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at GDC Mobile 2005

i'm at GDC Mobile 2005 this week. there's way more people here than i would have thought. i would post the picture i uploaded to flickr but "flickr is down for a massage" right now.

at any rate, robert tercek from mForma led off and had a lot of interesting points to make:

25% of humanity owns a mobile phone, 10% of those poeple have downloaded a game. when china mobile and china unicom get fully rolled out, one third of humanity will own a mobile phone.

john batter from EA was the keynota and also had some interesting points about developing for mobile. people usually keep consoles 5 years, but phones 2-3 years. that was a recurring theme - phone technology is increasing at twice the rate of moore's law.

john also had some great points about DRM - specifically, that a DRM system needs to support "sending to friends" and "gifting" for it to be successful. successful games are viral so sharing of unlockable content is key.

i'll post some more tomorrow.

MFR 2.5 J2ME version followup

since my comments here don't work yet (no time to debug MT!) i've received a few email questions regarding the roadmap for MFR 2.5 i mentioned yesterday - so here they are with the answers:

q: will 2.5 support loading feeds via OPML? a: yes, in fact 2.0 does, but 2.5 will work better. on phones such as the 6630 you'll be able to load them off the memory card or inbox

example:

q: will it support Flickr feeds? a: yes

example:

q: are you buying technorati? a: an odd question, but no, not to my knowledge. gotta love rumors.

mobile feed reader status

i've been getting a few questions around when the next FeedBurner MFR update will come out so i'll casually answer that here...

we're definitely still working on it - both the CNET Mobile Reader and our own MFR version, as well a few other permutations.

the biggest feature you'll see in the next release is xHTML rendering of descriptions, with images sized appropriately for the requesting device.

otherwise we've done a complete UI overhaul which will hopefully take into account many of the requests we have gotten.

here's a couple of examples of the description browsing:

when will this be released? hopefully soon. we have quite a few announcements with FeedBurner stacked up in the coming weeks and this will be one of them.

what comes after that for MFR?

The next version has been dubbed MFR3G, which will be specifically for 3G phones and the capabilities that come with high bandwidth and removeable storeage.

stay tuned over at Burning Questions for more official details.

mobileapps: another spinoff

yes, that's right, i'm expanding my personal publishing empire again.

one of the cool things about writing a weblog like this is that it encompasses a lot of different topics that might be interesting but the bad thing is that it lacks focus. My mobile application postings seem to do pretty well, so i've decided to spin that category off into another weblog just called "mobileapps" that will cover all the applications and games i come across and use on a daily basis.

it can be found here:

//www.burningdoor.com/mobileapps/

and of course the feed can be found here:

http://feeds.feedburner.com/mobileapps

line of site will get back to business on trends in the wireless industry as well as devices, music, and everything in between.

FeedBurner MFR 2 Symbian Series 60 Edition

I'm still calling this a beta because it needs more testing across different devices, but this version has been tested on the Nokia 6620 and 7610 - and should work well on those phones. This build may work on other MIDP 2.0 devices. Official builds will follow soon.

MFR 2 is a signed (trusted) application that can be installed by:

1) Downloading //www.burningdoor.com/jad-dist/mfr2-midp2.jad and //www.burningdoor.com/jad-dist/mfr2-midp2.jar to your PC and using infrared or bluetooth to copy to your inbox. From there, select the JAD file to install.

2) Attempt to hit //www.burningdoor.com/jad-dist/midlet.wml from the Nokia, Opera, or NetFront browser on your handset to download the application Over The Air (OTA). We have found this to be hit or miss depending on the firmware that may be on your handset.

3)You can attempt to push the app down via Handango.

A license can be purchased at the Handango website.

New Features:


Unread Feeds are marked with an icon.

Descriptions now show posting dates.

Registered users can load feeds from a URL accessable OPML file.

Additionally MFR 2 supports:

• Emailing entries


• Automatic updating


• WML/xHTML transcoding


• Embedded FeedBurner SmartFeed™ technology to support all flavors of RSS and Atom

And many more fixes and enhancements.

J2ME and BREW video monitoring

this looks like a pretty cool solution from iNet Cam. it basically allows you to use a video capture source to record and stream video to people who can monitor on their cell phones via J2ME and BREW.

I haven't tried this yet but it looks interesting. there was something similar OEM on the P900, and i wonder if that ever got off the ground.

I would love to use something like this for example, to check on the kids at daycare or at home if they were with a babysitter.

ProfiMail for Series 60 [via Russell Beattie Notebook]

an awesome Symbian Series 60 application.

not that russ needs any more link love, but i couldn't concur more with his post on ProfiMail for Series 60. the custom ui kicks ass and this definitely fills the need of the really lame Symbian Series 60 email client. yes, too bad T9 isn't supported (since they aren't using native widgets) but i really use my 7610 for reading email and not responding anyway. thanks for pointing this one out, russ.

while we're at it, i have been hooked on triz, a great freeware tetris clone for series 60. try it out.

RIM Blackberry Mobile Feed Reader - seeking beta testers

Hello there - we are nearing the release of the FeedBurner Mobile Feed Reader Version 2, which we provide as a service to help publishers get their RSS/Atom content out via mobile channels - and in addition to the Symbian/Java/Palm OS platforms we deployed Version 1 upon, we will be adding a couple new platforms: BREW and RIM Blackberry.

We're soliciting help testing our Blackberry versions since the implementations vary greatly from network operator to network operator, and inside and outside the enterprise. If you provide helpful feedback we'll provide you with a free license for the application when the general release is available.

The FeedBurner service plays an important part in making this app work on the Blackberry:

First, FeedBurner SmartFeed™ technology allows us to easily normalize any of the nine flavors of RSS and Atom into a common format so that the mobile client can stay thin and fast; dealing with all those versions on the client is much too cumbersome.

Second, many of the Blackberry and WAP gateways installed at carriers and enterprises don't allow the content types we normally see associated with RSS and Atom files to be passed to the device, which would normally cause feeds generated from many common publishing tools to be incompatible with the Blackberry service. Again, SmartFeed technology comes to the rescue and automatically makes RSS and Atom files compatible with the carrier gateways.

If you have a Blackberry that you purchased directly from T-Mobile, Cingular, AT&T Wireless, Rogers Canada, or another GSM provider, and feel like testing the mobile feed reader, enter the following URL in your browser (if your IT department gave you a BlackBerry, keep reading to the bottom):

http://www.feedburner.com/fb/products/rim/FeedBurnerMFR2.jad

and select "install" from the menu. The BlackBerry should then download the MFR, and notify you upon success. The FeedBurner icon should appear in your ribbon in the first postion. If you wish to move it, hold down the [alt] key and push in the scroll wheel, and select "Move Icon." Betcha didn't know that was there.

Now for the important part - setting your network preferences. Because of security features built into the BlackBerry OS as well as the BlackBerry Enterprise Server, you must enter your WAP gateway preferences.

To do this, push in the scroll wheel, and select "Network". You should see the network settings screen. If you see your carrier, select it. If you are in the UK or Australia, and want to try your GSM carrier, select "Other" and enter the Access Point, WAP Gateway IP, and WAP Gateway port you would normally use with a GSM phone on your carrier's network.

If you are using a BlackBerry 6750/7750 you puchased directly from Verizon Wireless you need to have a 3rd party WAP gateway service such as MobileWeb4U and install the .alx and .cod files via your BlackBerry Desktop "Application Loader" application.

If you are using a Nextel 6510/7510 and wish to try the MFR, select "BlackBerry Enterprise" - there will be a Nextel option in a future version. The same goes for 7510 on Telus in Canada - select "BlackBerry Enterprise".

Finally, if your IT department gave you a BlackBerry (specifically if your company operates its own BlackBerry Enterprise Server with Mobile Data Service (MDS) ), you can still likely use this application, just choose "BlackBerry Enterprise."

There are a few known issues with the app, and the user interface will go through a BlackBerry overhaul -- but all feedback is welcome.

We're going through this beta cycle to catch all the different network configurations that are possible and make the service as seamless as possible - so if something works or doesn't work please email wirelesssupport AT feedburner DOT com and let us know.

e-books finally working for me

i love books, i guess i always have - but i have way too many of them. and especially tech books - they become obsolete almost immediately. i've tried a few e-book systems in the past, and they just haven't worked for me - until now.

o'reilly's safari is great for tech books. i use this almost exclusively for any tech reference these days. the biggest shortcoming is the lack of being able to reference books offline. at the premium levels, you can get chits for checking out a chapter at a time off-line, but this doesn't really help for airline flights and such. otherwise, the small monthly fee is well worth what i would have paid shelling out $40+ per book.

for pleasure reading, i'm really liking mobipocket on the nokia 7610. as an experiment, i'm trying to read "the davinci code" and it's working out really well. now, this is a book written at the third grade reading level with short chapters, but it's great for reading in short chunks. if this is successful, i'll try to tackle neil stephenson's "quicksilver."

anyone that knows me knows i have an attention span of using a mobile phone for about two weeks. mobipocket might be the sticky application that keeps me on the 7610 for awhile.

FeedBurner MFR 2 - MIDP2.0 Beta

For those of you that are users of the FeedBurner Mobile Feed Reader, there is a beta available of the second version, which utilizes FeedBurner SmartFeed™ technology, which automatically optimizes all feed formats for the mobile client, and allows the compiled code to stay small.

this has basically been a rewrite for optimized parsing and size, but there will be more features before release:

It can be downloaded at:

http://www.feedburner.com/fb/products/mfr2-midp2.jad

or

http://www.feedburner.com/fb/products/mfr2-midp2.jar

This beta has been tested on the Nokia 7610, Nokia 6600, Sony Ericsson P900, and the Sony Ericsson K700i. It may work on other MIDP 2.0 phones.

the feature set is similar to 1.0 at this point, and it does not currently upgrade version 1.0 databases, so you will need to enter your feeds again.

License codes from 1.0 and above should work for 2.0 as well.

series 60 help

anyone know of a decent 3rd party symbian series 60 email client? i very much dislike the one that ships with it.

or maybe i can't figure it out. it's the main reason i don't use a series 60 phone as my main sidearm. it can't seem to check mail automatically (unless i can't find this option) and you can only have one mailbox active at a time (as far as i can tell). they just recently added SMTP auth.

any recommendations from the mobile masses?

thoughts on Nokia Lifeblog

i gave nokia's beta release of Lifeblog a spin today and here are some initial thoughts. this product is still in beta a 0.95, but seems pretty solid so far.

Lifeblog according the about box is "a PC and mobile phone software combination that intelligently and automatically keeps a diary of the multimedia item you collect on your phone, such as photos, videos, text messages, and mutlimedia messages," and seems that it will be packaged as an add-on to the Series 60 interface.

the idea is as you send or receive any of the items mentioned above, Lifeblog keeps a timeline organized by date, and allows you to add additional notes along the way. what i think it is, is a better way to organize multimedia than is currently presented on the Series 60 interface. this is a graphical view of your inbox, outbox, and any photos or videos you take that make it very easy to track back to items if you know the relative time they were performed or received, and it think it works, from that perspective, even if that is not the original goal.

it's analogous to how agendus is a far superior way to organize the Palm OS or the Symbian UIQ OS than ships with the respective native OSes.

With that in mind, here's what i'd like to see the roadmap for Lifeblog be:

1) make the UI object-oriented...not in the ParcPlace Smalltalk sense, but in the IBM OS/2 sense...great - i got to the pictures i took yesterday of the soccer game, but i can't "Send" from Lifeblog. anything i can do to an object in other parts of the Series 60 UI, allow me to do from the Lifeblog interface

2) Sync/Upload via Bluetooth

3) ability to add notes for that day

4) calendar widget integration...isn't this really just an extension of a calendar view?

5) upload to a server - i understand this isn't a moblogging tool, but it sure could be a cool one! i'd rather just have a safe place to store everything...hell, can i send it to my iDisk somehow? i wish.

that's it for now. i'll post more as i use this more. looks like a great start to a new way to thinking about organizing mobile media.