Congrats to BeeTagg! Their mobile tagging technology is now supported by One, the Austrian mobile carrier recently acquired by Orange.
It was at the BarCamp Vienna in June when I attended a presentation, given by Martin, of BeeTagg. Mobile tagging is somehow the link between the real world and the virtual internet world. By taking a picture of a special graphical code, the BeeTagg in our case, with a cell phone, users are able to retrieve information about a product, location, etc. from the internet. It’s an easy and straight forward solution to provide information online and place a link pointing there at any place in the real world.
E.g. I can add a BeeTagg to my business card which links to this site. It allows users to access my site directly by just taking a picture and without typing in the entire website address.
However, one question remains: what about iPhone support?
[via Mobile Zeitgeist]
TabletBlog covers a well done comparison between Apple’s iPod touch and Nokia’s N800. While reading and watching the video, one thing became clear to me: if I get such a web enabled mobile device, it has to be location aware. I don’t want to enter address strings and zoom and pan on maps until I find my position. I want the mobile web browser knowing my position automatically. I want instantly see content relevant to my current position whenever I open Google maps app or any site offering location aware content and services.
Gizmodo reports about a hack, actually it’s just about loading the Navizon app onto the iPhone, which adds GPS-like functionality (as they call it) to the iPhone. Apparently it’s nothing else then positioning based on cell towers and WiFi access points.
Basically it’s a feature most carriers could easily offer. But at the same time it’s a feature with serious privacy concerns. The question who is in control of and who gains access to people’s location information is a very sensitive one. Sooner or later there has to be a solution, as this will turn out as one of the most important features on mobile devices (yeah, I know, location based services are said to be the killer feature since 1998).
The mentioned Navizon solution still is a hack and not supported by Apple. The Apple iPhone is a closed platform, meaning none other than Apple is allowed to add functionality. In my opinion it’s the main reason for having a closer look at alternatives like the Nokia web tablets. Unlike Apple, Nokia still gives you control over the device you bought.
Michael has an interesting post about an unlocked iPhone running under the Austrian carrier One (recently acquired by French Orange). Hmm, I really wonder whose iPhone this may is…
So there is no reason to sign one of those rumored and ridiculous iPhone mobile plans to get the super gadget.
I definitely want a mobile version of Last.fm radio!
The availability of Flash-enabled mobile devices to use Last.fm’s player wouldn’t be the problem. It’s rather the bandwith consumption of an internet radio together with mobile data transfer limits of our mobile carriers and costs for exceeding those limits. Using a high speed mobile conneciton like UMTS for listening to Last.fm simply would make me a poor man.
Unfortunately Vienna is far away from being fully covered by free wifi, so another option like using wifi enabled mp3 players wouldn’t work either.
In the meantime the only alternative left is continuously rearranging my iPod playlists to match my Last.fm radio a bit. It’s a bit unfair, because Last.fm is computing my profile, providing me with excellent recommendations, and then I (have to) search for certain tracks on iTMS or Bleep and buy the songs there. So the work is done by Last.fm and the profit goes to others. The only option to purchase music on Last.fm for me would be via an Amazon link, but sorry, times of ordering CDs are over.
Could you imagine a better combination for an online music store than being embeded within Last.fm’s recommendation system?
Probably not.
This time it was my turn to get tickets for me and a few friends of mine in advance. At the ticket office I was told that paper tickets are already sold out, so I had to try this mobile ticketing thing.
Problem #1: I’m only allowed to buy 4 tickets at once, but I need 5.
Problem #2: If you buy more than one ticket at once you have to enter the name, the phone number, no problem until here, and, believe it or not, the cell phone model for each person!! Think of 4 of your friends and name their exact cell phone brand and model. This is an impossible task!! Besides, what would be the reason to set a limit of one ticket per cell phone?
Problem #3: Even if I would remember every single cell phone model I couldn’t enter the number of at least 3 friends because they use their business cell phone and their companies won’t pay for party entry fees.
So we just decided not to go and join another party instead. Yes, listen carefully Nokia, there are still parties you can enter without mobile ticketing.
Very uncool Nokia, very very uncool.
Nokia gives us a lecture in “how to convince skeptical users of mobile ticketing” by offering only a limited number of paper tickets – I simply can’t believe that this venue is already sold out – and forcing people who want to buy tickets in advance to order them on their cell phone.
So I guess Nokia leaves me no option but to try this mobile ticketing thing. I hope you get at least a drink at the party without using your cell phone.
Very uncool Nokia!
Yep, I’m an old fashioned paper ticket buyer, not a trendy mobile ticketing user as Nokia would like to see most of their guests at Nokia Trends.
It’s quite obvious that Nokia is trying to promote mobile ticketing. Popular mobile applications are good for mobile business. Strange enough that Nokia doesn’t even believe itself in its technology. Or why else would they mention a back-up system and ensure potential mobile ticketing users that everything is going to be fine, even if the mobile ticket (an encrypted image sent to your phone) doesn’t work.
I experienced too many unreceivable picture messages from different mobile phone brands and operators than mine is. So why should I bother and risk mobile ticketing when I can be a 100% sure that paper tickets will do their job just fine.
During last months I started using a GPS device, a Garmin GPSmap 60C, more frequently. I started tracking my bike routes through Vienna (see my bike_trails), loaded them into ArcGIS and began to compile a customised Garmin map, a bike routes map for Vienna in particular.
Organising this years holiday trip to California I thought I’ll try to load some digital city maps of my destinations onto the GPS. I only needed maps for a few cities such as San Francisco, San José and surroundings. Surfing through the Garmin website I found out that I can either buy whole North America or nothing, the same in Europe. Talking to the shop assistant where I bought my Garmin brought the same result. So I should spend 200-300 EUR just to replace two or three city maps? Seems quite pricey, a city map I get for about 10 EUR and I doubt the benefit of the GPS map is 20-30 times higher compared to a conventional paper map. Sure, I’m getting whole North America or Europe for that price, but I only need 2 cities out of the bundle. Why shouldn’t it be possible? It’s all stored in databases, just select the area and make it available. I wouldn’t buy all paper maps of North American or European cities at once either.
Not willing to buy whole continents (btw why does Garmin split it’s products into continents while they could force customers to buy all cities of the whole world at once) I started a little research about other data sources and found MapCenter, a great place for user created free Garmin GPS maps. The area around San Francisco and San José is covered quite well and I downloaded a few street maps there.
After the big European Google Maps update last week, I came yesterday across this headline: Google Maps on your mobile phone (via heise, german). This mobile application comes very close to what I was looking for, to have a searchable and easy to use city map in my pocket. Even better on my mobile phone because I don’t have to bother about carrying the GPS device with me. I guess mainly because of privacy concerns Google doesn’t locate you automatically, even if it would be possible in some urbanized areas. Frankly, I would like to have the option to enable this feature, to be located while connecting to Google Maps Mobile and have the map centered on my current location immediately.
However, I think I’ll get some paper city maps too. They still have some major advantages over digital maps, even without a search bar: drawing and marking individual spots, no loading, no bothering with zoom and pan…
The Austrian automobile club