Over the past few days the web has been awash with rumours of the HTC Dream, a Google Android phone. Well it looks official now, HTC will be releasing the phone very soon and it may be available as soon as September. It has received F.C.C. certification and T-Mobile the US carrier will be first to have it. No word yet on which Canadian carrier will have it or when.
Even though I have an iPhone now I am eagerly awaiting the reviews for the first Android phones. Competition can only be good for everyone. Apple gave the smartphone industry the kick it needed to start innovating and now things are about to be kicked up a notch with Android entering the scene. HTC also seems really serious about releasing great phones as they have proven with the HTC Touch Diamond which was based on Windows mobile. The UI of the Touch Diamond was nicely designed, but only skin deep, hopefully Android gives them the flexability to really flex their muscle and serve up an even better UI.
Google has also finally released an updated Android SDK today.
Reports around the web are claiming that HTC is still on target for a Google Android based phone by Q4 of this year. It may however take some time for the carriers to get them out once they become available as they will likely want to add their own ugly branding blemishes to whatever cool interface the phones come with. HTC is said to have its own UI which will be different from the Google default UI. They did a great job on the HTC Touch Diamond interface, unfortunately reviews have stated that it is slow and only skin deep. With Android they have full access to the UI and the ability to make any changes they like.
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Del.icio.us version 2, which is now a dots free Delicious (I never used the dots anyway) was publicly launched today. For the longest time this was my favourite ugly site, and wow was it ugly before. It has been completely redesigned and it only takes seconds to appreciate the new design.
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The makers of the incredibly popular Scrabulous application for Facebook were told to remove the application or face legal action by Hasbro, the makers of the original dusty Scrabble board. Hasbro lacking any vision of their own waited until they had their own Scrabble application. Reports are saying that this application is not near as polished as Scrabulous was.
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I have been reading about this new search engine Cuil that is supposedly the biggest search engine on the web, even bigger than Google. It has been billed by some as a “Google Killer”. I think one of the reasons it’s getting so much publicity is because it is run by a team of former Google employees.
The first thing you will notice about Cuil is its unorthodox appearance. The main page is black and the search is centred in the middle.
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Well, the new Blackberry Bold was supposed to be released on July 25. That didn’t happen, but Blackberry News has reported that it should be available at Rogers by the 29th. The Rogers Blackberry Bold web teaser has not been updated yet, but I’m sure it will be soon.
I’m still deciding which smartphone will be my first. Stories of a not so great battery life on the iPhone have held me back, of course having a good data plane here in Canada would have helped sway me. You can also find other country release dates on the Blackberry News website, but it looks as though Rogers will be the first to get it.
So many options just around the corner
The Blackberry Bold is one sweet looking phone, but then so is the iPhone and even Openmoko Neo FreeRunner has a lot of potential. Lets not forget RIM’s touch phone, the Blackberry Thunder which could really shake things up. Then there’s the new Android OS by Google which may show up on HTC phones later this year or early next year.
Update: Blackberry Bold in Canada soon
We have all see it, spam messages in your email, spam on your phone, spam in your blog, forum, social media portal and chat windows. A quick search will show that unsolicited email accounts for 80-90% of the email we receive. This seems high, but a quick glace at my Gmail inbox currently shows a spam box with 3438 emails and Gmail deletes spam that is older than 30 days. By the way, Gmail has an incredible spam filter.
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For the past few months something has been happening in Canada’s telecoms sector; an auction for wireless spectrum licences. The auction is now over and the outcome was more positive than most analysts expected. The Canadian goverment pulled in tripple what they expected, a whopping 4.2 billion. The verdict? This should be good for Canadian consumers and it’s about time. Federal Industry Minister Jim Prentice said,
The industry now has an unprecedented opportunity — thanks to the government’s Advanced Wireless Services policy and auction — to develop products and services that offer choice to Canadian consumers and businesses. We think consumers will be the big winners in this auction.
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I received an email about Protopage Mobile going live today; to be honest I had never heard of it. After looking it over I signed up for an account. The full web version is kind of like iGoogle, but its default setup is sweet, at least for a geek like me. Right away you will get feeds like the BBC, Engadget, Slashdot, Digg, Gizmodo and even a daily Dilbert comic to name a few. They are definitely targeting people like me with this setup. I have only briefly tried the full web version but the screenshots for the mobile version on the Protopage blog look nice.
If I do decide to get a smartphone in the coming weeks I might have to try it out. I’m a huge fan of any web based apps because they free me of being locked down to any one system. I feel that eventually all but the most demanding applications will be hosted online.
So maybe all the protesting over at Ruined iPhone and other places on the web have paid off. The whole iPhone outrage even hit mainstream news media. Basically Rogers and Fido (which are the same company) will allow you to take a phone plan and add a $30 6 GB plan to it. This is a temporary “deal” you can buy into with a 3 year contract before Aug 31st. It is a much better deal, but a lot of people are asking why it’s only temporary?
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