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Saturday, April 9, 2011

This week at The Fonecast: 9th April 2011

Mark Bridge writes:

We head into the weekend with the News of the World admitting voicemail hacking was more widespread than previously thought. Mobile networks had already made it much harder to access voicemail remotely… and now the NotW is saying sorry and preparing to pay compensation.

Talking of illicit activities, British police ‘on the beat’ have been given the ability to identify stolen mobile phones within seconds. Access to the National Mobile Phone Register has been added to the handheld computers used by thousands of officers, thanks to Recipero.

On to other partnerships now, and the biggest news of the week was Vodafone’s decision to sell its stake in French network SFR. What’ll this mean for its Verizon partnership in the USA?  Probably not much in the short-term, to be honest.

In Ireland, Telefonica O2 Ireland and the eircom Group announced a new mobile network sharing arrangement. And here in the UK, Everything Everywhere added another 3 MVNOs to its network. That’ll be a total of 21.

Facebook was talking technical this week. First came an announcement that it was moving to a mobile internet platform that would automatically tailor the appearance of its web site to suit the visiting phone – much like our own mobile site at thefonecast.com – and later in the week it revealed a new server centre in the USA.

Okay, let’s return to basics. Time for some sales figures. In the last few days we’ve seen research that emphasises the growth in ‘smart’ mobile technology. Worldwide cameraphone sales are expected to exceed 1 billion units this year… and almost half the world's new smartphones will be running Android by the end of next year.

Of course, all those smartphones won’t be much use without decent tariffs. This week The Carphone Warehouse stepped into the space already occupied by Three UK and giffgaff by introducing an unlimited internet tariff. At the moment it’s only available for purchases within the next month – but I’m hoping it’s a sign that the bigger networks might also be thinking of relaxing a bit. Well, you never know.


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Opinion Articles

T-Mobile, the Information Commissioner's Office and the stolen customer information

Mark Bridge writes:

The Information Commissioner's Office - the UK authority that upholds information rights - has published details of its recent case involving T-Mobile. Contact information and expiry dates for minimum-term contracts were being sold to third parties, enabling mobile phone dealers to target potential customers who were in a position to sign a new contract... which could earn the dealer hundreds of pounds for a new connection.

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This week at The Fonecast: 11th June 2011

Mark Bridge writes:

On Monday there seemed to be a dearth of mobile news as the industry held its breath and waited for Steve Jobs to speak.

Why there was quite so much breath-holding beats me, because Apple had already told us what the announcement was going to cover. Anyway, we learned about iOS 5, which will arrive in the autumn, and its 200 new features – including a new messaging service called iMessage.

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Interview with Todd Levy about the family-friendly BloomWorlds Android app store

Mark Bridge writes:

Today's best-known stores mobile application stores are the Apple App Store and the Android Market, although independent app stores including GetJar and Handango have been with us for much longer.

And now there's another independent application store preparing to launch. The company behind it is called BloomWorlds – and I spoke to co-founder Todd R Levy for this week's podcast feature.

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Soon, no-one will care about mobile phone numbers - and the networks will love it

Mark Bridge writes:

Watch almost any American TV show from the 1960s - I'd recommend a good police procedural - and at some point after a few episodes there'll be a scene in a restaurant. One of the main characters will be dining and their meal will be interrupted by a waiter bringing a telephone to the table. The phone will probably have an implausibly long cable, although there may be a telephone socket nearby.

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Apple iMessage isn't going to kill SMS

Mark Bridge writes:

Apple iMessage is going to kill SMS. And then, when it's killed it, it'll dance on its grave. Anticlockwise. Whilst mocking every mobile network in the world.

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