Stefan Constantinescu has loved technology since as far back as he can remember. It started with computers, but in the past few years his passion has turned to mobile devices.
He has been blogging since 2006 and joined IntoMobile in the summer of 2007, then got a job at Nokia in March of 2008, but has now rejoined the IntoMobile team as of June 2009. He is currently based out of Finland.
Stefan is a mobile phone enthusiast who lives and breathes devices that connect to the internet and he knows that there are others like him out there. He is strongly opinionated and enjoys a good debate so leave comments in his posts and he’ll get back to you!
Jay Sullivan, Vice President of Mobile at Mozilla, runs through Firefox for Maemo on the Nokia (NYSE: NOK) N900 in the video below and shows off how tabs work, the “awesome bar”, and extensions. You may be asking yourself what’s the point of Mozilla building Firefox for Mobile? WebKit has the largest share of the mobile browser space, and they’re doing a damn fine job at what they do, but you have to remember that WebKit isn’t a browser, it’s just a rendering engine. Apple (NSDQ: AAPL), Google (NSDQ: GOOG), RIM, they’re all building browsers that are powered by WebKit, whereas Mozilla is actually building a complete browser that you as a consumer can install on your mobile device similar to how you install Firefox on a fresh install of Windows today. Key difference. No clue as to when Firefox Mobile will be finished, and what platforms it will support, but at least you can sleep soundly at night knowing that there is a company fighting to make the internet a better experience regardless of the device you use.
[Hat tip to @luovanto aka Jussi Mäkinen, Marketing Maemo Devices @ Nokia]
Here is the original press release detailing the plans Nokia (NYSE: NOK) and Qualcomm (NSDQ: QCOM) have to cooperate. The first paragraph says it all really:
Nokia and Qualcomm Incorporated today announced that the two companies are planning to work together to develop advanced UMTS mobile devices, initially for North America. The companies intend for the devices to be based on S60 software on Symbian OS, the world’s most used software for smartphones, and leverage Qualcomm’s advanced Mobile Station Modem MSM7xxx-series and MSM8xxx-series chipsets for cutting-edge processing performance and ubiquitous mobile broadband capabilities. The first mobile devices based on this collaboration are expected to launch in mid-2010 and be compatible with the forthcoming Symbian Foundation platform.
“Nokia is very pleased to be in discussions with Qualcomm around designing mobile devices that can benefit from the high level of integration found on MSM chipsets,” said Kai Oistamo, executive vice president, Devices, Nokia. “We are eager to demonstrate to the industry the possibilities that exist when innovative and open software is combined with advanced hardware solutions.”
“Nokia and Qualcomm are leaders in advanced wireless technologies, and this new level of cooperation will bring exceptional leaps in mobile performance to people around the world,” said Steve Mollenkopf, executive vice president of Qualcomm and president of Qualcomm CDMA Technologies. “We are very excited about leveraging the substantial synergies between S60 software and MSM chipsets.”
Why is VentureBeat taking the facts from a 9 month old press release and repackaging them as “tips” from an “insider” is beyond me, but hey, what do I know about journalism?
Google (NSDQ: GOOG) has just released Google Mobile App 2.03 for Symbian devices and it now includes voice search! The iPhone, Android and BlackBerry (NSDQ: RIMM) have had this for a while if I’m not mistaken, so this feature is welcome for us Nokia (NYSE: NOK) users. Just launch the application, hold the green call key, and say your query. I tested it by saying “five hundred thousand Vietnamese dong in euros” and it worked beautifully, but then again I’m sitting alone in my dead silent flat. Does this work for you outdoors?
To download the app just go to m.google.com in your mobile browser.
Update: An official blog post from Google detailing the new application, along with a video that has been produced for UK audiences, has been published.
Google would never, ever, make an Android device. That would hurt their relationships with current vendors, it requires a completely different skill set than what any Google employee currently has, and most importantly it would tarnish the image of Android since all other devices would be compared to Google’s hypothetical ultimate smartphone.
Andy Rubin, the guy working at Google who actually heads the Android project, had a few things to tell C|Net:
We’re not making hardware
We’re enabling other people to build hardware
Making phones would be “a fundamental shift” in Google’s business model, and one the company does not seem prepared to make
It feels so good to be right. Pretty. Pretty. Pretty good.
Hackers, tinkerers, people who like to play with electronics, I totally love and respect them because without their hard work we would not be where we are today. That being said, slapping a telephoto lens on the back of an iPhone and hacking the 30 pin dock connector to allow you to plug in broadcast quality microphone equipment seems a bit overboard and to be frank: a total and complete waste of time. The iPhone is a fantastic camcorder and camera for one, and only one reason: it is with you all the time. Nothing, no matter how grand of a product of technical achievement, will be as useful as the slab of metal and plastic that lives in your jean pocket. With all that said and done, here is what is possible if you modify your iPhone:
Facebook’s mobile site and mobile applications have been very well received by social network addicts around the world, which makes you wonder why the guy in charge of it all, Jed Stremel, resigned? After 4 years with the company he probably realized that Facebook is nothing more than a useless time suck creating a false sense of companionship while doubling as a playground with a barbed wire perimeter that you’re forced to live in for the rest of your life. That or he is just tired of working with people half his age, his shares have vested, and now he can go look for work at a company that is actually doing something useful.
During their Q3 2009 financial results conference call, TomTom announced that they sold close to 80,000 copies of their iPhone application. Pretty rad considering the total cost of ownership, for the application itself and the dock to stick the thing in your car, is over $200.
Police officers from New York City issued 7,529 tickets last Thursday for people using their mobile phones behind the wheel. This 24 hour crackdown wasn’t as successful as the one earlier May which resulted in around 9,000 violations issued, but a far higher number than the usual 540 tickets that are issued on a daily basis for texting/calling behind the wheel. Last year the NYPD issued 197,198 tickets for being a douche who thinks that they’re so important every single call and text must be acted upon with the utmost urgency.
In other news, a record number of rapes took place last Thursday. When one of the few men caught asked what was so special about Thursday, he replied: “all them cops are going after people who pay their tickets real fast in order to avoid going to court, so us rapists saw this as an opportunity to take to the streets and add some notches to our belt.”
Update: The NYPD have issued a statement: “Oink. Oink. Oink.”
Motorola (NYSE: MOT) Droid fever has hit the team at IntoMobile, and our readers, ridiculously hard. We’re all enamored with the Motorola Droid for different reasons; some like the new Navigation application, some like the fact that it is running a more mature looking Android 2.0, the hard core among us know that it is the first ARM Cortex A8 powered Android device, but whatever reason you have for liking the Droid, we can all admit that it’s the first time in a long time anyone has actually paid attention to Motorola.
Late last night Will discovered that the name of the GSM Motorola Droid is “Milestone”. A bit too long, a bit too much ego, but it suits the device just right. I first spotted Milestone last Wednesday in Vietnam, and another video has hit the net this morning, courtesy of @eldarmurtazin from Mobile-Review, showing the Milestone one more time:
Nokia (NYSE: NOK) just posted an entry to their N-Gage blog saying that the N-Gage publishing platform is going to die in less than a year. Games will now be sold through the Ovi Store, which on face value makes sense, giving consumers a single location to purchase applications, whether that be a new alarm clock, or Super Monkey Ball, but all the community features that many of you have come to love will be gone. Stuff like high scores, messaging, and keeping up with your friends in the N-Gage Arena, that stuff is gone.
