Tag: mobile web
Virgin Mobile intros 30p-a-day mobile web tariff
Virgin Mobile has decided that its customers deserve cheaper access to the mobile Internet and has introduced a new tariff for moderate daily surfing.
The “Casual User” tariff, available to both contract and pre-pay customers, costs 30p per day and has a 25MB daily limit (we hope that it’s megabytes, though the press release implies megabits).
This, Virgin claims, is up to three times cheaper than most other networks. In an attempt to prove that, a lengthy and boring comparison chart has been published. I’m not going to mess about drawing you a table of figures, because you’re all more than capable of checking out the competition yourself. Suffice it to say, the deal seems pretty average. Heavy mobile Net users would probably be better off with a higher bandwidth or “unlimited with fair use” tariff, but for those just checking Facebook and a few sport and weather pages, it should suffice.
Apple to be sued over iPhone web browser because it makes pages smaller
Hey look, it’s another lawsuit! This time, EMG Technology LLC (a company of one) is suing the iPhone manufacturer because it allegedly infringes a patent for the way that it displays web sites on the mobile’s screen.
It’s not entirely clear what Apple is supposed to have infringed, because the iPhone’s web browser is based on Safari (which has been available on the Mac for years), and effectively displays a scaled-down version of each web page (sans Flash and Java, of course) which can then be manipulated by the user using the multi-touch interface.
If anything, the mobile version of Safari appears to do very little to the original web page — that’s the whole point and it’s what Apple has been banging on about since the iPhone was launched. It’s other mobile phone manufacturers that are more likely to have browsers that manipulate the page in order to make it more readable on their tiny screens…
iPhone won't run Flash or Java: is it a complete Web experience?
Apple has already made it clear that the Safari browser built in to the iPhone won’t run the Flash plug-in. Now it’s also been noted that it won’t run Java applications, either.
Because of these two omissions, Mobile Business magazine has weighed in and claimed that the iPhone won’t run the full Web.
They claim that Flash and Java are “near essential” applications – and I’ll own up and say that I’ve said similar about Flash. I’m not a huge fan of Flash, because it does its best to slow down even the most modern PC’s CPU, but I recognise that it has become a standard for a number of web applications.
Java, too, is a pain. The only Java I like is the hot, steaming variety that comes from my coffee percolator each morning. The other Java is – well – hot and steaming might describe it, but it ain’t coffee.
