeling very welcome — or smart for buying the app. Indeed I’ve paid a dollar for the privilege.

It’s perfectly fine for it to happen to me, I have a good understanding of the trials and tribulations of mobile development — but if this is the experience of your average consumer who’s just picked up a G1 or G2 and is expecting 100% friction-free total quality-assured service from the Android Marketplace, they’re not going to be at all impressed.

Like the ringtone marketplace a few years ago — you’ll pay once and if the experience sucks, you definitely won’t ever pay again.

What’s the right response?

Is this a FAIL on the part of the team at macrospecs? Is it a Yahoo FAIL?

Or is it an Android FAIL?

Would this have happened on an iPhone?

Carphone Warehouse latest deal brings music to our ears, by tuning into Nokia’s latest music phone on just a £15 contract.

The 5800 XpressMusic arrives gratis on one of the most affordable tariffs around, on O2 with unlimited texts and 100 minutes allowance per month to any network and at anytime. Hurrah!

As compared with other offers around, it doesn’t appear to be for a time limited period only on a fixed number of months, although the contract duration is for 24 months. Then again, what do you really expect for a free handset that normally costs £249 – they have to make their money back somehow.

How other network tariffs measure up against each other for the 5800 is of distinct interest, which we found both to our delight and amusement. Starting from the highest cost; Orange’s own offering will be on a £35 contract we’ve been informed, O2 comes in at £30, T-Mobile also £30 (£20, for the first three months), Vodafone and Phones4U are at both £25.

How the others fair in their call allowance per months is also a tad interesting. With T-Mobile coming in with 700 minutes, Vodafone has 200minutes. The other networks are either not entirely upfront with their details, or even lack the complete acknowledgment the phone’s existence on their website.

The 5800, just in case you hadn’t already read the plethora of copy already on MIR has a reasonable 8GB internal memory for around 6000 tracks with instant access to Nokia’s music store. Coupled with a 3.3megapixal camera and Sat-Nav abilities, it’s a formidable beast.

More can be seen here, on the 5800 Carphone Warehouse deal.

We brought you news of the 5800 coming to Orange, way before anyone else on the planet in December last year. The handset was spotted at their partner camp in Florida by us, in which we wrote up the exclusive here.

Initially, Nokia had screamed foul at us for pre-empting such a thing arriving as the phone was only brought along to show case new mobiles. Seeing as it was ‘deliberately’ placed on the table of all the phones Orange sold, we rightly and ever so correctly, assumed it would be on their network soon.

Isn’t it great when we can predict the future.

UPDATE: It now appears, possibly in a gut reaction to the CPW announcement, Phones4U also now has a £15 deal for the Nokia 5800 on a T-Mobile contract. The plot thickens!

That popular VoIP application for mobiles, Truphone Anywhere has just arrived on the HTC Google OS driven device the G1.

This Truphone release is now available in such far flung countries as the UK and the US of A, with Austria and Germany being on the cards next. The last one ties in nicely with the unveiling this week of the only Android *cough* handset to be releases in Germany for March. Coincidently it’s the exact same time the Truphone Anywhere application will be available, in that very countries language. Hurrah!

If you weren’t already aware and shame on you for not, Truphone offers far more than just VoIP. Instant messaging is an integral part of the software, with the likes of MSN, Yahoo, Google Talk and Twitter all taking pride of place within. With Skype access only being just around the corner too, although we’re not sure it’ll be here in time for CeBIT where it’s being rolled out.

On both Google Talk and Skye, it’s possible to speak to people for just the price of a local call. Although if they’re local, why not just pop around instead – food for thought there.

It’s now downloadable from Google’s OS app store, the Android Market – which still sounds far too close for our liking to a place in a Philip K. Dick novel.

With this announcement, Truphone for the G1 has now joined the illustrious ranks of being supported on devices such as the iPhone, iPod Touch, BlackBerry and Nokia handsets. All that’s missing now from their line up is a version for Widows Mobile devices and stretching further afield, PC and the Mac.

Who knows, we might have just pre-empted the next few unveilings of Truphone. But for the time being, let’s just say Anywhere for Android is now in good company.

Happy New Year from yours truly and what not. I had a brief moment yesterday (while chilling out in front of my laptop) when I came across Ed Hodges’ MIR post covering his thoughts on the G1.

Some of you may remember that back in November, Ed himself was there when I first gave the G1 a go.

The thing is, I never actually got round to publishing my thoughts on said handset as, well, it drove me NUTS. Why? Allow me to explain.

Back on that fateful day in November, not too long after my epic rant on the Nokia N96, our glorious leader here at Mobile Industry Review – Ewan MacLeod – furnished me with a brand new T-Mobile G1. The point being that we’d capture this moment on camera for a special G1 edition of the MIR show.

From that initial handover, much to Ben’s (who had paid for his) and Dan’s (who’s now finally got one) joint annoyance, I had said G1 in my possession for about three weeks. The only advice I was given, and I quote:

“James, I think you might benefit the most from this handset. It’s your opinion I want… BUT. I don’t want you to review the hardware; I want your POV on the software, the OS and most of all the ‘out of the box’ experience.”

Ewan made this VERY, VERY clear. So, software. Not hardware. Check. Right then, let’s dive in shall we? Here we go…

Today kids, I want to talk about ‘centricity’. What do I mean? Well, within the first couple of days of using the handset, a few things came to mind that made me look at the G1 in a very odd light. The issues I’m going to raise in this piece aren’t necessarily about the device per se, but they do relate to the kind of person that you’ll have to be to truly benefit from owning one. It should be noted at this point, I am not that person.

You see, as you all know, I am a mobile geek. My career in this industry has seen me move from product management to user experience, marketing, online, branding, blogging and ultimately a combination of the lot with the advent of Social Media. In this short time, there have of course, been learnings. These learnings bring me back to that word again; centricity.

Brands, tech, carriers/network operators, companies, banks, post offices, you name it – many of these over recent years have claimed to be USER-centric or CUSTOMER-centric. Now that, if executed well, can be very good for the organisation in question and of course, for the consumer. Fantastic stuff.

However, that’s merely my introduction to the notion of ‘centricity’. As the iPhone before it has benefited those consumers out there that have a mac-centric lifestyle, the T-Mobile G1 works best for those who live their lives through Google. GContacts, GMaps, GTalk, Gmail, … Geee-Ma! Look at my new phone!

You name it, it’s got it. You turn the phone on and you’re immediately invited to sign in, sign up or sod off. BUT! Before I get into the negative (because surprisingly, the thing ain’t perfect), I really must, must, must point how truly awesome the actual setup process is. Turn on, log in and within minutes the entire phone sucks down all your *cough* GOOGLE *cough* info; mail, contacts, calendar etc. and is up, running and totally in sync. Brilliant. Nokia – Everyone can learn a lot here.

At this point however, I believe it’s time to roll up my sleeves and get dirty…

The thing is, the G1 and I immediately got off on the wrong foot with each other because it assumes that the user (you/me/whoever), must have a GOOGLE-centric life.

Your contacts? Google.
Email? Google.
IM? Google.

As I said, a Google centric life.

Of course, this is the T-Mobile G1. The ‘G’ obviously stands for Google, which really wouldn’t be a problem if the phone had just appeared on the scene without much fanfare (yeah, like that’d happen). But it’s not the fuss that I’m moaning about, it’s the fact that it’s positioned as being ‘OPEN’ that gets me. I mean really, really gets me. OPEN?! OPEN?! Don’t make me laugh! I can’t even sign out of the bloody device without doing a full factory reset, and don’t even get me started on how such an ‘open’ device is LOCKED to T-Mobile… sigh

I digress. Imagine the scene; it’s a cold November afternoon, Ewan and I are sat in a quiet room at One Alfred Place. The show is ‘in the can’ as you say, when he turns to me with; “I’ve got one more thing for you.” Then he hands me the G1.

“I want to film it from the moment you turn it on and sign in with your Gmail credentials.”
“But dude, I don’t use my Gmail account. I send my Google Alerts there and that’s about it.”
“Ok, that’s fine. You can sign in with your Mobile Industry Review Google Group account.”
“Yeah but…”
“No, no, it’ll be fine!”
“But EWAN! I use Yahoo for my email, thanks an’all for that MIR account, but I never use it.”
“OK, fine. Then we’ll just export all of your contacts and calendar info from your Outlook, that’s easy enough.”
“Er… Alright. Let’s do that.”

This is where we come unstuck. The ‘out of the box’ experience – as no doubt the video showed – is fantastic. However, what really rubs my rhubarb is Gmail. Let’s make one thing clear. I have two Gmail accounts; one for MIR and one for me, personally. I never use either of them. Everyone always goes on about how wonderful they are, but I’ve tried – really I have – and I just can’t see the attraction. Really. Smite me G-Man, but I just don’t get it.

‘Gmail BETA’ to give it it’s full four year old name (Bored of beta? Yeah you are!) is so bad it makes me want to plunge USB keys into my eyes just to see if I’m able to find some way around their heinous contacts management system! It is atrocious!

You’ll see on the video (which you’ll just have to go and watch now I’ve referenced it three times) that once the contacts have finished sync-ing,  the first thing you see is a bunch of ‘unknowns’. This isn’t my doing. I don’t have random numbers stored in my handset kids. Oh no, you can place the blame firmly and squarely on the ‘revolutionary’ G1.

My N95 8GB and my E71 both sync perfectly with my Outlook over Mail For Exchange. WHY would I want to have a (broken) contacts management system such as the one Google provides as part of Gmail!? It’s not just me either. The BLIND LOVE shown by many a G1 owner that I’ve met is almost as bad as that of the Mac owner (you know who you are). For example, before Christmas I went to visit my ex-colleagues at the Mippin HQ offices in Fulham. Scott Beaumont, my old boss and now new G1 owner almost leapt out of his seat with excitement because he’d FINALLY managed to completely ‘de-dupe’ his entire Google contacts list which (surprise surprise) the G1 had royally messed up with its first sync.

“Look! I’ve done it! At last! It’s taken me FOUR DAYS but I finally did it!”

I nearly fell out of my chair with laughter. Just the fact that he was SO pleased, he had to scream it from the rooftops. Anyway, the point is, as simple and as (supposedly) easy it is to sign up/in into a G1 phone – if you don’t have a Google centric life, then this phone is not for you. Think about it. Think about it a lot. Then think about it again.

And on top of all that, the camera’s crap and the phone feels like a fisher-price toy.

(Sorry, not allowed to mention the hardware)

I’ll get my coat…

MIR Show – Week 44 – T-Mobile G1 Launch from Mobile Industry Review on Vimeo.

* Czech Republic
* Austria
* Netherlands
* Germany
* Poland

Have we got any readers from those countries who’re going to go and pick one up?

(via Reuters)

NewsOXY reckons they’ll be launching with T-Mobile and Sprint initially and that we’ll have a Samsung Android device this year.

Now, the problem with Samsung is definitely not the hardware. They make brilliant televisions and really smart handsets.

No. The problem with Samsung is the rubbish yet pretty operating sytems. Very good at being telephonic, very good at address books and ringtones — but not really that stimulating when it comes to the internet or ‘apps’ or any of that jazz.

So imagine the carnage when you’ve got Nokia trying their BEST to convince you to take a look at their N97, right?

You’ve got that in one hand, yeah?

And in your other hand you have Samsung’s top of the bleedin’ range 10 megapixel xenon flash handset sporting 25gb-onboard SSD hard disk full motion HD video running Android.

Both priced at 700 quid. Or free with an 18-month deal of joy.

Which one are you having?

Step into my office, Mr Samsung.

This is set to be a very interesting year.

After our posts about the HTC Tungsten the other day, we’ve heard from various knowing sources that it will most certainly be the next generation T-Mobile G2.

Just from the pictures the Tungsten looks a lot more SOLID than the pop-out-and-wobble-about G1.

Interesting.

I am, actually, quite enjoying my G1 at the moment. As long as I switch off the device and only switch it on when I want to use it. Otherwise the battery wears down pretty swiftly.

(Photo via PPC Geeks).

Carphone Warehouse is set to launch a sub £9 T-Mobile contract, according to a report on the mobile news website Mobile Today.

If and when this arrives, it will be the cheapest tariff in the UK by one penny. That’s right, 1p. Don’t knock this though, as the saying goes – if you look after the pennies, the pounds will take care of themselves. Although it will take over 8 years for those pennies to become self reliant, and reach the grand old figure of 100. So don’t put a great deal of worth in every saying you hear.

In the last moments of 2008, we brought you news of the network Three offering a £9 contract. This is accompanied by a Sony Ericsson K660i, on a mixture of 100 minutes or text messages a month. Not a bad deal, even if we do say so ourselves.

Mobile Today has it the Carphone Warehouse T-mobile deal will comprise of 100 minutes AND 100 texts a month, an even better bargain. However, they’re unsure if there’s a mobile phone thrown in for good measure on this offer. Only time will tell.

Either way, it’s great for the current climate and fantastic news.

Unless of course, you are reading this and tied to a 24 month contract that you’ve just taken out with the exact same benefits, and at twice the monthly cost. Then it’s not so fantastic news, and you’re currently cursing the screen right now.

Now back to business The INQ 1 has had a lot of coverage here on MIR, both positive and negative.  Both Ewan and Jonthan both have handsets, and thanks to the chaps at 3mobilebuzz and Trevor from the INQ 1 Blog, they have kindly sent me one to test for a month!

I am going to be covering the handset in three parts and the first one is due later on this week, I will be looking at all different aspects of the device. I am really looking forward to reviewing this phone. Sadly I am unable to use the device as my main handset, as I am not a 3 customer and my primary number is with T-Mobile UK.

If you have any questions or anything you want me to test specifically, leave a comment below or drop me an email ricky@mobileindustryreview.com

Deutsche Telekom has just entered the foray of a free portable computer, with a mobile broadband contract in tow.

They’ve now joined Orange who offered a similar deal back in August, with almost the very same netbook.

T-Mobile’s package is based around a £25 a month contract, with the Asus Eee PC 904HD thrown in gratis.

The Orange deal is at the same costing, with the exact 3GB download allowance per month. Although T-Mobile has 200 FREE texts a month, the other network has only 100.

Where they differ is in the netbooks they’re giving away. Orange’s model is a slightly older Eee PC 901 with 16GB of onboard storage, a 1.3 megapixel built in webcam all with 5-hour battery life.

The Eee PC 904HD is a newer model with the same processor, the same 1GB of RAM, same WIFI, same 8.9-inch TFT screen and the same Windows XP OS as the 901. It does however have an 80GB HDD, instead of an SSD and only a 0.3MP webcam with the same battery longevity.

T-Mobile’s mobile broadband is provided in the form of a USB dongle, whereas the Orange 901 has it embedded inside. This makes it a better deal in our opinion, as we’ve used dongles and also netbooks with it built in and preferred the latter.

We’re sure the 904HD could have it embedded too, but there is bound to be a pay off with getting it all geared up or just shipping it as it arrives from Asus direct to the shops.

See more on the T-mobile offer here, which also hints at more deals like this on the horizon as it lists two other laptops that are coming soon.

Turns out that’s not possible in Harrow. Over to Grant:

- – - – -

Hi Ewan,

Today I went out in search of a T-Mobile G1. Not to buy, but to try. After doing lots of research over Christmas I’ve *almost* decided that I want the phone, but before I do so I’d like some hands-on contact. Responsiveness is really important to me, as well as it’s ability to load my most important webpages.

I live in a North London town called Harrow. Harrow is quite big, and we have a large town-centre with lots of shops and lots of busy shoppers. T-Mobile’s shop is really well placed in a great spot in St Georges shopping centre. I got into the store and it was quite active – it seems lots of people were spending their Christmas money on new phones/tariffs. After waiting for a while I got to the front of the queue and asked if they had any T-Mobile G1 demo units. I was bowled over to hear the store assistant tell me that there weren’t.

I then went on a trek across Harrow, visiting 3 Carphone Warehouse stores (yes, they’re like fleas where I live!) and none of them could provide me with a demo unit to look at. I can forgive them mostly – the G1 is a T-Mobile branded device which is probably seen as niche as far as their customer base in concerned.

Why on earth would a T-Mobile store NOT have a G1 unit for prospective customers to use? Particularly when it’s their new, landmark device? The key to the G1 is meant to be it’s useability and you can’t demonstrate that with pretty pictures and big words. Surely getting ONE device out to each of your stores is reasonable, particularly stores in high volume areas (Harrow isn’t exactly the countryside…)? It’s not like they have to replace them, is it?

For now I’m going to be holding off – I want to make sure I’m making a self-informed handset decision. In the meantime, 3UK are likely to call me and offer me further incentive not to leave them. If they offer me a good enough handset-free deal, then I’ll take my business to them and *maybe* eBay a G1 later.

- – - – -

Grant, what a total arse.

I know just what you were expecting. You reckoned they’d have one or two on display, stuck in those cages or something like that?

I’d have put money on T-Mobile having them available to play with.

Perhaps there’s been a run on G1’s over the Christmas period? You’d expect them to have one or two around in Harrow, North London. Not exactly a remote location…

Has anyone else been out at the shops today browsing or buying?

BlackBerry Curve 8900 - T-Mobile

Deutsche Telekom arrived on the scene today with their BlackBerry 8900 offering, beating the shipping Curve by over a week.

Carphone Warehouse announced earlier on this week their 8900s will be in the shops on the December 20th, O2 said January 5th and T-Mobile will now be selling theirs on the 12th of December. Tadarrr!

This is despite the Carphone Warehouse telling Mobile Industry Review they were exclusively selling the handset, and then revising their statement to saying it’s the ‘Titanium’ version instead.

Earlier on this week we debunked their claim, as it’s the exact model being sold by O2 and now it appears that T-Mobile are selling the same version as well.

Coming along with unlimited access to RIM’s push email, with unlimited web browsing on T-Mobile’s web‘n’walk service.

The BlackBerry Curve will be free if signed up to a £35 a month contract, also known as their Flext 30 with a £5 email bolt-on. A tariff that has £140 worth of calls and texts, which can be made up of 700 mins, 1400 texts or a mixture of both.

O2 has still yet to make public their costings for the 8900 or any of the tariff pricing. Clearing showing the only reason they put out a press release on Monday was to trump the Carphone Warehouse announcement the following day, and T-Mobile’s today.

There isn’t a great deal more we can add to the handset they we haven’t already covered here, here or even here.

We haven’t heard so far from Vodafone or Orange, perhaps they can offer the handset this week, three hours before the phone was announced on a Thursday morning backin May.

BlackBerry Curve 8900 - titanium - Carphone Warehouse

The BlackBerry Curve got its launch today, not exclusively with the Carphone Warehouse as we were told by them nearly three weeks ago.

A press release arrived today from O2, around the same time CPW were announcing to the media their launch. Which they initially stated was an exclusive deal with Research In Motion on the new Curve 8900.

After we spoke to them, they were in puzzlement over the O2 announcement as a few weeks back they officially put in writing to us the BlackBerry 8900 was being solely sold with them. In fact, we were the first to tell them today it is also going to O2 as well.

It has now come to light the deal may have changed since we published those details many many weeks back.

Carphone Warehouse clarified all this by putting out a press release today informing the media they will now be selling the SIM free 8900, only with a different colour finish in ‘titanium’.

This is despite the O2 version of the phone looking exactly the same in every way shape or form as the CPW counterpart.

BlackBerry Curve 8900 - O2

We called to confirmed the image supplied by Carphone Warehouse was correct and the image supplied by O2 was also correct – both came back in the affirmative.

Even handsets they’re shelling out to the media and showed off at the launch today were the exact same ones as the O2 models; in fact the link on CPW website here just confirms all of it. Curiouser and Curiouser!

Just as we were writing this up T-Mobile has announced they’re having a press briefing this Thursday over the BlackBerry Curve 8900 arriving with them. What’s the betting the phone will look the same there too?

Also, just to make matters worse when we spoke to T-Mobile’s PR company they thought the Javelin and the Curve 8900 were two different handsets. D’oh!

O2 have said the pre-registration for the phones open up on the 10th of December, with pre-ordering kicking off from the 22nd on their website – with the handset arriving on the 5th January. All at a cost ranging from free to £234, on selected tariffs.

Whilst the Carphone Warehouse will beat them hands down, as the phone will be in their shops nationwide on December 20th, three weeks before O2 will have there’s. Although they haven’t offered up any pricing as yet, but we’ll keep you informed of those developments within time.

If you weren’t already aware, the Curve 8900 is their thinnest BlackBerry handset to date. It arrives with all the features you expect from them, whilst also being Quad-band with WIFI onboard.

It comes along with a 2.4-inch 480 x 360 pixel HVGA+ display coupled with a 3.2 megapixel camera, all weighing in at 110 grams and its dimensions measuring up to 109 x 60 x 13.5 mm. With a battery life of 5.5 hours talk time and 356 hours/15 days of standby.

Let’s hope the mess of who has what, what has who and when’s when is sorted out by the time they arrive.

We have no more details to bring, but will be able to pass more along tomorrow after the press briefing.

Just three weeks ago we brought you news that the shop will be exclusively stocking the phone, now we know with whom.

We’ll update this piece tomorrow, say tuned folks!

** UPDATE **  Its not on a T-mobile contract after all, it’s just SIM free **UPDATE **

News of the availability of the HTC Dream T-Mobile G1 Android based mobile phone has just reached us.

Sadly from the post seen here, it appears you have to be registered as a developer to obtain such wonderment. As it’s really geared up just for them and them alone, but who’s to say we aren’t all developers at heart.

We’re sure most of us have drunk our fair share of redbull in the past and stayed up to see dawn more than three days in a row. Doesn’t that qualify us all? Surely it does.

From reports it appears to have the cost attached of just $399, or around £286. With UK ordering also being available from the main site – Android Market on http://www.android.com/market/

Going under the moniker ‘Android Dev Phone 1’, it appears to all be above board and a legitimate SIM free unlocked mobile running Android 1.0. Just in case you were after such a beast and you’re still tied in to your contract for another 9 years, or something like that.

There’s more to be seen here, on what you need to do to qualify for the ADP1. Not that we’re endorsing in anyway shape or form deceiving Google *cough*

Also, you do need to sign up to become a developer here as well.

If this all seems too much bother, then it probably is.

Seeing as the deal with Nokia and Symbian is all wrapped up, done and dusted, put to bed, etc – perhaps an unlocked SIM free N97 could be obtained too.

For the purposes of development of Symbian, of course *cough* *cough*

I suspect that the battery on the G1 will make it unusable for me as a primary handset. The continual synching must really kill it. When I have been carrying it, I make a point of *switching it off* in the morning and putting it in my bag. That way, when I want to use it, it has full battery.

It is obviously not a primary phone at this point. But in order to use it as such, I needed to unlock it.

What to do?

Well, I visited www.unlock-tmobileg1.com. $44.99 was the unlock fee and they claimed to be able to unlock the G1.

Hmm.

I wasn’t so sure, you never know about some sites you find on the internet — and many times before, I’ve taken it upon myself as a Mobile Industry Review chap — or SMS Text News before then — to stump up the cash and test these things out for you.

Well, I ordered. Paid the $44.99 by PayPal.

And I waited.

At least 12 hours was the warning — it could take that long. I sat back and did some work.

I watched a few minutes of Strictly Come Dancing.

1 hour, 57 minutes later, my unlock code arrived by email.

So I ordered at 7pm, got the code at 9pm UK time.

Instructions on the email were straight forward.

I ignored them and did what I reckoned was correct: My job to play around, I thought. I took out my T-Mobile sim, put in the Vodafone SIM, and restarted the phone.

The phone started fine, finishing with this ‘SIM network unlock PIN’ screen:

‘Am I about to screw it up?’ I wondered.

I typed in the unlock code supplied and pressed UNLOCK:

I got a brief message saying ’success’. Brief enough for me to miss it and not take a photo of it.

I then saw No Service on the screen:

Uh oh.

Then the screen’s network ID went blank:

Right then. Maybe it’s worked? Has it worked? Maybe it hasn’t been hard-coded with the Vodafone network ID, I thought — so it won’t actually show up as ‘Vodafone’.

I was asked to re-type my Google Account password. I suspect that’s because I changed networks.

I ticked ‘allow international roaming’ and switched on data services in the phone’s menu, just in case that was needed.

I typed in the various Vodafone settings — the APN and so on from Filesaveas.com — and took a deep breath.

Perhaps I have to set it as default? Or so some other jiggery pokery? Maybe.

First off, let’s connect to the internet and see if it worked:

Yup.

Fast. Quick. Done.

Joy!

You know Izea? The get-paid-to-have-your-blog-post-sponsored? Typically they offer, say, $5 if you write about the latest movie on your blog. And if you write about some washing powder, they’ll give you $3.50. Or whatever the prevailing rate is being offered by the sponsoring company. Izea are the folk in the middle and they have oft come in for a bit of flack from some corners of the web because they are basically paying for content. They don’t influence the actual editorial opinion but they are the reason that many bloggers originate that editorial. If you post an Izea sponsored-blog-post, you are required to declare it as such at the top and bottom of the copy.

I think this kind of marketing has a place in the industry. I don’t think a lot of the $1.50 offers are ‘worth it’ but if you’re blogging away diligently with a generalised blog, you can earn quite a bit if it all adds up.

Where I really see the relevance of the likes of Izea is with this idea they’ve dreamed up with US shopping chain, Kmart. It’s genius. Forget the willy-nilly $1.50s. Kmart offered a $500 gift card to be spent in-store to some of the US Izea registered-bloggers.

Have a look at the newsletter about it:

I clicked through on to Chris Brogan’s Dadomatic site and read his experience. He had a wicked time. He took his kids and bought a ton of cool stuff. Likewise with Julia Roy and 1938 Media’s Jeremy Schoemaker.

I’m rather impressed with the concept. The blogger gets $500 to spend and some good copy to write (“And then I bought..”) and the readers of the blogs get to sit and think about what they’d do with $500… and if they’re up for it, talk to Kmart, via Izea, and do their own post.

This would be a total arse for the likes of Kmart to administer themselves — so there’s a clear reason for having Izea in the middle, managing it all.

Which got me thinking.

Could UK mobile operators adopt this sort of approach? I used T-Mobile as an example in the title of this post, but I wonder. Which mobile operator would you like to get £500 to spend with?

And how would you manifest that ’spend’?

You could blow it all on one Nokia handset. Or you could get yourself a dongle, a PAYG Nokia, a PAYG Samsung, some accessories, some speakers, a memory card and a spare charger.

Perhaps mobile operators don’t lend themselves to this kind of arrangement? Clearly at the likes of Kmart, you’ve got tons of possible items to buy — DVDs, clothing and so on. If I was standing in the 3UK store, what could I buy for £500?

Well. It’d still be fun. I could buy a contract for a year. I would definitely get myself an INQ1 (in the shops today). In fact, I’d maybe get two. A bluetooth headset perhaps. Aaaand what else? Hmm.

Wandering out of a blizzard is the latest version of the Android based mobile to appear, now in the colour of white from T-mobile’s online store.

As it’s been around in black now for a while and since they’re dealing with ‘negative’ press coverage all the time, why not produce a negative colour version.

The handset that will be now lost in the snow comes at the exact same specifications as before, with no difference apart from the colouring.

The screen is still at an annoying angle when you’re typing from the keyboard, meaning you have to tilt your head slightly to get in alignment. Yes, we’ve actually seen people do this – it looks much akin to a dog recognising its name.

Its keypad is still a large block, where you have to curl the palm of your hand around to type on the keyboard. Or reach over that unsightly block, both of which causes a hunched shoulder. We’ve also witnessed people do this too just so they can type, it all looks very weird.

In a generations time you’ll be able to spot the people that first used the G1, as their head will be permanently be at an angle from typing and they’ll all have a semi-Quasimodo stance.

The phone is around from now in white and black from T-mobile, enjoy.

** UPDATE**

It’s been confirmed that T-Mobile had their wired crossed yesterday after all.

The albino handset has JUST gone on sale in the US of A, and not the UK.

A T-Mobile spokesperson dropped us a line late yesterday, after the fault was officially confirmed/rectified.

It’s always good to uncross the wires that were crossed, now can T-Mobile and HTC fix everything else wrong with the handset

Will the networks be recaulating bills in regards to the drop automatically from the 1st of December? I certaintly will be contacting by network operator (T-Mobile) to ensure that the changes are reflected in my bill.

I know the savings will only be a few pence however in these hard times every penny is essential!

Have the networks planned for the situation?  We shall be finding out soon!

Hitting the stores this week is T-Mobile’s answer to 3’s wireless broadband mobile router, the mouth full that is the Mobile Broadband Share Dock

It works the same way as 3’s Huawei D100 Router, only with a less catchy name. The Share Dock plugs into their mobile broadband dongle, then enables surrounding devices to have ‘net access over its WIFI signal.

Seeing as the T-mobile HSDPA network is shared by 3, you’d have thought this product would have been out there first. The D100 has now had over a month or so advantage to gain its foothold in the marketplace.

How they both balance against each other in costs is of an interest. The T-Mobile offering arrives free on an 18 month contract, at £20 per month for connectivity.

On the 3 offering you have to buy the router at £69.99. On top of that still having to get the mobile broadband dongle plus whatever contract suits your needs. T-mobile bundles in with the Mobile Broadband Share Dock their dongle, creating a more rounded package.

The other consideration to take into mind is their fair usage policy. T-mobile has stipulated it will only be a 3GB data allowance, where 3 have a 5GB on a £15 18 month contract to match their D100.

All told over that 18 month period 3’s deal would come to £340, whereas T-mobiles package would be £360. With 3 of course there would have been an extra 36GB possible data allowance all totalled up.

Seeing as they are both using the same network, the clear winner has to come down to the numbers at the end of the day.

Got a moment?

I’ve got a Youtube video for you. Here’s the first screen:

If you’ve got a moment, watch the full vid…

Over The Air (“OTA”) update of the T-Mobile UK G1 from Mobile Industry Review on Vimeo.

Research firm iSuppli has it the G1 costs just $144 to build, where it’s selling for $179 in the states.

All the materials and components used just add up to a meagre amount, a lot lower than we would expect in terms of the profitability normally associated with handsets.

The HTC manufactured device, minus the software, research and development has the analysis worked out on the physical examination of the phone.

Although they admitted hadn’t yet taken apart the phone for a complete breakdown on all the components inside, which does include the processor and modem core designed by ARM.

iSuppli had factored in though the display, camera, the radio functions which included the HSDPA part of it all.

They went on to state it lacks the “wow factor” of other handsets such as the iPhone, which we concur.

What they do believe is that the integration with Google’s services, plus their apps could be a major advantage of the G1.

Let’s see if they re-evaluate the report with a more thorough investigation, but it’s interesting still to say the least. More can be read on the report here -http://www.isuppli.com/MarketWatchDetail.aspx?ID=309.

We’re just wondering, out of interest what the cost would have been if the G1 were to have run Windows Mobile instead and if a calculator could ever produce a figure that high.

- – - – -

Dear Ewan

My partner recently got a T-Mobile USB HSDPA dongle for his Windows laptop.

I tried the Mac software for this on my Macbook (one of the latest models before they went metal again) but it keeps crashing.

I really want to get one, but canI stop it crashing or are there any alternatives?

Thanks in advance.

Rachel

- – - – -

Well Rachel.. interesting. I actually ended up using the software that came with my 3 USB dongle to power both that and the Vodafone one — I had a similar issue.

Has anyone got some suggestions for Rachel?