Nokia has launched Messaging.nokia.com , a new portal site for all their messaging software ambitions. From email to social networks to IM, this should be the place to come to pick up latest news. There's a blog to subscribe to as well. Now all they've got to do is (ahem) finish the software itself!
Two weeks after Nokia announced that their N-Gage system was to be closed and the titles merged into Ovi Store, N-Gage old-hand Ewan delivers his verdict, looking at what Nokia did wrong, from support to marketing to community. More worryingly, Ewan also worries that similar errors might be being made with Nokia's other Software and Services.
Started in 2006 by Omar Hamoui, Admob has grown to be one of the leading platforms for advertising to mobile websites. And now it belongs to Google. In a move that costs the Mountain View company some $750 million, they now have acquired a company that is both profitable and has a significant share of the mobile advertising market. The benefits to Google are pretty clear, especially as their advertising operations is one of their key income streams.
Nokia have announced a product recall of around 14 million AC chargers for their phones. The products affected are the AC-3E, AC-3U and AC-4U models, built within a certain time-frame. The potential fault would see the plastic casing working loose and separating, exposing potentially live wiring inside. Full details on the affected units and how to obtain a free replacement can be found at chargerexchange.nokia.com.
With Skype's native Symbian incarnation still somewhat AWOL, it's interesting to see that Nimbuzz has stepped into the breach with their own pay-as-you-go VoIP to traditional number service, dubbed NimbuzzOut. More details and links below.
The Register has been taking a close look at the Nokia N86 8MP, concluding "Sure, it won’t shake up the smartphone market. But, bringing 8Mp camerawork to the Nokia range for the first time, the N86 is another heavyweight addition to the Nseries line-up." It seems they didn't spot the variable aperture or true digital zoom in video recording, mind you, but they still liked it overall, just as the N86 won a place in our hearts.
We've never reviewed the Nokia N97 fully here on AAS, mainly because we knew the v20 upgrade was on its way. And now that it's here, with the N97 distinctly nicer to use, along comes a sister device, the N97 mini that impresses by improving in almost every are, making the original N97 still hard to fully recommend. In a multi-part review series, I look at both N97 variants in detail. In part 1, I look at form factor, design, build quality and performance. Parts 2 and 3 will cover applications/usability and camera/multimedia.
In All About Symbian Insight 93 (AAS Podcast 157) we discuss the Q3 smartphone figures from Canalys and Rafe explains that Fujitsu and Quic have joined the board of the Symbian Foundation. We move on to a retrospective of SEE 2009 with discussion of the media reaction (which send Rafe into rant mode). We finish with thoughts on N97 PR 2.0 and the closure of N-Gage (sniff). You can listen to AAS Insight 93 here or, if you wish to subscribe, here's the RSS feed.
SEE 2009 (Symbian Exchange and Exposium) is Symbian's annual big show. In the video below you can join me on a walkabout around the show floor at SEE 2009. I share my impressions and analysis in an unscripted, one-take, walk and talk. As well as covering many of the Symbian related consultancy and developer tool companies there's also a quick look at the Nokia, Sony Ericsson and Samsung stands.
As we posted earlier this week, Opera has released Opera Mobile 10 in beta form, a full S60-native alternative web browser to the S60 Webkit version. Ewan's been trying it out on some of his favourite sites and here's his illustrated review. Comments welcome. He'll be revisiting Opera Mobile 10 when the app finally comes out of beta.
The third party community support site, GetSatisfaction, is fairly well known. It transpires that there's now an official (as in manned by Symbian employees) Symbian sub-community here, hopefully worth bookmarking should you 'need to ask that awkward question'.... Early days, of course, so the numbers are small but I'm sure it will grow.
Yes, a full retail Nokia N97 mini is at AAS Towers and I'm currently scribbling away on the ol' parchment to bring you a full review for next week. Just to wet your appetite though, here's my detailed N97 mini image gallery, with comments by Rafe and myself. With slimmer form factor and higher use of metal, I'd sum up my impressions of the device after a day as 'feels like the N97 that the Eseries team would have come up with'. More, much more to come next week.
On Tuesday evening, I took part in a Nokia first - bloggers from round the world were invited to a (virtual) meet with the people behind a device's firmware, in this case Frank Zillikens, the Lead Firmware Developer, and Catalin Gheorghiu, a member of the technical team responsible for the recent firmware upgrade, both for the huge v20 update for the Nokia N97. Clinton Jeff, also attending, has taken the time to produce a nice summary of the questions and answers. Note that more questions were actually asked and that Nokia said they'd get back to us with answers in due course.
Forum Nokia Kevin Sharp has produced a nice summary of Nokia's plans for Ovi Maps in terms of in-building navigation (think malls, airports, etc.), collating material from several recent events, much of it from Michael Halbherr, VP of Social Location. It's a good read, although the paragraph about Nokia collecting 'cell learning' data from our phones gave my privacy nerve a little prod. Comments welcome if you can expand on what Nokia is (or isn't) doing here!
Canalys' Q3 worldwide smartphone sales figures have been published. Headline figures are that the entire smartphone market grew by 4% year on year, with Nokia's S60 smartphone sales growing by 6% year on year and with their world market share now also up to 40%. RIM are in second place worldwide, with 21% (and impressive 40% year on year sales growth) and Apple are in third place with their iPhone with 18% (6.7% year on year sales growth). Down in marketshare are HTC and 'others'. However HTC's figures hides an increase in Android shipment and a decrease in Windows Mobile shipments.
