Mobile Insight Vol: 10 Issue 395 January 14th 2008
Microsoft buys Multimap for LBS reasons
Aiming to head off Nokia's
growing position in the online mapping sector, the Beast of Redmond has acquired
Brit mapping company, Multimap in a deal thought to be worth around £50 million...More
Opera in major tie-up with Kong Zhong
A new version of its browser, Kong Zhong Opera 2.0, should increase Opera's global footprint.
It has just released this version specially constructed for China's leading content provider, Kong Zhong...More
Wapple improves free ad-funded WAP sites
Wapple has said it now offers a choice four mobile advertising partners. To date, most of Wapple's free mobile websites have been primarily funded by Google Adsense...More
Microsoft vs Orange spat over MMS @ OMA
An otherwise dull standards forum – the Open Mobile Alliance World in
London – was enlightened by an unexpected tiff between a prestigious speaker
from Orange and a Microsoft delegate...More
Greystripe's AdWrap comes to Chocolate
Six made-for-mobile games created by Digital Chocolate will now become free thanks to Greystripe. That's because they contain ads placed inside the game thanks to Greystripe's Adwrap technology...More
Rok takes over laptop maker, Rock
UK based specialist notebook PC manufacturer, Rock, has sold a controlling interest to Rok Entertainment, the mobile video specialist...More
Hack runs up massive iPhone data bill
An IT hack who probably should have known better - Wired editor-in-chief, Chris Anderson - ran up a $2,100 bill using his iPhone
whilst 'roaming' in China...More
Probability brings gambling to iPhone
Mobile phone gambling specialist, Probability, is set to announce that it has cracked gambling on the iPhone
to enable owners to play games such as Blackjack...More
Client/server the answer says Probability's Cohen
According to Probability's CEO, Charles Cohen, the solution to putting gambling games onto the
iPhone is to take the client/server approach. There's very little onboard
processing involved...More
Carphone hit by power outage
UK mobile phone distributor, the Carphone Warehouse, has suffered a blow to its
Xmas sales ambitions. Just as it was predicting a bumper festive season, a power
failure has hit its Acton HQ...More
Snippets
An excellent tip from a source inside Nokia. He revealed that there's a good
way of getting rid of personal Information on a Nokia handset without having to
go through the rigmarole of a factory reset. Ensure your handset is fully
charged before attempting this as a failed rewrite could mess up the device
entirely. Type in *#7370# and follow that with the password 12345. It wipes the
slate clean. But don't forget you still have entries in your SIM card directory.
www.nokia.com
Another tip is that *#0000# shows exactly what version of firmware is presently
loaded on your Nokia handset. www.nokia.com
In Site of the Week (by Tony Dennis)
This week
Honda F1 Mobile
For a site described as "One of the most exciting and informative mobile WAP sites in the automotive sector to date", you'd expect something special.
Sadly Honda's F1 WAP site is hugely disappointing.
So what does it offer? Video clips from the last race at Monaco? Results and summary of performance from the Monaco GP?
Predictions for the next race? None of the above. What it does have are three pathetic F1 style ringtones and three wallpapers showing Jenson Button plus Rubens Barrichello.
The best part is probably the chance to win a tour of the Honda F1 factory in
GB.
For a company which offers state of the art technology, you might expect Honda to have tied location based techniques to displaying where the nearest Honda garage is located.
But, no. Surfers find the nearest Honda dealer by typing in their postcode.
Unfortunately the site's provider – the Mobile Interactive Group (MIG)– seems to think the site is industry leading.
This site definitely does nothing for the Honda brand. But at least it wasn't foolish enough to utilise a dotmobi (.mobi) address for the site.
