Right after Microsoft announced Windows Phone 7 Series, rumours began floating that they were going to offer it side-by-side a version of Windows Phone 6. Now, there seems to be an official confirmation of this – and we are ticked off.

Why? For one, the idea that this version is targetted at “emerging markets”.

Secondly, according to Bsquare, WP 6SE does not support 3G services on GSM networks.

Exactly what do these mean?

That African and Asian countries are the targets of WP 6SE? How did they arrive at this? Does it translate to cheaper devices? Experience shows that WindowsPhone devices are more expensive than same class devices from the competition. For example, the average non-3G WindowsPhone still costs an arm and a leg more than a 3.5G-enabled device from Symbian.

Note too that some of the most vibrant mobile markets on the planet are emerging economies – Nigeria, India, Brazil et al. These markets have much stronger 3G presence than some advanced economies have. The U.S. is an example of an advanced economy with horrible 3G presence.

How did this idea crystalize?

In closing, have you tried registering as a user at the official WindowsPhone 7 Series website? We did two weeks ago, and would you imagine that Nigeria was not initially on the list of supported countries? Apparently someone at Microsoft messed up big time. We were miffed big time. The good news, however, is that as at today Nigeria is now listed.

The laughable part is, there’s a section titled “My current phone is” on the registration form. The options presented there are:

• A Windows phone
• iPhone
• Droid
• Nexus One
• Blackberry
• Palm Pre
• Other smartphone
• Other

Apparently, Microsoft does not consider the world’s two largest smartphone platforms, Symbian, worth competing against. Plus, it is shortsightedness to list only specific products from Android and WebOS. Surely, the Droid and Nexus One account for only a small percentage of Android sales (though they may well be the current flagships).

Surely, Microsoft cannot be so shortsighted as not to see that emerging martkets currently make up some of the most vibrant smartphone markets?

Targetting non-3G devices at emerging markets? Doh! There goes Microsoft’s chance to expand the marketshare of WindowsPhone; and since Android does not seem to be into a show of strength in these parts yet, the chances of anyone knocking Symbian off as king of the smartphone jungle are still next to zero.

Sigh. And we were looking forward to some real competition.

Credits:
Story via WindowsMobile Experts

A revised edition of the free ebook, Guide to Mobile Internet in Nigeria (first published in June 2009), is now available for download, as lots of information have changed since its initial publication.

A revised version is now available for download

This is for all those who find a QWERTY keyboard essential on their mobile devices – whether those devices are smartphones or feature phones.

Some touchscreen QWERTY keyboards, such as those on the iPhone and the Samsung Jet, have introduced a new level of usability to touchscreen keyboards. Onscreen QWERTYs are becoming more and more usable.

But each option has its pros and cons. For example, hardware QWERTYs add thickness, mass and weight to the device, not to mention reducing the area available for the display (with the exception of slider keyboards, such as that on the Sony Ericsson Xperia X1).

Touchscreen keyboards are not as tactile, even with haptic feedback implemented. We must mention that a touchscreen easily makes a device more fragile too.

There are pros and cons on both sides, and it does not seem that either side will win the war. The question is, “What is your preference – hardware or touchscreen QWERTY keyboard? What informs your preference?”

Mobile devices provide the majority of the world’s 4.6 million mobile phone subscribers with their first and only access to the internet, according to Nokia chief executive Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo. Source

See also Tomi Ahonen’s article: Major milestone has passed, over half of internet access is now from mobile (says Nokia)

We told you mobile was the future; didn’t we?

Once upon a time, the term mobile internet in Nigeria meant taking up a subscription with one of the CDMA networks only. In addition, the internet service was restricted to just using a phone as a modem – mostly desktop phones in the early stages, and later also mobile phones. Browsing on-phone on Nigerian CDMA networks was unheard of back then.

Thankfully, things have changed. The coming of GSM technology has introduced a new level of awareness, competitionand services in the Nigerian mobile landscape – much like what the superb user interface of the iPhone did to the global mobile phone industry.

Pay as you browse internet services tend to be popular among casual internet users – those who do not want to shell out a huge payment every month but need access to the internet for light browsing and basic email. Usually, GSM networks charge for data transferred, regardless of how long a user stays connected. CDMA networks, however charge per minute.

On CDMA networks, this used to be very expensive business, with some networks charging as much as N7.50 per minute back then, though some are still close now. Translated, a subscriber would be burning N450 for staying connected continously for one hour. Xpensive!

Lower Tariffs
The tariffs for pay as you browse services have since dropped and become more pocket-friendly. Here are the options that you have on three of the most vibrant CDMA networks available now:

• Starcomms: N3.00 per minute
• Visafone: N2.50 per minute
• ZOOMmobile: N6.00 per minute peak; N4.80 per minute off-peak; N3.90 per minute midnight

We have no information on Multilinks’ tariff at the moment, as we could find no such information on this operator’s website.

The Visafone tariff of N2.50 per minute is the most pocket-friendly at the moment, closely followed by Starcomms at N3.00 per minute. Of course, you also have to pay attention to coverage and other factors in choosing a service provider, so do your research.

Do you use any of these pay as you browse services from CDMA operators? Would you like to share your experiences?

Earlier on this year, we did a spotlight on Globacom’s new website, pointing out the fact that it was more of a status symbol because it provided no useful information for subscribers.

We are glad to bring you an update, and it is good news. What has been done now is that the site has been split up into two main sections – “Corporate” and “Nigeria”. The “Nigeria” section of the website contains useful information about all services and products of the GSM giant, while the “Corporate” section features corporate info.

There is a drop-down menu at the top-right section of the homepage from where you select which of the two main sections that you want to go. There’s also now a search box, allowing users to find information quickly. But note that the box searches only whatever section of the site you are in.

Need any information on Glo products and services? Head over to the new GloWorld.com.

Good job, Glo!

The American blogosphere has been pursuing a campaign of untruths in the area of mobility for a couple of years now. While one tries to ignore most of it, because they stem from ignorance rather than an intent to deceive, it is still appalling some of the myths that are being propagated by mainstream blogs from the USA.

Unfortunately, because US-based blogs are dominant on the web, the untruths go round and after a while, people assume they are true. Here are a few of the iPhone-centric myths that keep making the rounds of US-based blogs.

Myth: the “real internet” started with the iPhone
I read one US-based blogger who submitted that the “real internet” – the capability to access desktop format sites on mobile phones – started with the iPhone and Safari combining the power of a Webkit browser and a mobile phone for the first time, and later adopted by Nokia and Google among others.

Hello! Nokia’s E-series and N-series devices had been combining the power of a webkit browser and a mobile phone for over three years before the iPhone showed up. Check out any Symbian S60 smartphone since Nokia’s E and N series have beeen around. You’ll find one powerful WebKit browser in those phones. It just isn’t true.

To put things right, it started with Nokia and was later adopted by the iPhone, and then Android, and now BlackBerry – all of them years after Nokia had implemented it on a wide range of devices.

Millions of users (myself inclusive) had been accessing the “real internet” – true desktop browsing – on their smartphones for donkey years before the iPhone showed up. The Nokia 9210i, 9500, 9300, E61, E61i, E90, and several models by Sony Ericsson, HTC and others are clear examples of devices that offered true desktop web browsing in the dinosaur era.

I owned and used all the above-named Nokias extensively, and they worked well for full desktop browsing. I didn’t have to tweak or hack them to be able to do this. They just worked out of the box.

Of course, the problem is that America was years behind the rest of the world in the world of mobiles. To the average American, an example of a great phone was the Motorola Razr – a phone that was so limited in just about everything except bling. Now, its those Razr-loving people who want to re-write the history of mobile.

The iPhone made the browsing more pleasant, but sorry – true desktop web browsing has been available on mobile devices since Adam. And when I say “real internet”, I mean really advanced things. Like accessing a VPN, Cpanel, or WebHostManager.

Myth: the iPhone’s Safari browser is the most widely-used mobile browser
That’s another lie sold by the American blogging community. One outstanding US-based blogger who shows a better understanding of the situation than the average is Dennis Bournique who runs WapReview. He addressed this in part in his recent article Why Do Mobile Web Designers Ignore Opera Mini? I highly recommend that article, as it shows the rank ignorance (or sense of self-importance) that pervades the US mobile web landscape.

Opera Mini’s global usage is waaaay bigger than the iPhone’s estimated installed base of about 34 million devices (assuming that all existing iPhones are used regularly by their owners for web browsing, which I doubt). Yet, the US media and blogging machine keeps on about how the iPhone made web browsing on phones popular. Fact: Opera Mini did – with millions of users worldwide who far beyond the number of iPhone users.

We do not need to speak of the mass of millions of Symbian devices (more than the iPhone can hold a candle to) many of which are used to access the internet daily outside of the US. But of course, the American blogging community gets its statistics of mobile web usage from US-centric ad networks. Admob anyone? What do you expect?

Dennis also references another insightful article by Peter-Paul Koch titled The iPhone obsession. While the article contains lots of expletives (reader discretion advised), I recommend it for its pointed exposition of the foolishness that has become the order of the day with Americans and the iPhone.

Be sure of it: the iPhone’s Safari is not the most widely used mobile browser. That honour belongs to Opera Mini.

Myth: the iPhone is a threat to Nokia/Symbian
This one is laughable, really, if not outrightly silly. The iPhone has never been a threat to Nokia/Symbian, and is not about to be.

As at end of 2009, the iPhone had only 2.2% of the global mobile handset market share. Nokia had 38%. Let’s put it in a table for clarity:

Global Top 10 Handset Makers
1 – Nokia . . . . . . . 432 Million 38 %
2 – Samsung . . . . 227 Million 20 %
3 – LG . . . . . . . . . . 117 Million 10 %
4 – SonyEricsson . . . 57 Million 5 %
5 – Motorola . . . . . . 55 Million 5 %
6 – ZTE . . . . . . . . . 50 Million 4.5%
7 – Kyocera . . . . . . 45 Million 4 %
8 – RIM . . . . . . . . . 35 Million 3.5%
9 – Sharp . . . . . . . . 29 Million 2.6 %
10 – Apple . . . . . . .. 25 Million 2.2 %
Others . . . . . . . . . . 56 Million 5%
TOTAL . . . . . . . .. 1,130 Million (1.13 Billion)
Source (really recommended reading)

In perspective, Nokia is as big as the next three biggest handset makers all put together. And the iPhone (Apple) is waaaay down at number ten. Okay, so the iPhone is an immediate threat to Sharp phones (number 9) – but when was the last time you saw one of those? That is how far down the iPhone is.

Samsung is the real threat to Nokia (look at all those amazing phones that Samsung have been putting out). Samsung have been aggressively growing their marketshare year after year, chasing after Nokia. The American community are not talking about that; are they? Why – almost no-one is mentioning it at all!

Apple has got Sharp, RIM, Kyocera, ZTE, Motorola (as bad as they’ve been doing recently), Sony Ericsson, LG, and then Samsung to deal with first – in that order. After catching up with Samsung, Apple will then have to sell three times as much phones as Samsung currently does in order to catch up with what Nokia currently holds. Get the true picture?

In terms of smartphone marketshare, Symbian has 45% and Apple has 15%. Contrary to those who shout the death of Symbian (yes; Symbian has issues and thankfully they are addressing those; but no; symbian ain’t dying), the platform experienced a growth in marketshare in the last quarter of 2009. Growth.

So you get the picture here too, Symbian is as big as the next four smartphone contenders (BlackBerry, iPhone, Windowsphone, and Android) all put together. Ponder on that a bit.

Another often unstated fact: RIM (with 20% of the global smartphone market) is ahead of Apple and has been growing steadily too year after year. RIM understands the game. When they focussed on the small North American market (NAM), they stayed small. A few years ago, they got smart, realising that a love relationship with the NAM is a recipe for staying in the backwaters.

If you really think that America is that vibrant as a mobile market, show me one manufacturer who has largely focused their energy on the North American market and made it big. This is the mistake that Palm made with the older Palm OS. It is the same mistake that they are still making with WebOS. And Apple is walking that same line. But the NAM is the backwaters of the mobile industry. At least for now.

The problem with Americans is that they think that the world revolves around them. In many other different areas; Yes. But in mobile and mobility, an outstanding No. This is one turf they need to wipe the smugness off their faces. It is the same reason why the US blogging community are obsessed with Palm and WebOS, as well as Google and Android. Its an American thing!

Yes; Apple wowed everyone with the iPhone’s user interface. But everyone and their dog now have a fancy user interface – Nokia/Symbian (see a demo of Symbian^3 showing up on phones later this year), LG, Samsung, Sony Ericsson, HTC, et al.

Now, it is the iPhone that is under pressure. The iPhone’s unique selling point is not so unique any longer. Its market appears to have plateaued as well. As things are right now, the iPhone’s marketshare will grow a little more and then stop. This is the time for Apple to change strategies or be content with the small marketshare it currently holds.

But I don’t think that Apple will shift. Its just not their thing. Mac PCs still hold a small PC marketshare till date and are basically US-centric too. That’s Apple. Mostly great products; mostly limited marketshare. That cannot be a company that can actually threaten Nokia’s dominance. Full stop.

Last Line
I am not a Nokia fanboy. As a matter of fact, current Nokia/Symbian devices do not meet my needs. I buy and use devices from any manufacturer and on any platform so long as my current needs are met. Perhaps tomorrow, I may buy a Nokia. Or an iPhone. Who knows?

But truth is sacred. Facts must not be distorted for any reason.

I like the iPhone for what it represents. I am not bashing it. But if we don’t set records straight, we’ll keep living in the Matrix – a world of distorted reality cooked up by Apple and the uninformed American blogging community.

The iPhone is an outstanding device. But basically, it is a device that costs an arm and a leg but with limited functionality and limited availability primarilly in a country that makes up a small percentage of the world’s mobile market, as well as being a country that does not reflect the realities of the rest of the world’s mobile market.

No; the iPhone has never been a threat and is so, so not going to be a threat to Nokia or Symbian. At least, not unless Apple changes its current strategy for something better. Or – God forbid – Nokia decides to abandon the mobile phone business.

The American mainstream media and blogging community – and everyone who is blindly following them – need to pull out their heads out of the sand and face reality. ‘Nuf said.

PS: By the way, I have nothing against the US or Americans. I have American contacts and acquaintances that I deeply treasure, so if you are American, please don’t take this the wrong way.

A shocking $2.5 billion bid by New Generations Telecommunications Consortium (formerly Telefonica) threw competitors off balance to clinch the preferred bidder slot at the financial bid opening for the acquisition of 75 percent of the moribund national telecom carrier, Nigeria Telecommunication Ltd and its mobile arm, MTel.

New Generations Telecommunications Consortium has GiCell Wireless Limited (a nNigerian company), China Unicom (Hong Kong) Limited, and Minerva Group as members.

With this development, the preferred bidder now has to pay $750 million within 10 days from the date of National Council on Privatization NCP approval while the balance is expected within 60 calendar days of the council’s approval.

MTN Nigeria also emerged the sole bidder for SAT-3 with an offer of $25 million, though its offer is still subject to the confirmation of the National Council on Privatisation (NCP) subject to meeting the reserve value for the bids.

Source

Last year, RIM acquired TorchMobile, developers of Iris, a WebKit based browser that was available for Windows Mobile devices till that time. That move seems to be paying off already, as RIM has announced a new WebKit-based browser for its blackberry range of smartphones.

The browser supports:

• HTML 5
• Javascript
• Blackberry & JIL widgets
• Fast panning and zooming
• Proxy technology

And according to Gizmodo, it also scored a perfect 100 in the Acid3 rendering test.

Check out the demo video below:

Source

This effectively takes care of one of the major limitations of the BlackBerry platform – a modern, capable web browser. BlackBerrys just got more attractive to the average smartphone user.

The guys over at MobileCrunch have three videos of Windowsphone 7 series running on an actual device. Here is one:

You can head over to MobileCrunch for more Windowsphone 7 series live action.

BARCELONA, Spain — Feb. 15, 2010 — Today at Mobile World Congress 2010, Microsoft Corp. CEO Steve Ballmer unveiled the next generation of Windows® Phones, Windows Phone 7 Series. With this new platform, Microsoft offers a fresh approach to phone software, distinguished by smart design and truly integrated experiences that bring to the surface the content people care about from the Web and applications. For the first time ever, Microsoft will bring together Xbox LIVE games and the Zune music and video experience on a mobile phone, exclusively on Windows Phone 7 Series. Partners have already started building phones; customers will be able to purchase the first phones in stores by holiday 2010.

“Today, I’m proud to introduce Windows Phone 7 Series, the next generation of Windows Phones,” said Steve Ballmer, chief executive officer at Microsoft. “In a crowded market filled with phones that look the same and do the same things, I challenged the team to deliver a different kind of mobile experience. Windows Phone 7 Series marks a turning point toward phones that truly reflect the speed of people’s lives and their need to connect to other people and all kinds of seamless experiences.”

Designed for Life in Motion
With Windows Phone 7 Series, Microsoft takes a fundamentally different approach to phone software. Smart design begins with a new, holistic design system that informs every aspect of the phone, from its visually appealing layout and motion to its function and hardware integration. On the Start screen, dynamically updated “live tiles” show users real-time content directly, breaking the mold of static icons that serve as an intermediate step on the way to an application. Create a tile of a friend, and the user gains a readable, up-to-date view of a friend’s latest pictures and posts, just by glancing at Start.

Every Windows Phone 7 Series phone will come with a dedicated hardware button for Bing, providing one-click access to search from anywhere on the phone, while a special implementation of Bing search provides intent-specific results, delivering the most relevant Web or local results, depending on the type of query.

Windows Phone 7 Series creates an unrivaled set of integrated experiences on a phone through Windows Phone hubs. Hubs bring together related content from the Web, applications and services into a single view to simplify common tasks. Windows Phone 7 Series includes six hubs built on specific themes reflecting activities that matter most to people:

• People. This hub delivers an engaging social experience by bringing together relevant content based on the person, including his or her live feeds from social networks and photos. It also provides a central place from which to post updates to Facebook and Windows Live in one step.

• Pictures. This hub makes it easy to share pictures and video to a social network in one step. Windows Phone 7 Series also brings together a user’s photos by integrating with the Web and PC, making the phone the ideal place to view a person’s entire picture and video collection.

• Games. This hub delivers the first and only official Xbox LIVE experience on a phone, including Xbox LIVE games, Spotlight feed and the ability to see a gamer’s avatar, Achievements and gamer profile. With more than 23 million active members around the world, Xbox LIVE unlocks a world of friends, games and entertainment on Xbox 360, and now also on Windows Phone 7 Series.

• Music + Video. This hub creates an incredible media experience that brings the best of Zune, including content from a user’s PC, online music services and even a built-in FM radio into one simple place that is all about music and video. Users can turn their media experience into a social one with Zune Social on a PC and share their media recommendations with like-minded music lovers. The playback experience is rich and easy to navigate, and immerses the listener in the content.

• Marketplace. This hub allows the user to easily discover and load the phone with certified applications and games.

• Office. This hub brings the familiar experience of the world’s leading productivity software to the Windows Phone. With access to Office, OneNote and SharePoint Workspace all in one place, users can easily read, edit and share documents. With the additional power of Outlook Mobile, users stay productive and up to date while on the go.

Availability
Partners from around the world have committed to include Windows Phone 7 Series in their portfolio plans. They include mobile operators AT&T, Deutsche Telekom AG, Orange, SFR, Sprint, Telecom Italia, Telefónica, Telstra, T-Mobile USA, Verizon Wireless and Vodafone, and manufacturers Dell, Garmin-Asus, HTC Corp., HP, LG, Samsung, Sony Ericsson, Toshiba and Qualcomm Inc. The first phones will be available by holiday 2010. Customers who would like to receive additional information about Windows Phone 7 Series and be notified when it is available can register at http://www.windowsphone7series.com.

To watch the full replay of Steve Ballmer’s press conference at Mobile World Congress, and to experience Windows Phone 7 Series through an online product demo, readers can visit http://www.microsoft.com/news/windowsphone.

The image at the top of the page is a shot of the new WP7 home screen. Here is a video demo of features of Windowsphone 7 series.

Our Thoughts:
The adoption and enhancement of the zune interface for WP7 is a good move.

We like the concept of hubs. It sounds intuitive, and we hope that it is well implemented. Instead of having to scroll between applications, you simply go to a hub for related apps and services. For example, instead of having to look for the FM radio application, simply go to the Music + Video hub. Any other source of video and music is integrated in there. Smart.

Microsoft seems to be heading in the right direction with WP7. Now, we only have to wait till the end of the year for the first devices.

The Symbian Foundation has unveiled Symbian^3, and we have a video ‘design preview’ of the new user interface for you.

Highlights from the video, embedded at high resolution below, are multiple homescreens, 3D ‘Coverflow’ for music albums, ‘single tap’ direct manipulation UI everywhere, multitouch (pinching, splaying, to zoom) and live visual multitasking (Web OS/Maemo 5-style).

The first set of Symbian^3 devices will show up in the second half of 2010. Enjoy the video:

Via