I often think about the rather abysmal battery life in my mobile devices. You know, the Smartphones, the Tablets, the laptops, what have you. There are several ways to look at this, but two are useful:

• We need bigger batteries
• We need electronics that consume less power

If you think about it, both statements are absolutely true. Bigger batteries mean more absolute power is available for use. On the other hand, more efficient power use allows you to do more with the same absolute quantity of power.

Look at successive generations of Apple’s iPhone. Each handset does more faster than the previous generation handset did with roughly the same overall battery size (and life). This is accomplished by a combination of greater efficiency and marginally larger battery.

This thought has occurred to me again as I read about T-Mobile USA’s plans to use their anemic spectrum holdings differently, which will allow them to deploy an LTE as good as their competition with only a modest increase in spectrum–spectrum they received from AT&T as a consolation prize for the failed AT&T/T-Mobile merger.

It certainly makes me question AT&T’s statements about mobile bandwidth scarcity. Or Comcast. Or any other ISP or Telco for that matter.

Back in the days of dialup Internet access, I listened to streaming audio thanks to technologies like RealAudio and TrueSpeech. They made excellent use of the very limited bandwidth to allow me to hear audio streamed over my dialup modem. Technology allowed me to make the best of our limited bandwidth, turning my scarcity into abundance.

And then I think about areas outside of North America and Europe where traditional desktop and laptop computers are common. I’m talking about places like Nigeria where most the closest thing many people have to a computer is a mobile phone–a phone through its limited interface and even more limited data networks that many people access the digital world.

Which makes me think we are trying to bridge the digital divide in the USA all wrong. Rather than bringing expensive Internet with expensive, complex computers to the poorer masses, why don’t we bring them capable mobile phones backed by a strong wireless network with compelling mobile services? What do you think?

I had some more thoughts on Nokia’s entire strategy with gutting Symbian and Meego and switching everything to Windows Phone and their Lumia handsets. It is related to Tomi Ahonen’s excellent post about how Nokia Lumia handsets are not being sold by operators.

There is clearly a perception that the Lumia 800 is a “flagship” device. Especially for consumers who haven’t heard much from Nokia lately under than about Lumia. That’s not entirely true as Nokia has also been pushing their Asha devices. I find them quite compelling from a form, functionality, and pricing standpoint (especially the Asha 302). I’d buy one if they were sold in the US, which, sadly, they’re not.

Anyway, Tomi’s assertion in his article–which I agree with, by the way–is that people expecting certain features to be present in “flagship” devices will be truly disappointed when they pick up a Lumia device, either immediately or shortly after they take it home. In fact, even in its current iteration (7.5 “Mango”), Windows Phone seems a bit like iPhone 1.0, which also lacked many smartphone features. That didn’t stop people from buying it in bucketloads.

Personally, I think Windows Phone 7 is targeted at people upgrading from featurephones, which don’t have a lot of the features that are missing on Windows Phone. People who aren’t accustomed to “smartphone” features aren’t going to notice those features are missing, thus may not complain and return the device.

This highlights just how risky Nokia’s strategy truly is. They gutted their high-end phones (Symbian, Meego, etc) and opted to replace it with an yet-unproven “smartphone lite.” Meanwhile, the rest of the market is clearly pushing towards smarter phones, not dumber ones.

From Communities Dominate Brands: Disappointed Buyer = Returned Lumia = Salespeople Avoid = Growing Nokia Retail Problem:

MTV3 the Finnish TV broadcaster and news service ran a secret test of the Finnish handset retailers in the Helsinki and Tampere regions the two largest cities of Finland. They sampled two stores from each of the three mobile carriers/operators, and two stores from the two largest independent phone resellers. The MTV3 journalists pretended to be normal consumers and visited ten stores and every time asked to see Nokia Lumia smartphones. In six out of ten stores, the sales people showed only rival phones Androids mostly by Samsung when the consumer asked for Nokia Lumia !!! In another two cases the sales person came with several phones rather than just the Lumia and offered immediately a series of handsets to compare. Only in two cases out of ten, did the sales person show a Lumia on first request. Every store had the Lumia on display and in stock and the news story makes the point, that in most stores Lumia had the biggest sales displays at prominent places.

Tomi Ahonen, as usual, is spot on in his analysis of Nokia. This passage is buried pretty deep into his several thousand word posting, but it pretty much summarizes how Nokia is doing in their transition to a Windows Phone device manufacturer–namely, not good.

If they’re having that much trouble getting the operator stores to sell Nokia Lumia phones in Finland, where they’ve historically had over 85% of the the market, imagine how bad it is elsewhere.

From Telecoms Groups Fight Back Against Free Messaging – ABC News:

Needless to say, mobile companies are not happy at the flood of free messaging services piggybacking their networks. Telecom Italia SpA chief executive Franco Bernabe told MWC that free messaging services are undercutting the ability of phone companies to invest in their networks. Paid texting, or SMS, has been a cash cow for phone companies that uses minimal network capacity.

The new “players have based their innovation in the mobile domain, without a deep understanding of the complex technical environment of our industry. This is increasingly creating significant problems to the overall service offered to the end user and driving additional investments for mobile operators,” Bernabe said.

After years of study, the big telecommunications operators announced this week that they will try to fight back by introducing software this year embedded in new cell phones that will allow users to do the same sort of Internet-based messaging and voice calls that consumers want without paying separate fees.

Actually, if the telecoms had half a brain, they could easily compete with these so-called free texting services without spending a dime. It’s called lowering the cost of existing SMS services.

See, one of the reasons I personally like SMS is that, for the most part, it just works. Anywhere. On any phone. Even in areas without data networks or where data networks are congested. SMS just works.

Surely the operators can always do more to make sure SMS is reliable and that messages are delivered in a timely manner. That’s a minor incremental cost, plays to the telecoms strengths–running a network–and doesn’t require getting into areas telecoms are notoriously weak, i.e. in building add-on services that people will actually use.

I guarantee you, if SMS were super cheap, like under a $0.01 USD a message, with international SMS no more than $0.02 USD, and no more than $5 USD for unlimited texting, few would bother with these competitive texting offerings. The operators still get revenue, albeit not the kind they currently get off SMS, but it’s better than the zero revenue they get when the alternatives are used.

I’m just going to come right out and say it: most of my personal computing is done on a mobile device. A mobile device being a tablet or a phone either with WiFi or some kind of mobile Internet connection. This is despite being surrounded by more conventional laptop and desktop computers. Note this does not count my work-related use of computers, which, unfortunately, is still tied to a more conventional laptop.

It’s hard to know when the tipping point happened for me. Likely when I started getting more capable smartphones from Nokia, whom employed me at the time. Surely I had experienced the various Communicator-style devices (I had a 9210, a 9300, and a 9500). However, the two most pivotal devices for me: The Nokia E70 and the Nokia N95, which is the middle of 2006. I still have (and occasionally even use) the Nokia N95, even though by today’s standards, it’s only marginally more functional than a featurephone.

Of course in those days, Smartphones were not entirely accesible to the masses. Sure, they were obtainable in the sense you could go to any operator and buy one. But then what? Most people had no clue how to use them. Why else do you think the US operators had no problem selling unlimited data packages? Because no one was really using them (except for a few of us).

Then something changed: the iPhone came on the scene. While the first iteration of the iPhone OS (now called iOS)  was arguably less functional than smartphones of the day, it quickly became the smartphone that everyone in the developed world wanted. It raised the bar for what the user experience should be on a phone.

Then Google-backed Android came on the scene and, after a few iterations, became a credible alternative to the iPhone. Microsoft, being a bit late to the party, completely redoes their mobile operating system. Nokia’s Symbian, the long-time leader in the smarphone space, could not keep up with the level of innovation Google and Apple were cranking out and, eventually, Nokia announced their plans to sunset the operating system and go with Windows Mobile. RIM, maker of the Blackberry handsets, have also struggled to keep pace and have stagnated.

It’s pretty clear to most industry observers (and even lay-people) that Android and iOS are the dominant phone operating systems. But it’s more than that: it’s now mobile computing. The same popular smartphone operating systems are now available in a different form factor device: tablets. And, as a number of industry analysts are saying, tablets are the new personal computers.

Apple led the way again here by introducing the iPad, using the same OS used on the insanely popular iPhone. A number of other hardware manufacturers have tried (and failed) to duplicate the success that Apple has had with the iPad using Android. The only manufacturer having any success is Amazon, who introduced the Kindle Fire at the end of 2011. Even their numbers are anemic compared to what Apple sells, but they have something the other tablet makers don’t have: a thriving ecosystem on which to use the device. Remember, Amazon sells all kinds of digital goods in much the same way Apple sells them through iTunes and the App Store.

Why do people prefer to use mobile devices rather than traditional computers? For me, it’s always been: because the device is always with me and connects me to what matters most. Even if it’s not a full experience, it’s often good enough.

For other people, it’s that these mobile devices are easier to use than traditional PCs. This is partially due to the easier-to-use touch interfaces on the current generation smartphones and tablets. There is also less for the average person to “screw up” as well, making for a less intimidating experience.

For another class of people, it’s because they can’t afford the PC and everything it takes to make it operate. This is certainly true in less affluent nations, such as Nigeria.

I had an interesting conversation over Twitter with Yomi Adegboye AKA Mister Mobility (he’s well worth following at @Mister_Mobility). It confirmed this hypothesis. Of course, during the 10 years I worked at Nokia, I took every opportunity to read up on everything Nokia was doing, including how they were developing phones for places like India and Africa. My hypothesis was already well informed.

In these less affluent nations, many people don’t even have electricity. Or if they do, it is supplied by a generator of some sort. Wired phone service may or may not exist (if it does, it is surely expensive for voice service, much less data service). The infrastructure needed to operate a PC may be entirely out of reach.

Meanwhile, while even a basic mobile phone is out of reach for some, that, a SIM card, and an occasional source of power is all one needs to compute and stay connected. For these folks, their mobile phone is their only computing device. Not because they prefer it, but because that’s what they are able to obtain.

There is no doubt in my mind that computing is going mobile. Will more traditional computers go away? While I expect my children won’t even need to own a traditional computer when they are young adults, the traditional computer will likely never go away entirely.

There is always going to be a need for bigger screens and more horsepower than you can pack into a device that lives in your pocket. Especially by people who generate large amounts of content. Will that be the norm for the average person, however? No.

See also Mister Mobility’s take on moving away from traditional computing.

There’s been an interesting debate going on about the state of blogging lately. Jeremiah Owyang kicked off the most recent debate when he declared The Golden Age of Blogging Is Over in where he says that at least the tech blogosphere is maturing and changing as the result of a number of factors. 
 

The funny thing about blogging is that it’s a new name for something I’ve been doing for 15 years or so: putting content on a website for other people to use and comment on. I am best known for a series of Frequently Asked Questions I wrote about the Check Point firewall products over a period of about 8 years. After that, I changed my focus to something more fitting to my nickname: telecoms, VoIP, mobile phones, gadgets, etc.
 

Blogging, both for myself and others, became a real serious business. That is the main point of Owyang’s piece, really. It was a business I thought I wanted to be in at one time, which is why I decided to join Creative Webblogging back in the day. I went through a period of time where I was blogging daily. Multiple times a day, in fact. I generated a lot of content. Both on my own site and for several of the blogs for Creative Weblogging. 

During that time, I saw a lot of the same ideas over and over again, hashed and rehashed. Both in the products I was covering and the people talking about them. It’s not called an echo chamber for nothing and I simply got tired of contributing to it. The money I was making was not commensurate with the effort required to generate content. The payoff simply wasn’t there.
 

I also experienced a significant change to my personal situation in 2008 related to my job at Nokia. The end result is that I now work for Check Point Software, the company my personal brand has been most tied to over the years. This necessitated a change in focus for me–back to the very thing I was best known for, albeit with the backing and support of Check Point.
 

While I have a number of roles at Check Point, the most visible one is being an advocate for Check Point in the “social media” space. I created our Twitter, Facebook, and Google+ presence and actively participate there. I answer questions on two externally run forums about Check Point proudcts and services. 
 

That isn’t to say I haven’t blogged about VoIP, telecom, mobile phones and the like. I occasionally blog about my employer as well. That said, I do not feel the need to say something on my blog every day. I am a lot more deliberate about what I decide to blog about and when. It has to be something unique or something I can provide a unique insight, perspective, and opinion on (to borrow a phrase from Andy Abramson).
 

I tend to express quick thoughts about a number of things on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, and others. Thoughts that, some time ago, I would have turned into a blog piece. Is that the right approach? I’m not sure. 
 

The one thing I do miss from the earlier years was the sense of community we had. While we independently put our words out there for all to see, we did exchange and play off each other’s ideas. That was fun. There is some of that going on today on Twitter, etc., but it’s not the same.

 

Rest assured, I will continue to provide my unique insight, perspective, and opinion. I may not do it as often as I used to on as many things as I used to, but you can be assured when I do, I’ve got something worth reading about something worth knowing about.

It’s no secret that a number of outlets are reporting that the Nokia Lumia 710 will launch on T-Mobile USA sometime in January. This phone is one of two devices Nokia has produced with Windows Phone 7 on it (the other being the higher-end Lumia 800), which were initially made available outside the US in November. 
 
Being an ex-Nokia employee for nearly 3 years now, and not being among the smartphone reviewing elite that companies regularly send handsets to for view, I haven’t seen this device up close and personal yet. That said I’ve heard and read a number of reviews of the device that suggest that it is a respectable device for the price point. Having used Nokia handsets for more than a decade, I have no reason to doubt those assessments. 
The chatter I’ve seen on Twitter suggests people are excited about Nokia’s return to the US smartphone market, even if it is on the weakest of the largest carriers and not their “best” Windows Phone device they have. You have to start somewhere, I suppose. 
 
I read an interesting statement on The Verge about how T-Mobile is positioning the Lumia 710 against other smartphones: “against first-time smartphone buyers.” In other words, they are betting the Lumia 710 will be big among people buying smartphones for the first time. 
 
It’s great that Nokia’s getting back in the US Smartphone game with the Lumia 710, but let’s face it: the real barrier to adoption isn’t the price point of the handset itself, it’s the cost of the monthly service plan required to operate it. 
 
If you wanted an iPhone and hadn’t yet bought one, you can get the 3GS for free on a two year agreement with AT&T. The iPhone 4 can be had on Verizon and AT&T for $99 with a two year agreement. You can find Android handsets at similar price points on all operators. 
 
Handset cost for a subsidized smartphone is really not that much of an issue. It’s a one-time cost most people can absorb or save their pennies for. The much harder pill to swallow is the additional $15-$30 per line per month (in addition to a $40 voice plan) that is required when you buy a smartphone from a major US carrier. That’s a price you have to pay even if you choose to pay full price for the handset. 
 
Until the operators restructure their service offers to make the overall cost operating a smartphone on their network cheaper, I don’t expect to see a massive uptick in smartphone adoption–here in the US or anywhere else. 
 
And as for Nokia kick starting Windows Phone 7 sales, I doubt it. They’ll bring in some incremental improvements to their overall market share numbers, but I don’t see this phone on the weakest of the four national networks being the one that breaks open the market for Windows Phone 7.

Every laptop comes with some method for hooking up to a computer monitor. On PC laptops, it’s a VGA connector. On Macs, it’s whatever version of DisplayPort Apple is using these days. Some might have HDMI ports–heck, phones and tablets certainly do. 
 
Getting a computer hooked up to a modern TV is not nearly the ordeal it used to be. My Visio has a VGA plug on it, making it really easy to hook up to any computer. So one wonder why you might need a device like the UltraAV USB 2.0 to HDMI Adapter from Accell? 
 
The problem with VGA: it’s an analog connection which means you can’t play back any videos with DRM. Also the video may not be as crisp and clear as you might get with a digital connection. You also would need a separate connection for audio. You might also not have a TV with VGA. Or, if you have one of those really thin laptops, no video output ports at all! 
This USB 2.0 adapter solves that problem. Every modern computer has at least one USB port (whether it’s free or not is, admittedly, another matter). The device will work with any PC or Mac and includes a driver disc. Unfortunately, my PC laptop has no optical drive, so I opted for downloading them from the provided URL–interestingly not Accell’s site.
 
I tested the adapter, which was provided to me as part of this review, using a Lenovo X201 laptop and my 40″ Visio TV. Once I loaded the drivers and plugged in the adapter into my laptop, my big screen was now a monitor that Windows could mirror or extend my desktop to. I played a few videos to test the adapter and everything worked as expected.
 
You can get a UltraAV USB 2.0 to HDMI Adapter from Amazon or other places for $99.99. 

Every once in a while, a new app comes along that provides a fresh approach to something. For me, Path is doing this for Social Networking. Instead of encouraging to share with as many as possible, it’s encouraging me to share more to fewer people.

According to Path’s website, path is a smart journal that helps you share life with the ones you love. It actually began its life about a year ago as a photo sharing service similar to Instagram with one major limitation: you can only share with a limited number of people. This started out as 50 but was increased to 150. Compare 150 friends with Facebook’s limit of 5000 or Twitter’s unlimited.

From a feature standpoint, there is nothing new in Path. It’s an Android and iPhone app where you can share your thoughts, photos, where you’re at, who you’re with, and what you’re listening to. Rather than being called a status update, though, it’s called a moment. Aside from sharing to your friends in Path, you can also share individual moments with your Twitter or Facebook friends and check-in on Foursquare. You can also be completely private, if you prefer, and show a moment to absolutely no one.

One unique feature I haven’t seen on any app so far is the ability to do an “awake/sleep” post. It automatically posts an “awake” or “sleep” message with time, location (specific to neighborood.city), temperature, and if you’re waking up, how long you slept. It’s a nice touch.

Finding friends is pretty simple. You can use your address book, your Facebook contacts, friends of friends, or just a regular search box. Select whom you want to share your path with. If they confirm you as a friend, you will be able to access each other’s path and your activities will appear in each other’s timeline.

The timeline view is well done. Scrolling is quick and easy. You can see how many people saw a particular moment (and who). You can react to a moment with one of five emoticons: happy, laugh, surprise, sad, or love. You can post a comment of your own. You can see when people become friends with one another.

The iPhone and Android applications are nearly identical, though the Android version is missing a couple features: the ability to share on posts on Twitter and utilize Instragram-like photo filters. Edit: Version 2.0.2 of Path on Android adds support for sharing posts on Twitter.

As I said, none of this is new. Many social media applications do all of these things. Arguably, these things can be done better on existing, well-established platforms.

This isn’t about features, though. It’s about the experience. The experience reminds me of something I used long ago on my Nokia S60 phones–Jaiku. Jaiku had at least some of these features and was tied to a Nokia S60 handset. As far as a social networks go, it had a very intimate feel.

Path definitely has that same intimate feel. By keeping the service phone-only and not providing the ability to share other things like web pages, or allowing you to import content from other services, you really only see moments that people make a conscious effort to share on the service. This keeps the noise relatively low. The upper limit on the number of friend forces you to be a little more choosy about whom you want to be friends with.

I really like Path. It’s clearly not for everyone as you have to have an iPhone or Android device to even use the service. That said, it provides me a new, fun way to share my life with others and be a part of other people’s lives. I wish there was an iPad version of the app, but that’s my only serious complaint. You can download it from the respective App Stores for Android and iOS:

• Path for Android
• Path for iPhone

I like my iPad 2. I really do. While it’s not perfect, I have a significant investment in the Apple iTunes universe. I could get it with WiFi and 3G. It does most of what I need. In many ways, it is the replacement for my personal computer, even if it does have some restrictions.

So, one wonders, why did I decide to spend a couple hundred more dollars and buy a Kindle Fire? Especially for a device like the iPad, is tied to an ecosystem I am not heavily invested in?

A number of reasons. First of all, the price tag. $199 is quite compelling. It’s the kind of thing I see more people buying than an iPad, which has a minimum entry price of $499. It’s smaller than an iPad: 7 inches instead of 10, which will affect how one might use the device. Third, it is tied to a well-established company with nearly as compelling of an ecosystem as Apple. I have no doubt Amazon will introduce other Kindle Fire-type devices in the future and the first generation Kindle Fire will improve with additional software updates.

So how does the Kindle Fire measure up? Hit the break for my thoughts.

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