The State of the Mobile App

The current state of Mobile applications are in a catch 22. Currently, there are so many platforms to design applications for the WebOS, the iPhone OS, Android, Symbian, WinMo, and Blackberry. Many of these OSes have their application stores. The Apple App store, is flooded with over 80,000 applications, how is one to find an app? This is state of emergency for the mobile application, how can it survive on a 3.5 inch screen when it does not pop up in a search result or in the Top 10 or 100 applications. In the Apple App store, developers have resorted to making multiple applications of the same application with slight variations, thus inflating the Apple App store. The Palm App Catalog, has come up with an innovative method of giving each App it own URL, with this URL an application can be distributed outside the App Catalog. Which is an innovative approach to solving this problem. Luckily, there are only 300 apps in the Palm catalog. Palm is the only manufacturer looking out for the developer.

The Future of Mobile Teleco

Just announced today, T-Mobile will start offering reduced plans with no contracts or no commitments. What is the catch now? They want you to a bring your old phone to them, and use it on their network. No longer are the days where carriers will provide a highly subsided phone in exchange for a one or two year commitment. Is this a new way the mobile / wireless industry is going, or is it just competition for the lowest rates, and how to survive in this economy.

What a week!

This is a gadget's boys week come true. So many gadgets released this week, as well reliable rumors. To start off the bat, Blackberry Bold 2 was announced this week. Windows 7 was made public, finally a version of Windows that deserves the hype. The Barnes and Nobles Nook was announced, I like their Web 2.0 naming approach, but ebook readers to me seem like luxury items. The Droid campaign got more intense with the Moto Droid leaks, and this device gives the HTC Touch Pro 2 a run for its money. Then there is Apple, the small company in Cupertino, CA with their their best quarter ever, and the new Magic mouse, which takes a step back from the multi-touch on the macbooks. They also had a silly product launch for the plastic unibody macbook, which is just silly.
Anyways, waiting for another week like this, will it be before CES?

The New Wave of Smartphones

It is very interesting to hear about the new wave of smartphone devices coming out this year. A majority of these phones run on Android or Windows. It is even more surprising to see a Manufacturers like HTC and Samsung to make multiple devices with roughly the same hardware, but loading different mobile operating systems like Windows Mobile, custom roms of Linux Mobile, and Android. HTC started making Windows phones, but has expanded to Android. Samsung makes phones using Linux Mobile, Windows, Android, and their own OS for their non-smartphones. Now Dell is coming into the game selling a phone running on Android. There is also ASUS/Garmin that is selling a phone that runs on Windows. Motorola is selling their DEXT with Android. The market is flooded with devices running on Windows Mobile and Android.

The next interesting point is all these phones are particular made in the same factory. All these manufacturers outsource their manufacturing to Foxconn or another company all located in the same city. It really doesn't matter which device you buy it is being built by the same people. Normally you could compare devices by saying it's a Dell and it's built in Texas, but that is no longer true (Dell just announced they are closing a manufacturing plant in NC).

Pre-G20 @ cmu

The G20 is coming to Pittsburgh, but how does it affect the average Carnegie Mellon student like me? Well, not that well. Midterm season starts this week, and professor's are ignorant that the G20 is interfering with student's schedules. My schedule this week has 2 exams, and 2 quizzes this week each one on a different day. It makes it impossible for me to attend any of three the guest lectures this week. Even though theses lectures are probably a once in a lifetime opportunity, the school is not encouraging these opportunities nor are giving students a break. Instead, the G20 is creating more annoyances such as shutdown the library, buildings, and local roads. Increasing security to high levels. These are inconveniences, but we are expected to perform at the same levels regardless the lack of resources such as the library or easy transportation.

ZuneHD: my thoughs

The ZuneHD came out this week. Even though the launch was quite quiet. This gadget has been echoing all over the blog-o-sphere. I really like the UI, they have fixed all the issues that I find annoying with the iPod touch. The ZuneHD is a true media player, unlike the iPod touch which is more focused on being a small web app tablet. The true media junkies have been waiting for the ZuneHD because it is made of better components unlike the iPod which is now a big brand name, and Apple is known of being the master of cheap components. It is no surprised the ZuneHD is already sold out at many online stores, and B&M's. I don't really expect an MP3 player to be a web-browser. I want my media player to play media in an easy fashion, be cool, be able to share my media via HDMI or to another zune, and play the radio if I get bored. By the way, the zune music player is awesome! iTunes is the worst music app ever, it uses so much memory, and how it organizes music on the local disk of the ipod is indescribable. CNN says the zuneHD is no ipod killer, I disagree with them. The ipod touch is not a ZuneHD killer. The only problem I have with the ZuneHD is it should have been launched last year. Apple is already on their THIRD gen ipod touch, and this Zune's first gen touch player. Also, the launch of ZuneHD should have been earlier in the summer like in July or June before the back to school shopping period. I'm really wondering what took zune so long, the iphone/ipod touch interface was announced 2 and half years ago. Most the zune interface was made back then, and ZuneHD UI is just minor tweaks for a touch interface. I'm still puzzled why this is coming in 2009, when it should have came out in 2008 or 2007.

Song of the Week: MSTRKRFT ft. John Legend - Heartbreaker

Nice music video, it's fun to watch, and it features the great John Legend (Green Light).