Author: Stuart Dredge
Korea/Japan Week: Day Two Roundup
Right now, I’m sitting in a Tokyo hotel room, trying to make sense of all the new mobile stuff I saw in Korea, to clear my brain for a day of futuristic Japanese phones tomorrow. With jetlag. It’s all going a bit fuzzy round the edges.
To wrap up the posts from Korea though. A visit to LG’s demo centre threw up lots of interesting stories. The company’s concept Rolex handset was intriguing, while the revelation that every UK operator will be selling the LG Viewty made me wonder how O2 will price it compared to the iPhone.
LG 'Corona' K520 Windows Mobile smartphone: "Like the Prada, but with more features…"
It was a frustrating experience nosing around LG’s mobile demo room in its Seoul office today. There were loads of new phones sprinkled around the room, but no photographs were allowed. You’ll have to excuse the image-free nature of this post, in other words.
Pick of the bunch was the new K520 handset, which is currently codenamed ‘Corona’ (although this isn’t final apparently). It’s a smartphone running the Windows Mobile 6 operating system, with a full 2.8-inch touchscreen, two-megapixel camera, Wi-Fi and push-email.
“It looks like the Prada, but with more features in it,” said the guide…
Korea/Japan Week: Five ways RFID is being used in mobile phones
If there’s one thing I want to see in Korea and Japan, it’s people slapping their mobile phones down and Doing Stuff with them. You know, paying for shopping, getting cans out of vending machines. That kind of thing. A visit to Korean operator SK Telecom’s demo centre yesterday didn’t disappoint.
They were showing some of the applications for RFID technology, and it made for an interesting selection. Starting with…
1. RFID Banking (left). Go up to an ATM, hold your phone against the special sensor, and receive cash and/or a statement without a debit card in sight. Apparently more than one million people are using the service in Korea now, paying a monthly fee for it.
Korea/Japan Week: LG’s concept NYX phone with a jog-wheel
At the end of my visit to the LG Demo Centre, they showed a quick presentation of another concept phone, called NYX. It has the slogan ‘Display Only Card Phone’, although that could be a way of saying ‘not for sale concept device’ I guess.
Anyway, it’s interesting, with a three-inch touchscreen and five-megapixel camera, and a big jog-wheel on the back of the device, which is used for everything from zooming while taking photos to altering the volume when listening to music.
Korea/Japan Week: LG reveals concept Rolex mobile phone
You’ll have to trust me on this one, as I wasn’t allowed to take photographs inside LG’s mobile demonstration room. But one wall has a display of concept mobile phones, including a model that’s basically a phone with a Rolex watch-face embedded in the casing.
It’s unclear whether LG and Rolex are actively working together on the watch, or whether it’s just an LG designer’s idea of how such a phone could look if they were. Rolex buffs would certainly approve – the phone had a luxurious leathery exterior, and looked reassuringly expensive.
LG Viewty: UK operators confirmed (including O2, despite iPhone)
O2 might have signed an exclusive deal to sell Apple’s iPhone in the UK, but the operator appears to be hedging its bets by also signing up to sell LG’s Viewty – one of the iPhone’s fiercest rivals.
However, O2 won’t be the only UK operator selling the Viewty – they all will. That’s what I found out during a visit to LG’s Seoul demo centre today, anyway. Besides giving a hands-on demo of the Viewty, LG said that it’ll be sold through Vodafone, O2, Orange, T-Mobile and 3 in Europe, and showed a model that was branded as O2.
Korea/Japan Week: Day One Roundup
Today I’ve posted about ten cool things on show at Samsung’s Anycall store, shot a video of its fun touchscreen-based phone recommender, and wondered why removable fascias are enjoying a new lease of life.
I’ve also looked at the problems of DMB mobile digital TV here in Korea, heard that video-calling is just as unpopular as in the West, discovered how you can feed your pet dog or cat via mobile, and shivered at the prospect of The Victim, a musical seemingly influenced by survival horror games like Silent Hill and Manhunt.
Korea/Japan Week: The problem with DMB mobile digital TV…
Us Westerners know that South Korea is ahead of us in terms of mobile technology, but we often assume that everything that’s launched there is successful, simply because it’s innovative. It appears that’s not always the case though, with DMB a prime example.
It’s digital mobile TV, comparable to having a Freeview or Sky receiver in your mobile phone in the UK, rather than watching streaming TV over your 3G connection. S-DMB (satellite) and T-DMB (terrestrial) have been available in Korea since 2005, but both have encountered problems which are less to do with the technology, and more to do with how they actually make money.
Korea/Japan Week: Manhunt The Musical?!
Why isn’t Andrew Lloyd-Webber writing musicals about serial killers stalking and killing people in a gruesome way? The heady mix of slaughter and showtunes would pack in the crowds. Possibly.
That’s what came to mind when I spotted this poster for a South Korean musical called The Victim. Judging by the poster, it’s more than a little influenced by games like Manhunt and Silent Hill. Survival horror hits the stage? Sounds like a good idea to me.
Korea/Japan Week: Feed your dog or cat via mobile phone
I had a nose around Korean mobile operator SK Telecom’s demo centre today, where it was showing off its latest mobile services. Most were serious, but there was the odd bit of quirky tech too, such as this Pet Care service.
Basically, it’s an automatic food dispenser, which pops out biscuits for your cat or dog to munch on, while you’re on holiday or away from the house. But here’s the fun part: you control it by mobile phone.
