Author: Duncan Geere
Samsung announces Tocco Lite
Samsung’s Tocco did rather well last year, but its touchscreen interface hasn’t been a hit with absolutely everyone. Since then, though, it’s released the Tocco Pro and today it’s launching the Tocco Lite in an attempt to widen the market that give it a try.
The Lite is very much just a downgrade of the original handset. For starters, there’s no mention of 3G connectivity, which in 2009 is rather surprising. The 5-megapixel camera has been downgraded to 3.2-megapixel, and the onboard memory is now just 50MB. That’s still upgradable via an SD card to 8GB.
Alongside the spec decrease, the price will have gone down too. But Samsung hasn’t told us how much that’ll be just yet. I’ve emailed them. If they let me know, then you can bet your bottom dollar I’ll tell you, too.
Samsung Mobile
Twitter is just a passing fad, claims research
Research from Nielsen Online suggests that Twitter might have problems with ‘stickiness’ – with retaining users that give it a try. Its statistics suggest that more than 60% of Twitter users fail to return a month of using it.
In fact for most of the past twelve months, Twitter has had difficulty keeping more than 30% of its users after a month, though the entry of Oprah Winfrey has helped. Facebook and MySpace, before their explosive growth periods, had nearly double the retention rates that Twitter currently faces.
What would be interesting to see would be how many people come back later on. It’s been my experience of the site that people sign up and bag their name, then ignore it until lots of their friends are using it, at which time they return.
Still, it’s worrying news for the site which needs to start crossing over sooner, rather than later. Intense media coverage in the UK has helped, but it’s still not obvious to many new Tweeters how the site works, or its Twittiquette.
(via Nielsen Wire)
Nintendo DSi vs Sony PSP Go!
This morning we got some details on the the Sony PSP2, which they now seem to be calling the “PSP Go!”. I thought it’d be interesting to compare and contrast it with the Nintendo DSi, which is by far Sony’s greatest competition in the handheld market.
Storage
Sony’s completely dumping the UMD format, after it’s been such a massive flop. The new PSP will instead have plenty of storage onboard – 16GB or 8GB, and let you download content to the device over the air.
The DSi still relies on cartridges, though I suspect that’s for backwards compatibility more than anything else. The latest version of the handheld lets you download content over-the-air as well, and you can store the content on an SD card upto 16GB.
Game Catalogue
For the PSP Go! there’ll be 100 titles available at launch, including Gran Turismo. Any games you own for your PSP won’t work, as the UMD format won’t be supported. All DS games are still compatible with the DSi, though there’s far fewer titles available in Nintendo’s download store.
Controls
While the DSi’s much touted touchscreen has proved a bit of a headache for some games developers, others have used it fantastically. There’s no word yet on whether the PSP Go! will have a touchscreen but it will have an analog stick, a feature sadly missing from Ninty’s handheld.
Size and shape
We don’t know how big the PSP Go! will be, yet, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s rather more compact than the rather chunky original PSP. What we do know is that the slide-out screen will definitely be present.
The DSi, on the other hand, is a svelte 137mm x 74.9mm x 18.9mm and 214g. It folds in half like a book, and can easily be slipped into a coat pocket. Portability is obviously an important factor for these devices.
Release date
The DSi came out on April 3rd 2009 in Europe, and in November 2008 in Japan. The PSP Go! won’t be out until the last quarter of 2009, i.e. not before October. It’ll be shown off at E3 in June, though, so we should get some pictures of it soon that we can use in place of all the concept art that we’ve been employing up till now.
Conclusions
The most important things for Sony to get right are the look of the thing, and the game catalogue available. It’d be a good move for them to implement a system where you can get your old games on download when the PSP Go! is released, otherwise I think there’ll be a certain amount of consumer backlash.
As for me, though, I’m sticking with my DS Lite. I don’t feel the push, just yet, to switch to downloadable games – particularly as backing them up seems to be an issue. When the next generation of devices comes round, I’ll be ready.
4chan founder named as "World's Most Influential Person"
Each year for the last three years, TIME Magazine has run an internet poll to find the “World’s Most Influential Person”. This year, the winner is moot – a 21-year-old student whose grandmother calls him Christopher Poole. He’s the founder of 4chan.org – the world’s second biggest, but certainly silliest, message boards.
Since 2003, when the site launched, it’s brought Lolcats, Chocolate Rain and Rickrolling into the mainstream. More impressive is its traffic, though – the site gets 5.6 million unique users a month and one sub-board sees 150-200,000 posts a day.
Although TIME’s web team was forced to act against several attempts to hack the vote, moot recieved 16,794,368 legitimate votes. Although he might not seem the obvious choice for World’s Most Influential Person, nor do previous winners – Nintendo’s Shigeru Miyamoto in 2007 and Korean pop phenomenon Rain in 2006.
TIME.com managing editor Josh Tyrangiel said: “I would remind anyone who doubts the results that this is an Internet poll. Doubting the results is kind of the point.”
(via TIME)
Sky launching 'green button' on-demand ads
In an attempt to charge their advertisers more for their content without pissing off viewers too much, Sky is launching a ‘green button’ service for advertising. Much like the red button service that lets people find out more information about a program, the green button will enable ‘extended advertising content’.
Advertisers will be able to encourage users to press the green button during a trail, and it’ll take them to a location where they’ll be able to find out more, or watch an extended version of the advert. It could even feature entirely new footage.
Warner Brothers will be trialling the new technology for the upcoming release of Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, and a campaign for T-Mobile will also be live from launch.
But why would anyone ever use it? Except in a few cases, like the Superbowl, most people regard adverts as a necessary evil to get the content they want. Unless companies used this service very imaginatively, then I can’t see viewers really getting too excited about this one.
(via Brandrepublic)
Microsoft launches Vine – Twitter for emergencies
Microsoft has a new software product called Vine that it’s beta testing with a small group of users in Seattle. It’s a location-aware social networking app that lets people share information in emergencies. As a result, the focus is on ease-of-use and robustness of the network in tough conditions.
The Windows-only program sits on your desktop and gathers data from local news sources and other users. You can post short ‘alerts’ or longer ‘reports’ to it via SMS and email, and it integrates with Facebook. Soon it’ll integrate with Twitter, too.
Emergency management officials are reportedly very excited about having a new tool to inform people in disaster situations, but Microsoft also says it could be used by football teams or schools to notify of closures or schedule changes.
If you live in Seattle and want to help Microsoft beta test it, then you can sign up at http://www.vine.net. If not, sit tight and with any luck it’ll be available in the UK within the next couple of years.
Vine (via Mashable)
Nokia 5800 Star Trek edition beams down
It’s a handset, Jim, but not as we know it. Nokia are releasing a limited edition version of the 5800 ‘Tube’ with Star Trek branding all over it, to coincide with the release of J.J. Abrahms’ Star Trek movie.
Available exclusively from Phones 4U stores, the handset will include four special animated screensavers, three wallpapers, eight ringtones, including ‘red alert’ and ‘phazer shot’, and there’s also a special ‘Phazer’ application.
It’ll come in blue, red and black/silver, and will be free on £25/month contracts from May 1st. No word on how much they’ll be charging for Data, or whether it’ll have N-Gage functionality. Beam me up, Nokkie.
Android 1.5 to hit G1 owners in May
T-Mobile G1 owners yearning for an onscreen keyboard, video recording and Latitude for Google Maps need yearn no longer. Well, not much longer anyway. Android 1.5, better known as ‘Cupcake’, will be hitting handsets in May.
T-Mobile has sold 100,000 G1 handsets since its launch in October, six months ago. That might not seem like much compared to the iPhones dominance of the smartphone sector, but it’s not bad for a completely new OS, brand and device. It’s T-Mobile’s most popular handset, too.
The Cupcake update will be delivered over-the-air to phones, so you won’t have to do anything except maybe hit ‘yes’ once or twice. The onscreen keyboard should help ease complaints that you have to flip out the QWERTY to enter even small bits of text.
T-Mobile has also announced that it’ll be releasing a second Android handset in 2009. This isn’t the G2, or the HTC Magic, which is coming out on Vodafone and will be available this weekend to people who’ve preordered.
No, it’ll be completely new device. A device that we know absolutely nothing about – because T-Mobile won’t tell us anything. Damn them. When we find out, we’ll let you know.
T-Mobile
Home Office accused of Phorm collusion
The UK Home Office has been accused of being in bed with Phorm after emails have come to light that show the government asking if the ad-targeting firm would be “comforted” by its position.
The Home Office appears to have been in discussion with the company over the advice it was drawing up for the public in relation to targeted advertising, though it has denied that it has provided “any advice to Phorm directly relating to possible criminal liability for the operation of their advertising platform in the UK”.
The emails, which were obtained by a member of the public following a freedom of information request, show Phorm repeatedly asking the department if it “has no objection to the marketing and operation of the Phorm product in the UK”.
Liberal Democrat spokeswoman on Home Affairs, Baroness Sue Miller, said:
“My jaw dropped when I saw the Freedom of Information exchanges. The fact the Home Office asks the very company they are worried is actually falling outside the laws whether the draft interpretation of the law is correct is completely bizarre.”
Meanwhile, the company has launched a website – http://www.stopphoulplay.com/ – which it says aims to stop the misinformation surrounding the technology.
Phorm (via BBC)
Is Apple launching a low-end iPhone and tablet PC?
If rumours are to be believed, then Apple will be launching an “iPhone lite” and a “media pad” this summer. People “familiar with the matter” have been yapping away to BusinessWeek, and let slip that the new devices might coincide with the release of iPhone OS 3.0.
One device is a smaller, cheaper, iPhone that’ll allow users to make calls and send texts, but probably cut back on other features like GPS and the camera. The other is a tiny tablet PC, smaller than a Kindle, that would allow owners to view HD video and listen to music. It would also be able to place calls over Wi-Fi.
The rumour has arisen due to Apple’s ongoing talks with Verizon, a US phone network. The company would be the distributors of the devices, if they come through to reality.
(via Ars Technica)
