It's like trying to get steam off the polar ice-cap, getting a response from Amazon...

:-(

If I can find something, I will!

---

any idea on what is happening with the Kindle in the UK?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/...usrc=rss&feed=media

Jack Schofield has picked up on USA reports of larger sales. But I don't think there is any announcement on a UK Kindle release.

The Sony Reader is out on Sept 4 in Waterstones. Not a phone as in the Kindle as far as I know. You have to cable up to something else. Will this matter much?

No worries at all. I hope you find it useful.

Matt w: thanks very much for the link to your comparison site. Useful info. I wish there were more like you about here!

Elder Norm: thanks for the post.
Like you, I am a big fan of Bluetooth addons - in theory. In practice they aren't a serious mainstream product.

As a photographer remarked, when asked about which camera was best: "The best camera is the one you have with you. You can't use any other one to take pictures."

Same applies to devices you have to carry around with you. If you don't always have it with you, it has no useful features. Most people carry their phones at all times; few of us carry cameras or keyboards in a spare pocket, just in case.

Slide-out keyboards have a big advantage over the Blackberry style; I agree with you there. On-screen keyboards have many advantages, but the drawback is that they hide part of the screen. For many applications, that's a nuisance. It's a real nuisance, even on a full-screen Tablet PC; on a small-screen phone, it can be a showstopper. Some people won't want it; they will want a pullout keyboard like the one on Sony Ericsson's X1 phone. Others will be happy with the iPhone as it is.

What neither you nor I know, is how many of which there are; the only way to find out, frankly, is to launch the darned thing and see how many it sells. Which is why I've seen prototypes...

Hi Guy, I am an new poster and you may/may not want my type round here!

I read your article Sim-only deals: which is actually best? How do you find out? with interest.

I am trying to get my head around your anti comparison site mentality (yes I do run one).

I agree that for SIM only saving a few pennies doesn't really make sense and as a result we don't push this on our site at all. But for everything else I believe mobile comparison (note that I am not using the work 'price' here) sites can offer loads of value when buying a new phone.

So here is my 20 sec pitch for the reputation of mobile comparison! For me it's about filtering down a vast amount of information to exactly what people need or want. On Omio.com we let users filter mobile deals and phones by features, styles, networks, brands, offers and price. E.g you can see all the mobile deals with free GPS phones at £20 per month. You can't ask a friend or probably even a shopkeeper for that kind of info.

Actions speak louder than words so here is Omio. I am sticking my neck out for a bashing but I feel very strongly that we offer a genuinely useful service for most mobile buyers. You can play with our filters here http://www.omio.com/deals/ or http://www.omio.com/share/YSLHAV (with phones view selected).

Matt
(Proud member of Omio.com!)

I have used the full touch screen 3G smartphone A925 by Motorola since 2003, there are also A1000 an advance model.

Those smartphone works fine without the conventional keyboard, and no worry about any mechanical problem.

How about the future touch screen/pad notebook computer which also does not have a solid QWERTY keyboard, and it only provide a full flat panel with virtual keyboard for text input? Should this new design accept by customers?

Apple 3G iPhone design should be the leading in smartphone operating environment.

What a goof ball!
What a nerd!
What an ultra maroon!

OH wait, I get it. Its a joke. A pun (the lowest form of humor, right?)

A slide out keyboard for the iPhone. Ha Ha Ha. ..... I get it now. :-)

Actually a real keyboard is a great idea. As programs become available to use the power of the iPhone and its real OS, a keyboard will be a great idea. ...... Just not one of those puny tiny things that the BlackBerry uses. Sheeezzzzeee.

Take a look at the bluetooth keyboard that you can get with the Apple units. Its full sized, auto registers , is battery powered and is only slightly larger than the iPhone. If I need to type, I would hope someone (Apple anyone??) updates the OS to allow syncing an apple bluetooth keyboard to the iPhone. And since the iPhone can play movies on a tv, you could set up a small portable 9 inch screen lcd tv to be your screen. They already have those that sync to an iPhone.

Its a mostly done deal and much better than that stupid crackberry thing.

Just a thought.

en

Keyboard iPhone? Never!

There is a real, not imaginary, drawback to the iPhone's on-screen keyboard. Like it or not, the touch-screen is a real step forward in many ways (even if it pinches ideas from Picsel).

But you can't make omelettes without breaking eggs. And what you give up with a keyboard on screen is pretty simple: "Some of the screen is invisible."

If all you want to do is type your name into a dialog box, then who cares? You can see the box. But if you're trying to type something a little more complex, then some people will feel a need to see the screen while they type.

Well, are they right? And if they're wrong, does it matter? What matters is that people buy the iPhone, surely?

"I can't hear you!"

It's not a boat really. No sails. Noisy engine. Wave-piercing hulls (three or them). No wonder they need Sennheiser to provide noise-cancelling headsets for all the crew...

On the right track...

Traincomms... we thought it would all be about WiFi for passengers.

Apparently, that's very low on the list today - or so say delegates to traincomms 08...

---

For a moment, you had me going there!

:-)

Make sure I get the full release. But of course, being a PR group, you guys won't do a proper press release for your own stuff, will you?

...I'll get my coat.

---

Guy, My warmest greeting to you in the name of the Lord. I am writing this letter with due respect and heartful of tears since we have not known or met ourselves previously... oh wait, actually we HAVE!

Thanks for stumbling upon our Museum of Mobility History (MuMoH). We're telling the world about it formally on 4 June, but very happy that you have found it. We'll be putting up a legitimate wiki to allow people to post information about their own favorite mobility relics. People can see our blog at www.mumoh.com/blog and the wiki will be up at /wiki (and everything can be found through our home page at www.mumoh.com).

Thanks for giving us some early publicity!

Nice to see you commenting! Hope I didn't spoil the chance of a good dinner by mentioning the possibility in public...

:-)

Thanks Guy, honoured to be mentioned on your blog. Funnily enough I have had 2 invitations to lunch from Qualcomm and one invitation to a phone conversation. The phone conversation and one of the lunches were later cancelled. The other (excellent) lunch was eaten, but no reasonable answer to any of the usual criticisms of Qualcomm was put forward.
So maybe, as you suggest, San Diego is beginning to take some of the criticism to heart.
All the best,
David

Edited by author 04-14-2008 07:29 AM

How to spy on your kids...

You give them a "perfectly ordinary phone" and then...

I mean, is this a serious suggestion?