I was able to test out Nokia Sports Tracker on my run last weekend. The application is free and works with several S60 GPS enabled handsets. It allows you to broadcast your progress live through data services as well as build a work-out diary that you can use to set goals and bench-marks for improvement.
You can see from my workout posted above, I lost my GPS connection a few times (no I can’t run 98kmh!) but all in all it did a great job. After using it with some success, there are two things that come to mind which would be great improvements:
A device specific arm-band: It’s not easy to find a store that carries the N95 let alone any accessories for it. For my initial run I had my phone in-hand which is no good, because I’ll eventually drop it if I keep doing that. There is a lot of useful data that is visualised when you’re in-run (elevation, time, etc..) so you would need an arm-band with use on the go in mind. If anyone knows of one let me know.A heart-rate monitor: Right now I use a basic run of the mill Polar watch and heart-monitor strap. A lot of the gear I use in my gym has Polar compatibility built-in and it would be a great feature to have in SportsTracker. It would be interesting if Nokia released a work-out centered hand set and marketed it toward sports and excercise customer segments, sort of the way Nike does with the iPod. Even with Nike’s limited success, there’s a niche market there that has yet to be exploited to it’s full potential and it’s clear that Nokia sees this.
Believe it or not I hate running and only do so grudgingly to stay fit, but I’m looking forward to my next run and shaving off a few minutes. Feel free to watch along!
According to Engadget Samsung just announced the SGH-L870, a Symbian device which includes… wait for it… the Safari mobile browser. Safari is based on Webkit just like numerous other browsers, including the S60 Browser.
If true, this represents a significant effort by Apple to break into new segments of the market where they have lacked presence on mobile hardware other then the iPhone. This would be a smart move as it’s clearly no longer a 2-3 player desktop only game (Mac, Windows, Linux) for software platforms as mobile platforms continue to gain marketshare. Not to mention the Safari browser has considerable name and brand props that the S60 Browser lacks as I went over in this post.
But sorry, I just don’t buy this. I’m going out on a limb and calling this news as lost in translation. It just is too unlike Apple and I just don’t see Symbian playing nice with another Web-kit browser when they already offer a great one, which by the way supports video and Flash where Safari mobile does not.
An Evening with S60 lands in Boston on Thursday June 5th from 8 PM to 10:30 PM at The Living Room. This all part of Dan Shugrue’s grass-roots marketing campaign to help get the word out to the general population on how open and cool S60 is. There is also the S60 Ambassador program for folks who are looking to enfranchise the public in return for some free Nokia product and accessories.
In other S60 news, AllAboutSymbian has released their latest podcast touching on N-Gage, Maps, and Apple’s impending 3G iPhone release. I’ve been listening to Rafe, Ewan, Stefan, and Steve for awhile now and this podcast series is a must listen for anyone into Symbian and mobile in general.
So the inevitable convergence is happening with Open Screen Project. The program is dedicated to ensuring a consistent rich Internet experience across a broad range of digital screens and form factors including mobile phones, consumer electronics, televisions and personal computers. This move solves quite a bit of the fragmentation issues that Flash was facing across both desktop and device platforms and more clearly indicates how Adobe Integrated Runtime (AIR) will play into the mobile space.
The other big news is that Flash will no longer require licensing. So there will be a more compelling reason for carriers and handset manufacturers to develop and include it in their offerings (are you listening Apple?).
I see two big contributing factors that has led to this program. One was Microsoft Silverlight’s emergence as a player outside the Windows Mobile space on S60, though it’s important to note that Silverlight is indeed a plug-in technology and not a run-time as of right now. Another was Adobe’s Mobile and Devices Business Unit merge with its Experience and Technology group. The re-org obviously positioned them tactically to enact a strategy just like this one where before it would have posed quite a few challenges.
All in all, I see this move as good for developers and consumer alike.
My trip to Nantucket was side-swiped by mother nature. Rainy and freezing, I had foolishly dragged my bike over with me thinking I’d ride the entire island, but it was not to be. But on the ferry ride back, I’m tapping away on my N95 and I look up and think “hey I know that guy from somewhere…”, and then it occurs to me, the ultra-exclusive, invite-only Nantucket Conference was this weekend, attracting people just like him; New England’s top entrepreneurs, investors, and tech executives.
In talking with him, Don was immediately charismatic and conversational, letting me in on some of the great stories he heard at the conference. As a long-time reader of his blog, this confirmed to me his tremendous insight into business and innovation and I was thrilled that he sat down and talked with me for a while. He even gave me his off-the-record opinion on the Microsoft-Yahoo merger melt-down that happened only hours before. Very inspiring conversation indeed
Whether you like Microsoft or not, it’s clear that visionaries like Don are what helps them retain their juggernaut status. Any MBA student (like myself),aspiring entrepreneur, or venture capitalist can stand to learn a lot from his blog here. A favorite post of mine are his thoughts on dividing equity in start-ups.
I went to visit some family this weekend on Nantucket and was able to test out Twipster. Twipster integrates your S60 3rd Edition device’s GPS capabilities to journal your trip using geo-codes images and Google Maps. It allows for some excellent context and provides real-time updates of what, where, and when you see things to the world. It was great to send the link to my 8-year old who couldn’t join me and allow him to vicariously experience my trip.
See my trip for yourself below and if you have a compatible handset, try it out!
Ah N-Gage. I’ll never forget buying an original N-Gage handset as a Flash Lite 1.1. test device when I was a developer. It was an after-thought that it also played cool games like Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater But it was a console model, the hardware was the platform, and ultimately a big failure for Nokia. Not so with the current iteration of N-Gage. And from a business standpoint, it’s brilliant. It’s everything that the old N-Gage wasn’t. Portable, scalable, and looking forward to a future where usability, not hardware is key. Not unlike Nintendo’s path with the Wii. Enfranchise gamers with low cost, low margin hardware that exceeds their expectations with best-in-class game play.
My big gripe (there’s always one), is making it easy. If the N-Gage app isn’t built into your handset, unless you’re a super-geek, you won’t know how to find it. If it is, great, but for the love of god at least make it easy to do business. I say this because I just now tried to buy Creatures of the Deep through my N95 8GB. At the point of purchase, I got an unknown error. So they just lost a sale. It doesn’t matter how good your platform is if you make it so your money-in-hand customers can’t buy your goods.
Still, not to diminish the fact that N-Gage isn’t anything but hot! Fantastic! Awesome business model and revenue potential. But they already blew their wad with the release. If the transactional piece isn’t in place, not to mention a large offering of truly great content, they are out tons of cash and have squandered that very “hotness” that goes along with a unique product launch. Hope they didn’t pull the trigger too soon.
I picked up on this over at Symbian Freak. With FL3 out for a matter of a few months, FL 3.1 will supposedly have the following enhancements:
- Much better browsability than FL3
- Support for h.264 codec
- Flash 9 content will play in FL3.1 as long as it is published as AS2. AS3 engine is not ported to FL3 yet.
The first two are great… just makes more things possible and compatible for the web and video experience in your mobile. The third is interesting, but looks like it will create some confusion for developers. I’m no purist but publishing an AS2 based project in Flash 9 is a little pointless when you can benefit from AS3 and OOP so I don’t think there will be tons of extra compatibility added to the browsing experience. Plus does this mean that content identifying itself as FL9 will error out or not render if published using AS3? We’ll see.
All I can say is there better be an upgrade path for my Nokia N95 8GB.
At the beginning of the year I promised myself that the next handset I would buy would have to have Flash Lite 3 pre-installed and working in the browser. When I heard from Adobe’s Bill Perry that FL3 was shipping on new Nokia N95 8gb models on the heals of the recent N95 firmware upgrade, I pulled the trigger. Cost me a cool $600 shipped with tax but so far, worth every penny. After a year in service, my Nokia 5700 is officially retired.
It’s a truly awesome handset and I look forward to testing out some of Nokia WRT going forward. I’m also loving the Maps program integrated with the onboard GPS. And did I mention 3G networking? It’s all good.
And here’s a shout out to my friend Ugur in Finland from Kuneri. This video done by one of his staff was inspiring to say the least.
