Mobile Insight Vol: 8 Issue 346 December 18th 2006
BT's UMA service goes WiFi
BT has
snuck the news out that its 'Fusion' service has gone Wi-Fi inside its latest financial results. BT Fusion WiFi for Business is aimed at SMEs not consumers at present.
Basically this is the 'converged' service which most observers thought BT should have offered initially – rather than going with a Bluetooth version based on UMA (Unlicensed Mobile Access).
The service will be made available via the Nokia 6136 and Motorola A910 handsets with Samsung’s P200 to follow in January [2007].
The tariffs are intended to be highly competitive (for the UK): - 5 pence for all UK fixed line calls; 15 pence for calls to BT mobiles or 25 pence for calls to other UK mobiles. Each call can last for up to an hour.
These charges apply when the user is in his or her office or – using the WiFi connexion to make calls via BT's OpenZone wireless hotspots.
Given that most users will also be using their handsets to surf or access email, BT is even throwing in 20 MB per month worth of GPRS data access for free.
It also wants to tempt potential customers to sign up for its One Plan offering which offers a fixed line connexion plus broadband and mobile access.
BT claims that its BT Business division already services 1.1 million UK SMEs.
Mobile Insight isn't sure how on Earth BT claims that, "This is the UK’s first converged fixed-mobile service for small businesses that uses Wi-Fi technology."
It's not clear when consumers will be able to purchase it.
A system which will enable network operators to disable the camera function inside mobile handsets has been installed by leading operators in both Europe and North America.
The software is being supplied to both operators and leading telecoms integrators by software house, Mformation. Clients already include Telefonica, Vodafone, T-Mobile, Cingular and Rogers.
Basically, the system can turn off (or turn on) any application which runs inside the handset. This includes the camera function as well as picture messaging (MMS), Bluetooth and WiFi.
One major benefit for an organisation where photos snatched by a cameraphone can be commercially dangerous, is that regular employees will no longer have to surrender their handsets on entering a building.
The mobile network will sense the employee's location and then temporarily disable the camera's functionality via an OTA (Over-The-Air) message.
The reverse is also true. Corporations will wish to enable (and correctly configure) the WiFi capability within cellular handsets. So – once inside a building – an employee's handset can automatically be switched to VoIP rather than a regular cellular call.
The software can drill deep into a handset's capabilities – even going as far as blocking certain kinds of content. Normally, this function would be used to block users from downloading games onto their work handsets.
But it could conceivably extend so far as blocking employees from downloading the latest cricket scores – so that they don't waste valuable company time.
The full Mobile story ... Cameraphones disabled over the air
According to a report in the Sydney Morning Herald, Apple’s Steve Jobs
was expected to announce the release of the phone at January's MacWorld Expo.
However, Ittai Kidron, an analyst with CIBC World Markets now thinks that
unlikely. Kidron believed the timing of Apple's iPhone commercial launch is
around late Q1 2007 or early Q2 2007. He believes that for some reason, Apple
has decided to delay the release of the product. Could this be related to the
fact that the company's trademark of the iPhone name - as previously reported -
isn't fully secured?
In a Bizarre attempt to raise funds for the UK's Shelter charity over Xmas, BT has used text-to-speech technology to record a version of ancient Kinks' classic, 'You Really Got Me'.
The voice sampled to produce the track for BT's 'Text Aid' is, however, Tom Baker's. He's best known for his role as Dr Who although he now narrates Little Britain.
The actual conversion is supplied by Nuance Communications' RealSpeak. But the real reason for using Tom Baker is to popularise BT's text messaging to landline service.
So a text message sent to a fixed telephone line number will be read out to the recipient with Tom Baker's voice.
Those of a masochistic nature might want to buy the Kinky track from eMusic or iTunes.
It seems that music channel supremo, MTV Networks, has finally woken up to the fact that its audience increase watches the mobile phone screen rather than the TV screen.
According to the FT, it has decided to form a new division – the Mobile Media group – to capitalise on its content and brands.
"Connecting with our consumers on every platform they love is at the heart of our digital strategy," claimed Judy McGrath, CEO with MTV Networks.
MTV Networks says it is already the leading supplier of video content to mobile phone carriers – publishing more than 600 clips and 30 hours per month in the USA.
The company is apparently most excited by a new service, Mobile Junk 20, that it has launched in conjunction with cdmaOne operator, Sprint.
This service enables Sprint subscribers to upload, rate and share all the off-the-wall videos that they create using their mobile phones.. They can also vote for their favourite clips, which will be broadcast on the company's networks – MTV and VH1.
To get the VH1 Mobile Junk service simply text the word 'JUNK' to 2323.
A service which claims to be the world's first free mobile video sharing service, Moblr, has just been launched in the UK.
Obviously aiming to be the YouTube of the mobile world, Moblr has been put together by WAP and SMS specialist, Kiboo.
Mobile Insight can confirm that it's entirely feasible to sign up for Moblr using nothing but a mobile handset – similar services require subscribers to join via a PC based Internet session.
The company claims it is possible to upload a handset generated video via the browser as well as via MMS (picture messaging) or email. It also claims to be able to accept videos in all popular formats.
The service certainly does appear to work – although the pages look too small if the handset is using its built-in HTML browser rather than a WAP browser.
It remains to be seen if Moblr can build up a sufficient following to establish itself. It can't help that the site's name leaves itself wide open to misspelling.
Some sort of mobile security product will be installed on almost 8 per cent (
circa 250 million) of mobile phones by 2011, according to a new report released
by Juniper Research. Given that mobile handsets out-shipped PCs by nearly five
to one in 2006, they're far more likely to be stolen or lost. So criminal
elements are increasingly turning their attention towards mobile phones. The
security threat doesn't just cover mobile viruses and malware but of identity
theft, too. The report – entitled - Mobile Data Security: Access, Content,
Identity & Threat Management, 2006 to 2011 - forecasts that nearly 4 per cent of
mobile phones will be stolen annually by 2011. It predicts the biggest mobile
security market sector will be in the secure mobile content sector (anti-virus,
anti-spam, anti-spyware and content filtering) with 40 per cent of the total market.
Alan Goode, the report's author commented, "Initially driven by the data hungry mobile business user who has seen the benefits of data services such as email, predominantly on their Blackberry devices, we will see mobile security products go mainstream by Q4 2008/Q1 2009."
Revenues from mobile data and mobile file encryption products are expected to
outstrip the PC market by 2011.
Discussions are underway to enable mobile phones running Qualcomm's Brew environment to interact with Microsoft's Xbox consoles connecting over broadband.
The news leaked out at the launch of Qualcomm's first major European customer for Brew – Italy's TIM (Telecom Italia Mobile). TIM said that an Xbox to Brew phone capability should be operational by Q4 2007.
TIM might be a little optimistic revealed Qualcomm Europe's business development director, Anthony Sheehan. Initially players from both platforms will be able register their respective high scores on the same web site.
It might take a little longer for a true interactive multiplayer game to take place where one player is on a 3G phone and the other on a broadband Xbox.
Nonetheless he confirmed Qualcomm is talking to the Beast of Redmond about just such a possibility.
Sheehan also dispelled the popular notion that Brew can only be run on handsets based around Qualcomm's own handset chips. On Verizon in the USA, Brew is being run on certain Nokia handsets.
Obviously other European operators would embrace Brew wholeheartedly if it could run on all leading handsets. Today's launch of Brew by TIM involved only two handsets.
The N5050 from Onda and the Z630 from Samsung were the two involved. Mobile
Insight has captured an N5050 and hopefully should soon be able to report which Chinese manufacturer supplies Onda with its handsets.
Sheehan hinted that Nokia would only probably consider offering Brew on its handsets in Europe once it was convinced that new versions of Brew would appear simultaneously for Qualcomm and non-Qualcomm based handsets.
At the launch, the 3D games which Brew facilitates to run on 3G phones definitely looked like the Dog's Bees.
Yet more speculation that the UK arm of Hutchison's 3 network is up for sale in the Mail on Sunday. This time a financier and China Mobile get a mention.
The newspaper reckons that corporate financier, Simon Holden of Goldman Sachs,
has been touting the business for around £6 billion to the usual suspects –
T-Mobile and O2 (a Mobile Insight previous hot tip).
Now we've got China Mobile – the world's largest mobile network operator in terms of customers – in the frame too, apparently.
But hang on – shouldn't Holden be throwing his net wider? If you're thinking of buying a 3G network in the shape of 3, you don't need to know how to operate a network. Ericsson is doing that for 3 under contract.
So perhaps Holden should be looking at the big media companies – a Sony or BMG – because what 3 UK does very well is sell pop music video downloads.
3 UK itself is still busily trying to deny the rumours. Over in the Sunday Times, group CFO, Frank Sixt, is quoted as saying, "We’re not keen to sell 3. After we’ve missed a target, we don’t put the ‘for sale’ sign up."
Sixt told the publication that, "UK management had initially blamed the large number of deserting customers on poor-quality handsets early customers received."
Considering Italy and Australia are doing well for 3, this is a bit of a lame excuse. Sixt reckons it's poor distribution so he wants to see 3 UK build up its store chain.
Mobile Insight never thought selling 3 handsets from the group's Superdrug outlets was the most logical of moves.
Of course, one of the reason's why 3 Australia does better is that it embraces
content completely. And that includes adult content.
Figures released by the UK's Qualifications and Curriculum Agency (QCA) show that one quarter of all exam cheats were using mobile phones.
The agency has called for drastic measures to prevent such cheating including sitting the exams in metal lined rooms designed to create a Faraday cage. The aim is to block mobile phone signals.
The QCA wanted to recommend the use of mobile phone signal blockers but the practice is banned by Ofcom, the UK's telecoms watchdog.
Other suggested measures include searching pupils with metal detectors. "New types of mobile phone blocking paint could be available in the future," said Professor Jean Underwood of Nottingham Trent University, which carried out the study for the QCA.
Phones were being used to text friends to ask for exam answers or to access the Internet to cheat in exams.
Out of 4,500 candidates penalised for cheating in 2005, around 1,100 had smuggled in mobile phones.
The Inquirer reports that Apple Computer might not have got the iPhone
name trademarked as widely reported. A Candian firm, Comwave, has been selling a
product called the iPhone in North America for some time.
www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=36205 ...
In Site of the Week (by Tony Dennis)
This
week
BBC Three Mobile
Mobile Insight recently discovered that there is as a WAP site run by the
British broadcaster , the BBC, for its BBC3 channel - BBC3
Mobile site. What this site does is enable you to download video clips of
certain BBC programmes like Torchwood, Comedy Soup and (theoretically) some
episodes of the Sci-Fi hit, Dr Who. Anybody who wants to try BBC 3 Mobile out
should text the word 'THREE' to 81010. Or type the following URL into their WAP
browser :-
