Today is a hell of a big news day. Lots going on from all corners of the globe it feels.
Apple
iPhone: New unlocked 3G iPhone is rumoured to be launching with Telecom Italia Mobile (TIM) an Italian mobile network provider soon. Everyone has pretty much assumed that Apple would launch a new iPhone in June 2008 like they did last year.
According to MacRumors reader grigio, the main points are as follows:
- Direct introduction of UMTS-capable 3G iPhones on the Italian market, skipping the current 2G version.
- No revenue sharing, instead a higher selling price.
- No permanent exclusive distribution by a single operator. Instead, TIM will be given the right to distribute the iPhone with some months of advance with respect to its UMTS competitors.
Google
iGoogle Googles ‘virtual desktop’ is slowly morphing into a social application. Developers who leverage Google’s OpenSocial to create cross-platform social applications can also widgetise their application to work with iGoogle. Want to throw food at a friend? You can now use iGoogle for this nonsense too.
The plan will allow unlimited calls to land-line phones in 34 countries for $9.95 per month, said Don Albert, vice president and general manager for Skype North America.
The countries encompassed include most of Europe, plus Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Chile, China, Singapore, Taiwan, Japan, Korea and Malaysia.
Calls to domestic land lines and cell phones are included as well, as are calls to cell phones in Canada, China, Hong Kong and Singapore, but not cell phones in other countries.
Sony
Sony delays their competitor to Second Life et al for the second time until late 2008 and the talk is that they won’t even offer a general release at that time only a ‘Open’ beta. Too bad for Sony because when I read about this product last year I felt it was leading edge, but the market is evolving and their lead is shrinking.
Nokia
Today Nokia has release two new music mobiles a Nokia 5320 and 5220. They have also finally signed Sony BMG to their free music service dubbed by ‘Nokia Comes With Music‘. This follows on speculation for the last few months that Sony would sign and this is on the heels from an earlier announcement from Universal Music. 
These two giants currently (April 2008) make up over 50% of all music released so this is good news for Nokia’s mobiles for music strategy.
Ping THIS!
| 
On FriendFeed, this post was liked by 0 people and commented on 0 times 
{ 1 trackback }
{ 0 comments… add one now }