Tag Archives: smartphones

At the end of July, I went searching for a new smartphone. (I’m still searching, by the way.) I visited every store, but at the Verizon store, I had a prolonged discussion with one of the managers. I wanted wi-fi on my phone (and I didn’t necessarily want Windows Mobile). Not surprisingly, I was attracted to one of the Blackberry phones, but it was without wi-fi. The manager and I went back on forth on why I did/didn’t need it. In fact, he tried very hard to convince me that there was no need for wi-fi when you have the Verizon 3G service.

So my thanks today to Om Malik, who has written an excellent post on exactly why I need wi-fi on my mobile device. Quite frankly, it helps me to be more mobile.

It all comes down to this – whether we’re using an iPod Touch, a netbook, a laptop, or a Blackberry, we’re using portable devices to access the Web no matter where we are. We can be in a park, a coffee shop (as I am right now), our home, or in an airplane. Om got some statistics from his neighborhood wi-fi net provider, Meraki:

First, some stats from the census that compared the devices that accessed Meraki access points in 2008 and 2009:

• The number of Apple devices observed, including laptops, iPhones and iPods grew by an impressive 221 percent.
• Apple now represents 32 percent vs. 14 percent in 2008 of all the devices seen by Meraki networks in North America.
• The number of smartphones (handheld devices) has quadrupled over the past year, with RIM showing a gain of 419 percent.
• The number of people using Intel-based devices declined 11 percent, which tells me that more people are using smartphones vs. laptops.

That last stat is key for me. Intel-based devices declined 11% in a year, which means there are more smartphones accessing this particular net than laptops. That’s fantastic growth, and should be a key indicator for wireless carriers. Their phone must access the Internet with more than just the 3G option.

An AdMob report from Feb 09 shows that smartphone usage increased from 25% to 33% in the previous 6-month period. Even the recession couldn’t stop us from investing in smartphones. According to PC Week, the number of smartphone users in 2007 doubled from the previous year. If that was 2007, can you imagine 2010?

Heading out? Don’t forget that computer in your pocket. And Verizon Manager Guy? Check out the stats and let me know if you still think I don’t need wi-fi on my phone.

Photo Credit (via Creative Commons)

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Cheers!

Tweet Michelle @writetechnology, send her technology news at michelle[at]writetech[dot]net, visit her wine blog when you’re thirsty, and drop by her day job.

by Michelle Lentz

There’s a fair amount of buzz about the Palm Pre launch and when it might actually occur. You see, the closer we get to June, the closer we get to the iPhone 3.0 announcement, which will turn all the blogs into all-iPhone-all-the-time. Based on previous years, it will again be all-iPhone-all-the-time in July when the new iPhone launches. (I’m sort of glad I’ll be on vacation in July.)

By continually avoiding release date talk, other than “first half of 2009,” Palm seriously risks losing a lot of marketing time to the latest iPhone launch. Apparently, a lot of folks expected the Pre to launch last week. The next guesstimated date is May 17. Mid-may would at least give Palm a couple weeks of attention before all eyes shift to Apple.

Both Palm and Sprint need the Pre to help revive their flagging businesses. According to AdAge, Sprint & Palm have enough problems without creating new ones:

Survey results released by ChangeWave last week suggest that the Pre will have to deal with Sprint’s image problem as a second-tier carrier with poor customer service. In a survey of 4,292 cellphone owners, 17% said Sprint is the top reason they will not consider the Pre. Incidentally, the same percentage said they won’t buy an iPhone because of AT&T. But Sprint is no AT&T. It’s struggling to keep its 49 million customers, while its bigger rival is growing its 77 million subscriber base.

I fall into that latter category by the way, I’m itching to get my hands on a Palm Pre and leave my horrid AT&T service (and equally bad customer service) behind. AT&T is apparently a little worried too – and they’re just good sales people. An internal AT&T document has leaked that provides talking points on how the iPhone is better than the Palm Pre. I would beg to differ with a couple of the points, but at least AT&T has talking points. I have my fingers crossed that, upon release, Sprint sales folks can tell me how the Pre is better than my iPhone and how to effectively sync the Pre with my Mac.

A recent post by 24/7 Wall Street lists Palm as one of the 12 brands most likely to disappear in the next year, partially because of its partnership with Sprint.

Recent research shows that almost no one who owns an Apple (AAPL) iPhone or RIM (RIMM) Blackberry will switch to the new smartphone, so Palm will have to essentially expand the market to get share for its new device during a recession.  The “Pre” will also be sold exclusively though Sprint (S), the No.3 cellular carrier in the US which has been losing subscribers consistently for more than two years. The launch of the “Pre” is a disaster in the making.  … The bottom line is that Palm has no chance of getting an even modest part of the smartphone market in a severe economic downturn since it competes with two of the premier technology companies in the world—Apple and RIM. Palm won’t be in business in a year.

Palm is expected to drive the advertising and has hired Modernista for the campaign. (Modernista did the “Skittles thing” before Skittles did.) But I wouldn’t put Sprint out for advertising either. One of my favorite commercials at the moment, one that I’ll stop the DVR and watch, is the new Sprint commercial with the 3-D Twitter birds, some humor, and the shot of the Pre at the end.

What do you think Palm and Sprint’s chances are?

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Email: michelle[at]writetech[dot]net
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by Michelle Lentz

The tech/gadget world has been all a-twitter (literally) about the new Palm Pre. Like everyone else, I had pretty much written off Palm as far as Smartphones go. I even routinely make fun of my husband’s clunky Treo (regardless of the fact he has better reception than my iPhone). This was silly of me. After all, Palm was one of the early companies out there. Apple’s Newton failed rather spectacularly, but along came the Palm Pilot and things changed. I had two or three different Palms over the years, as recently as five years ago.

I gave up the Palm for a Blackberry when I realized that a Palm, a phone, and an iPod in my purse was one gadget too many. That was followed by the iPhone, which miraculously reduced me to one gadget. Yet I often pine for the keyboard on my Blackberry. I’m one of the few, it seems, to have never quite taken to the virtual keyboard on the iPhone. My contract is up this year and I was seriously considering investigating other services and other phones. The Android was tops on my list, followed by the Storm, but now I think the Pre may be pushing all those others aside.

Palm debuted the Pre (prounounced “pree” – there’s a line over the e that WordPress doesn’t like) at CES this week. Since then, several different gadget bloggers have had the opportunity to get up close and personal with the phone. Interestingly, Palm won’t let any of the bloggers actually touch the phone, but they’ve tried. No price has been set on this innovative new smartphone and the release date is sometime in the first half of this year. So they’ve got some time to work out bugs and settle on competitive pricing.

The new phone runs Linux, has an accelerometer like the iPhone, touch screen capability and a pull out keyboard. Apparently the toolbar is a really cool feature, and the speaker is fairly loud. The applications are all fairly solid, from what I’ve read, and your contacts have information pulled in from their social network profiles. That’s small, but impressive. My favorite? System wide cut and paste.

I’m curious to know how well it will sync with a Mac and just as important, and often forgotten, is it a decent phone?

My favorite video so far is the one from our friends at Boing Boing Gadgets, so I’ve embedded it here.

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Contact Michelle with news, stories, events, and more.
Email: michelle[at]writetech[dot]net
Twitter: @writetechnology
Friendfeed: michellel
Blogs: Write Technology, Wine-Girl.net