Here I am again in Heathrow’s Terminal 5. Vodafone has updated it’s advertising as you can see. The current message is ridiculously misleading. Unless, perhaps, I didn’t get the memo. It’s certainly possible.

The message Vodafone wants to get across? European roaming mobile internet can be included in your monthly price plan.

That sounds pretty good doesn’t it? Indeed it sounds like you can finally get rid of the worry of running up crazy amounts of roaming data fees by having it all integrated into a nice, fair price plan. An extra fiver a month, perhaps? If only.
Now then, I haven’t looked at the latest Vodafone offering but long, frustrating experience leads me to assume that — yet-a-flipping-gain — the marketing team at Vodafone has vomited out a beauty. I suspect that when I look closely, I will be able to swap to a price plan that includes, I don’t know, perhaps 50mb of roaming data per month, for an extra tenner? Something like that. Something half useful. Something almost worth considering. Something that enables the marketers to spunk out a different, slightly modified message — but that is wholly pedestrian.

I’d like a few hundred meg included at least. At least. But when ‘unlimited’ data on Vodafone tends to defined as a paltry 500mb, I suspect I’m indulging in wishful thinking.

I would be delighted to be corrected. I’ll have a look at the Voda site later on.

Oh, the suspense. Sent from my BlackBerry wireless device

Posted via email from MIR Live

Related posts:

1. Text from Vodafone: “South Africa now included in Vodafone Passport”
2. How not to buy a Vodafone Nokia N95
3. Vodafone drops data roaming costs by ‘up to 45%’ (sort of)

Look at this. Totally flipping ridiculous. The AA have decided to send me this marketing message. I don’t have a problem with it per se, I did opt-in to receive messages.

My problem is the call-to-action. They want me to phone them. Phone? You mean, like, with a voice?

Why can’t I just hit reply and type ‘yes’? Why do I need to phone up The AA call centre? I can’t be bothered. I don’t have time to give my life story to a (no doubt very nice) call centre agent.

But I would have agreed to the offer if I could have either typed ‘yes’ or visited a secure mobile web page to tape ‘yes’. But phone? And quote a reference? Get with the programme, AA!
Sent from my BlackBerry wireless device

Posted via email from MIR Live

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Continuing our series on BlueVia, we’re back with Jos Valles, BlueVia’s top man. In this segment, I asked him what it’s like working at BlueVia.

For more information on BlueVia, Telefonica’s developer programme, please visit www.bluevia.com.

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1. Jos Valles: The background to BlueVia
2. James Parton introduces BlueVia from Telefonica
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I got some rather eye-popping statistics in from Cable & Wireless today. They talked to over 4,800 consumers and businesses across the UK, India, Spain, Germany and Singapore and ended up with these results:

- Over 42% of Brits check or write emails and 32% doodle while taking part in a conference call

Well, I admit to having done similar. But only when the person on the teleconference is droning on about something I already know. Right?

You’re the same too, yeah?

- 24% of the UK would be happy to deal with a Doctor on a video call

I’m surprised at this one. I have no issue with this. Indeed I’d much prefer a video call with a doctor rather than having to arse around getting to the surgery.

- Over 46 per cent of all respondents from Germany, India, Spain and Singapore check or write emails, while on average 43 per cent surf the net, 17 per cent doodle and 11 per cent have even made another phone call.

Almost every teleconference I’ve been on with more than 5 people seems to feature at least one of the parties having to ‘put himself on mute’ whilst he makes another call. I always find that rather fascinating, given you’re meant to be paying attention to the current call.

Other findings? Heh. Have a read of this one:

- Over a third of respondents in the UK still put on a formal phone voice when answering a call from a number we dont recognise and on telephone conference calls

Heh. Now, I don’t think I do this. But I wonder if, subconsciously, I actually do. Shocking. I think I do.

“Ewan speaking?”

OK let’s talk focus:

- In the UK our concentration and focus on telephone conference calls begins to wane after an average of 23 minutes, but on a video conference call or in a face-to-face meeting our attention span rockets to 35 minutes, putting us on par with Singaporeans who report the longest concentration time on a video conference call at 37 minutes

On a video conference there’s next to no room for staring at the wall, is there? That 23 minute statistic will be heavily relevant to anyone who has to work through 60+ minute teleconferences every week.

- Interestingly, on regular one to one phone calls the average focus in the UK is just nine minutes, a figure our German cousins put to shame with the ability to concentrate for over 16 minutes

This is shocking. Goodness me. Don’t bother with any call longer than 10 minutes in the UK then?

- 87% of Brits claim face to face contact is more likely to lead to a business decision

Aye, I buy that.

- The use of video conferencing solutions in business can save customers at least 25% on their travel costs.

Oh come on, only 25%? And the rest! What about the 12,000 business class flights? x3?

I’ve seen quite a lot of video conferencing services across the years — and the best are the ‘life size’ ones where it really is like being on Star Trek. You feel like you’re actually sitting across the board table from the people in Sydney.

I will need to check out the Cable & Wireless ‘managed video conferencing‘ service and see how that works.

Meanwhile, if you’ve got some 60 minute teleconferences scheduled next week, send the ‘meeting owner’ this post and tell them to keep it to 30 minutes in order to hold the attention of the attendees…

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This is Momchil here wrapping up the discussion on the mighty Nokia N8.

As mentioned before, I am a Nokia supporter and I always use a Nokia as my primary handset. I have been closely following the development of Nokia touchscreen smartphones since the 7710 made it to the market. This leads me to my first point reliability. Every Nokia Ive had, smartphone or not, has always been utterly reliable. The 7710 Ive owned since 2004 still works perfectly despite having been dropped in the pool and suffering numerous substantial impacts. The Nokia N8, being its very distant successor, is also extremely reliable.

The 7710 was relatively unsuccessful in the market for a reason which is no fault of Nokia engineers as the phone was (and still is) amazing. The only problem with the 7710 was that the device was way ahead of its time. Now coming back to the future (Nokia N8), the lesson has been learned. AMOLED screen, HDMI out, USB OTG, 12 megapixel camera, aluminium shell, these are the fundamental components of todays ultimate smartphone. The customer is already used to touchscreens, he has an HDMI compatible TV or monitor at home, he would make good use of the amazing camera and he would know the difference between 12 megapixels with HD video capabilities and the 5 megapixel phone he probably owned before. The market is ready for the N8, and Nokia N8 is already setting standards in the market.

It all ties in Camera, HDMI, USB OTG, 16GB

Start by taking some really impressive high resolution crisp photos with your N8. Make a video or two, or as many as you wish, the 16GB internal memory will handle it. Impress someone at work or at home by connecting the Nokia to a big HDMI flatscreen and playing your clips. Amaze your friends even more by copying the pictures to their USB flash drive, which they happen to carry on their keychain. Enjoy!

Things we take for granted

Amazing sound quality and playback time. The music player is very user-friendly and the 3.5mm stereo jack enables you to plug your favourite earphones. Music playback has been tested at MIR and works perfectly with our huge pair of Sennheiser earphones. The sound was also sharp on our JBL sound system and finally we tested it with a Phillips amplified setup in the 5.1 dolby digital sound mode again fantastic results. A huge advantage of the N8 over competitors products is the ease of music (and video) accessibility. You can just plug the Nokia to your PC in mass storage mode, upload some MP3s and videos, and they will be immediately ready to play. The same applies to USB OTG, just connect your flash drive or external hard drive to the device and it will play anything, yes, instantly, in High Definition, on your HD TV. No need for special PC applications or conversions.

Improvements of the OS

Symbian OS hasnt been so spectacular recently compared to what others have to offer. However, Symbian ^3 is a real improvement to the previous versions of the system. It is much more user-friendly and there has been an enormous effort put into making it more touchscreen-oriented. Take the QWERTY keyboard, for example. It occupies the entire screen, providing more area for each of the buttons, therefore making it easier for the user. There is a much more decent task manager and the menus are more intuitive compared to the N97, for example. Messages appear on the screen as IMs, no need to click Open every time you receive one. E-mail connectivity works really well. The automatic screen orientation feature on my N82 and my N97 was really annoying, I had it switched off. However, on the Nokia N8 it feels really different. It actually works when you need it to. There is a little pause just before the change of screen orientation, to make sure this isnt just a random movement of inclination. In general, Symbian is much better now!

The on-screen clock

I have elaborated on this in my first N8 post: Nokia N8 First Impressions. I absolutely adore this seemingly normal feature. There is an on-screen clock visible at all times when the phone is locked. It doesnt disappear in a minute. You dont have to press a button in order to check the time. Its simply brilliant!

Aluminium and Glass

The scratch and scuff resistant anodised aluminium body speaks of quality, and feels like it. I must add that the phone feels cool most of the times, not like other handsets with powerful processors that might fry your palm. Glass screen, not plastic, feels much better and is more responsive than the N97, for example. Rigidity is a strong quality of the N8, take the micro USB port reinforcement for instance. The very access to the port is integrated into the shell of the phone, which helps support the micro USB plug when connected, unlike many other handsets on which the port is prone to snapping off the mainboard.

The ULTIMATE TEST

The N8 as a portable home entertainment centre?

Here at MIR we decided to put the N8 to the ultimate test. We wanted to use USB OTG, audio and HDMI playback at the same time. How so? We connected a USB wireless mouse/keyboard to the Nokia. We used the HDMI port and placed the handset close to our HD monitor. We linked our JBL audio system in. But first, let’s transfer something from an external hard drive…

Active Ingredients: Nokia N8, USB Hard Disk, USB Keyboard, Bluetooth Mouse, Full HD Monitor

The Nokia N8 as a Portable Home Media Centre

How this worked:

First, connect a USB Hard Drive to the Nokia (or any USB Flash Drive). Browse for videos, copy them to the phone or open them directly.

Connect a Keyboard, it works automatically. Pair a bluetooth mouse, it takes seconds!

Now let’s put this all together. Bring in the Full HD monitor!

Try the browser, connecting to a WiFi is easy enough. Let’s see if the keyboard works… Flawless! The mouse functions are fully integrated and really useful, hold the right button and you have a Task Manager!

FINAL STAGE OF THE TEST

THE PORTABLE MEDIA CENTRE

It works!!! The Nokia N8 really did it! We have a USB keyboard, Bluetooth Mouse, Full HD Video file copied from a USB Hard Drive, Full HD Monitor and a JBL Audio system connected to the Nokia N8 Simultaneously!!!

I can’t express my feelings right now… This device is really, really powerful. In addition it didn’t heat up at all while playing in HD and the battery was charging at the same time too!

WELL DONE NOKIA, I am truly impressed!!!

Related posts:

1. Nokia N8 Second Thoughts
2. Nokia N8 – First Impressions
3. Nokia Big Screen for the N8: Flippin’ Wicked