iPhone Enlargements!!

Every now and then we see something we didn't expect but that when we think about it is obvious.

Today we found a host of iPhone accessories which demonsrate why the likes of Kodak have left the room.

60X Magnification Mini Digital Microscope with LED Head Light and UV Light for iPhone 4 just $14.49



Long Focal Lens Tripod Set for iPhone 4S/4 Just $29.99



Telescope 6X Zoom Camera + Case Holder for iPhone 4 / 4S Just $11.67

Perhaps the immortal Mae West would now have said,'Is that a iPhone in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me?'

Click to see more from miniinthebox.com

Samsung and Apple Lock Horns

We handed in our old and trusty HTC Hero Android last week which now some two years on is showing its age. We looked hard at what was on offer from operating systems, hardware and networks and choose not to wait for Ice cream sandwich and choose the Samsung Galaxy S 2 running gingerbread. It isn’t until you actually get your hands on the latest Samsung technology that you appreciate the real threat they pose to Apple today.

In just a handful of days, iPhone users who have seen my smartphone have been taken aback and old iPhone users are clearly jealous. The thing that won it over the other Android for us was the quality and size of the AMOLED screen and its lightness and thin profile. The thing that won it over the iPhone was the growing position and offer of Android. We didn’t consider the others as serious contenders. Samsung also offers the tight integration of many apps and superb communications. It even came preloaded with the majority of apps and social services we use including BBC iPlayer which is as good as watching TV and of course for us free Sykpe, GTM app and much more.

Samsung is now locked in patent wars in some 10 countries with Apple and its isn’t the one way traffic some would have you believe. Samsung is trying to even ban sales of Apple's latest iPhone on alleged patent infringements in Australia, Japan, France and Italy. Apple has preliminary injunctions against some Samsung products in Australia, Germany and the Netherlands, and is trying block US sales of some Samsung models. Samsung has also appealed against an Australian court's decision to block the sale of Samsung's Galaxy Tab 10.1 tablet and a full court hearing is scheduled for later this month.

The battle is not just about phone patents but also tablet ones too as these two giants tussle for what is a huge global market. To top it all and little know to many, is the fact that even Apple buys chips and displays from the South Korean giant!

We now have the smartphone market growing by some 42% year-on-year in the third quarter and shipping some 115.2m units. Smartphones continue to not only outsell PCs, but the gap is growing. In just three years since its launch Android now powers 52.5% of handsets shipped, which is staggering, given this was just 25.3% only a year ago. Samsung claims to have shipped more smartphones in the third quarter of 2011 than any other company. The Android genie is definitely not going away and Samsung still has others such as Motorola, LG, HTC all pushing the Android envelope.

Is Apple concerned – well yes, according to the recent Steve Jobs biography. Apple’s market share has dropped from 16.6% in the third quarter of 2010 to 15% in 2011 and even though its sales rose from 13.4m to 17.3m, this fell short of Samsung’s 24m.
It’s no wonder Apple wanted to put the Australian case hearing put back till next August, but the judge has set a date on March and feels August is simply too far away.

So we come back to our decision and what we have in our hands today. When I demoed it to someone yesterday they summed it up perfectly by saying I had a true mobile that offered everything and can make calls as well! Why bother with a tablet you can’t slip into your pocket and are tablets really the answer or just a fad?

Apple's ‘Cloudy’ Scrumpy

Apple has announce that it has sold over 1m units of the iPad in just four weeks since its launch in the US. So Steve Jobs appears to have the Midas touch and now has it most successful launch. It has even had to delay the international roll-out of the iPad as it tries to keep up with demand. Since its launch, users have downloaded more than 12m apps and developers have created some 5,000 unique iPad apps. Apple claim to have sold some 1.5m eBooks, or one and half books per reader.

However with the glory come the inevitable challenges. We have written about the Adobe Flash, CS5 and restricted development tool licensing. Apple has also banned app developments from transmitting analytical data which could prevent ad networks from being able to effectively target ads. This obviously would give Apple's iAd mobile-advertising significant competitive advantage.

There are extensive reports that Apple may be investigated by the US Federal Trade Commission.

Remember only last year Last year, Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt resigned from Apple's board after the Fedral Trade Commission had investigated whether sharing directors with other companies violated antitrust laws.

Last weekend Apple launched the 3G version of the iPad. So far it has got mixed reviews with concerns being raised about video quality and differences in battery life.

With the iPad now comes another jailbreak application. MyWi, which at a of costs $10 turns the iPhone into a Wi-Fi hotspot that can be used by the iPad to acess the internet. This would enable iPad users with an iPhone use the tablet under the same data contracts. The application however can only be used if the user has jailbroke their iPhone. If applications that enable the iPhone Wi-Fi take off then the network carriers will be the big losers as they expect each device to have its own contract. It begs the question why not design and sell it as way in the first place. It would lock in iPhone and iPad users and you would only be using one at a time.

Finally, Apple is closing the streaming music service Lala, which it only bought last December. Some to question whether they want to move iTunes to be cloud based and onto a music subscription model and that they have closed Lala in order to reposition iTunes. This would certain start to support our belief that we will shift from owning to subscribing to media such as music on demand. This would take Apple into a new model and one it may not have wanted to do under Lala.

Are All Tablets Good For You?

It is somewhat sobering to read that Palm, the company behind the Pre and Pixi smartphones and heralded as a serious iPhone competitor only a year ago has warned that its sales for the year are likely to fall short of the projected target owing to the fact that its smartphones have failed to compete.

The return of the Tablet offers much but like 3D it has yet to deliver. It certainly will herald the rethinking, if not end, of those terrible ebook readers and their single application black and white world. Will the tablets been another transition of have they the legs to last a little longer? Mobile, screen and battery technology are certainly major factors and its also interesting to watch what will be the media or application driver.

This year promises many tablets. Some will be hard to swallow, others will not deliver the fix required but just like the eInk ‘lookie likies’ before them their will be many chancing their arm. Google, Mircosoft, HP, Sony, Samsung, LG, Dell and of course Apple will make their plays along with many smaller players such as Haleron, Freescale and the JooJoo. What will be the differentiator, the price, the applications, the media, the package, the look?

Mobile Updates From Barcelona

Mobile World Congress in Barcelona has opened and news is pouring out in every direction.

Windows 7
Microsoft has unveiled Windows Phone 7 which focuses on social-networking, real-time information, and organising contacts and data in to single “hubs”.Joe Belfiore, vice president of Windows Phone, said, “Too many phones are made to look like PCs. We wanted to come up with a user design that was different, that moved beyond the metaphor of the PC.” Windows Phone devices will feature three buttons - Start, Search and Back and be built around six different “hubs”, based on the services that people use most, accessed through the Live Tiles home screen (not a lot different to the Android in my hand there). However Microsoft has enabled users to access and edit Microsoft Office documents on the device.

Microsoft said that Windows Phone 7 Series devices would be available at the end of the year from a variety of handset makers, including Samsung, LG and HTC.

MeeGo or MeGoo or Me Too

Nokia is merging its Maemo N900 smartphone platform, with Intel's Moblin, which is an open source software project, to create MeeGo. Devices are due out this year but who is driving strategy at Nokia and how many operating systems do they want? They clearly are on the back foot and in danger of losing the plot and claim once again that others will join the show. Sounds more like MeGoo than MeToo.

Remember Symbian, the operating system which Nokia took over and made "open source" and failed to convince other manufactures to adopt. However, Google’s Android, has been installed in 27 different handsets from a range of manufacturers.

Wholesale Applications Community
24 mobile operators, including Vodafone, Orange and O2, have joined forces with manufactures such as Sony Ericsson, Samsung and LG to take on Apple's domination of the mobile applications market. Apple have now claimed 150,000 apps and these are certainly creating the difference today with only Google’s Android showing any ability to compete. This new alliance aims to create an open app platform which will enable developers to reach over 3 billion customers.

The Wholesale Applications Community is the latest attempt by mobile phone companies to ensure they are not sidelined by hardware makers and internet companies that reduce the networks to mere billing platforms and networks. However the industry has a poor record of working within an industry consortium."

Andy Rubin, Google's vice president of engineering, remarked that he was sceptical about the potential success of the mobile phone operators in creating their own application platform, "There is always a dream that you could write once and run anywhere and history has proven that that dream has not been fully realised and I am sceptical that it ever will be."

Maybe less WAC and more WACKY

Mobiles, eBooks, Androids and Media

The Pulse Report from San Francisco-based analysts Flurry claims that in the last four months, book apps have exceeded the popularity of games apps on the iconic iPhone. One out of every five new apps launched in October was a book! Apple clearly have a potential media winner if they ever get a tablet to market and also they have the potential to do to books what they have done to games. Everyone said that the games needed dedicated devices and although these still dominate there is a clear segment that are happy with just one device.



Meanwhile the Androids are still coming and Motorola plans to get back in the race with its Android 2.0-based Droid handset, called the Milestone in the UK. There appears to be a number of differences with the UK version having HSDPA 3G and multi-touch technology. The there is the Sony Ericsson Rachael Android smartphone Xperia coming to the market. Take a look at the video and make your own mind up but it clearly looks a good multimedia Android handset?

100,000 Apple Apps and The Pretenders

Apple claim that it now has approved over 101,887 applications with some 93,118 being available today in its App Store. That’s some ten times more than its competitors and all since July 2008, less than 18 months! Is it like a banquet offering as much as you can eat at one price as sometimes a la carte offers quality over quantity? Apparently only some 20K are free and the average price is $2.55, or $3.25 if you exclude the free apps.

When we look at some of the app pretenders we see Nokia's Ovi Store, Windows Mobile Marketplace and Palm's App Catalog have less than a thousand between them and the likes of the BlackBerry App World has only some 3000. Welcome to the void!

The challenge comes potentially from Google's Android platform with some even predicting it will overtake Apple in the future. Manufacturers such as Samsung, LG, Sony Ericsson, Motorola and HTC are introducing a plethora of Android devices and Dell is using it for its entry into the mobile market. The versions of the system read like a US bakery; cupcake, donut éclair and demonstrate how quickly the platform is developing.

The challenge is for Android to attract the next wave of developers and the successful iPhone ones that want a second home.

But returning to the iPhone Amazon’s Mobile App, is now available as a free download in the UK some 10 months after its US launch.

Apple Open Up UK iPhone Market

Following the news that UK network operator Orange was to sell both the iPhone 3G and iPhone 3GS and effectively end the exclusive UK arrangement between O2 and Apple, which has been in place since 2007, Vodafone have now announced that users can register an interest online, with the handsets becoming available to customers from early 2010.

So the exclusive madness looks to be ending and leaves only the likes of 3Mobile outside the party. However, we believe that could soon also follow suite and some customers have already been offered deals.

So Which Device Has That X Factor?

So what is the coolest gadget and what do we want for Christmas 2009? Yesterday the iPhone was anointed the number one of ‘cool’ in the UK, but that was like stating the obvious and the challenge is to understand what will be the number one tomorrow and some of the dynamics that will help it achieve the converted status. What will have the X Factor?

There are a number of consumer factors that will always decide as to whether the device is a winner and a ‘must have’, or is a another ‘also ran’:

Look and feel – image is important in this ‘designer label’ age. Skoda may make great cars but they do not have the same cache as Mercedes or BMW. Apple has always had a strong iconic brand which has been built on design and functionality. If Apple were to launch a tablet device tomorrow it would be a success because it is Apple as its solutions are 100% image and 80% functionality.

Convenience – for convenience read convergence. Women want a device that will fit in a handbag, but still leave room for the other essentials of their life, whilst men really want it to fit in their pockets. One device is a must, two starts to become difficult and three is a bridge too far for many. So what do we all need on the move? A phone and after that email, text, office basics and then access to information, music, content, photos, video , games etc. Very few of us now carry a camera – it’s in the mobile. The MP3 player may have had its day and many single applications devices will follow. The key is that they start as standalone devices and then flip. The eInk devices may be easy to read in all conditions, but with OLED coming fast to small screens, their advantage, even in this area is not sustainable. Anybody who has read a book on an iPhone will tell you it isn’t hard to adjust.

Price – this is a major player once the device becomes commodity but is not so important if the perceived value is high or the device is in the early stages of its market.

eInk readers are transitional devices and although the technology gives them the edge today they act and look like the old clunky 8 track players of the 80s. Their major plus is the screen and its readability and power saving, but the major minus is the screen as its black and white and no matter how many greyscales you add its still black and white. The device can do much more, but then it starts to compete with other devices that can do a lot more. We think the device is a short term toy that readers will grow out of and will age quickly.

As more gets loaded onto the smartphone then the power demand grows and the tedious task of recharging becomes more frequent. However the screen size and quality is getting there and with new technologies such as OLED will make it. Not only can it play it can record. Not only can it show photos it can play video and all in full colour. The challenge is that the market is fragmented, and we have issues on operating systems, browsers, exculsive carriers and of course applications. The iPhone has show what can be done and is guaranteed to lead the way for some time to come.

We all want a tablet or a device that is half way between everything and can potentially offer that single device on the move. Apple is coming sometime, Microsoft is now threatening to spoil their party and you can guarantee that others have seen the opportunity. When is a tablet a smartphone and when is it a netbook, or a ereader etc? What is clear from the hype over the Apple tablet is that is what the market demands and if positioned and with the right support offer and price we could have a clear category killer. Anyone who has doubts click here and watch this video from Gizmodo.

Netbooks will appear and offer much for the office man on the move, but the right tablet and even smartphone render them limited in their appeal. Perhaps size does matter and big is not as good as small!

Game machines are the one dark horse. Should games migrate onto smartphones and tablets or do they offer a reverse path? We have seen Nintendo toying with ebooks, but in a half hearted offer. When you see devices such as the PSP it makes us wonder why Sony don’t develop the device for digital content. Perhaps they think that once a gamer, always a gamer and a dedicated device is needed, but is this reality or an historic viewpoint?

What is clear is that the device wars go further than ebooks. We remember that Betamax was a superior technology to VHS but failed because they didn’t invent the consumer camera, MP3 is inferior to many other music formats but is more widely available on devices and DRM free. Winners don’t always follow convention logic but they strangely can be predicted.

iPhone Goes Orange in the UK

Orange is to sell Apple's iPhone in the UK. This move which has been widely expected clearly ends the exclusive deal Apple had with O2 which has been good for O2 but some would argue bad for Apple.

If the planned merger between Orange and Deutsche Telekom's T-Mobile goes through and creates a 28.4 million customer business and becomes the UK's largest provider, it certainly would open the flood gates to many more iPhones being taken up.
It is estimated that some 75% of the UK market would be able to have an iPhone and with the Pre and other competitors struggling to catch up the iPhone could become a category killer in the UK.

It has also been announced today that the iPhone app store has just clocked up its 2 billionth download. It is only a few months since they announced that they achieved 1 billion! The others are clearly way back in the dust.

The other interesting thing to watch is the reaction of the other non iPhone carriers who are already struggling to offer exciting models and now find themselves squeezed by the big boys. Some suggest you will be able to get an iPhone through the other carriers on a ‘special deal’ and that these exist already. Whatever the case the iPhone could be the phone most people are using this Christmas and New Year to phone friends and family.

iPhone Goes Orange in the UK

Orange is to sell Apple's iPhone in the UK. This move which has been widely expected clearly ends the exclusive deal Apple had with O2 which has been good for O2 but some would argue bad for Apple.

If the planned merger between Orange and Deutsche Telekom's T-Mobile goes through and creates a 28.4 million customer business and becomes the UK's largest provider, it certainly would open the flood gates to many more iPhones being taken up.
It is estimated that some 75% of the UK market would be able to have an iPhone and with the Pre and other competitors struggling to catch up the iPhone could become a category killer in the UK.

The other interesting thing to watch is the reaction of the other non iPhone carriers who are already struggling to offer exciting models and now find themselves squeezed by the big boys. Some suggest you will be able to get an iPhone through the other carriers on a ‘special deal’ and that these exist already. Whatever the case the iPhone could be the phone most people are using this Christmas and New Year to phone friends and family.

Grindhouse Introduce Girlie Apps on iPhone

Wherever technology goes pornography in its many levels follows. Now Grindhouse Mobile has managed to get past the iPhone to slip in a couple of porn-star-branded applications.

The applications don’t show naked girls but act as appetizers, teasers to get users to subscribe to live updates via a premium service. There is a blog photos of semi clad girls who are promoted as ‘amatuers’!

Sunny Leone's a premium version is currently awaiting approval and apparently offers more features, photo sets. videos, games, blogs and ways to contact Sunny on our phone. Former Penthouse Pet, Aria Giovanni’s app is the second adult application developed by Grindhouse to be approved by Apple. Again the next version is pending approval and will include several new features, more content.

Grindhouse has closely followed Apple's strict guidelines while developing an offering that is ‘compelling and user friendly.’Grindhouse plans to present more as the industry finds its own inovative ways around any censorship issues.

Spotify Number 1 Top of the Pops

Even though its usage is restricted to Europe and it costs £10 a month to use, the free at point of consumption digital streaming service has within days of its release hit the number one app download spot. iTunes App Store free downloads The Spotify application, which also allows offline listening, was released on Monday for Spotify premium subscribers in the UK, Sweden, Spain, France, Norway and Finland.

This ad free service gives subscribers access to millions of tunes and pays dues to the artists. It certainly a model to watch not just for music but other media. They now have the audience, the model, the channels (they also have an Andriod offer) and could effectively revolutionise how we access, pay and enjoy a library of works.

We now wait to see if Apple want to revamp iTunes or are happy to see their lunch being eaten off their table.

82 Million iPhones in 2012?

We have long supported the consolidation of technology on a mobile and netbook. It makes sense as storage and computing power expands and technology shrinks and also costs tumble that tomorrow’s technology will consolidate on the mobile and netbook platforms. MacRumors.com reports on a study released by RBC Capital Markets that further supports this view placing smartphones at the core of the next wave of computing.

RBC believes that there will be different smartphone centres of interest dictated by usage and each with its own leader. They suggest Apple will head up the “media-centric” devices, RIM the “productivity-centric” business phone with other centres being based on “PIM-Centric” ( personal organization) and “cloud-centric” (social social-media/email0. We believe that they are wrong on there division and that these bands will not be so defined as they conclude. Phones will be phones and the only division will be on the economic bands not functionality.

RBC forecast that Apple's market share will rise from 10.8% to 16.3% in 2012. We believe that only the turnaround in fortune of the current incumbents, such as Nokia, or the take-up of Android threaten Apple today. One of Apple’s greatest strengths is their app store which will take some catching. This means that Apple's total mobile market share is predicted to rise from 1.1% (2008) to 5.7% in 2012, or 82 million iPhones on the market in 2012!

Apps Stores: Fad or the Future?

Last week Apple’s app store reached another milestone with 1.5 billion downloads and now supports over 65,000 applications.

So on the same day that O2 launches a £10,000 prize for the best iPhone application voted by its iPhone members, Google believe the app store days are numbered and others say that the app craze is going to just go on getting bigger. Who is right and who is wrong? What are the issues driving this demand and is it a fad or the start of something big?

In a drive to incentivise and reward developers and grow customer loyalty O2 has launched a two month, £10,000 prize competition to select the best iPhone app. The key criteria for the winner will be an app that can ‘help build a lasting relationship between O2 and its iPhone customers.’

Ilja Laurs, CEO of GetJar, a leading independent application predicts that there will be a peak of around 100,000 apps by the end of the year, but with a failure rate of some 90%, he questions whether the lack of revenue will force a rethinking of the current development environment. Will consumers pay and play once, or adopt the apps into their lifestyle? Are apps essential tools and fulfilling real demand, or mere novelty and fashion fads

Symbian’s Lee Williams believes that the app store model is flawed in that it offers too much unwanted stuff and not enough relevant content and applications that will help enrich or add value to a user’s life.


Vic Gundotra, Google's engineering VP believes the app store is a fad and that the focus will shift to powerful browsers. Obviously Google is investing heavily in the Chrome browser, the Android operating system and search, all of which they see as platform and device independent. Therefore it makes sense for them to dismiss apps as a fad.

The question today appears to be one of mobile bandwidth and the lack of interoperability of applications, making development a nightmare and consumer choice complex. Tomorrow the game would appear to be moving towards one app across multiple platforms, devices, carriers, but this requires that all so elusive collaborative thinking and approach that is often lost in today’s ‘exclusive’ world.

What is clear is that app development is a gambling business today and one many will loose their shirt on and one that a few will find very rewarding.

Apple To Let Other Operators Carry the iPhone?

According to Mobile Today, Orange and T-Mobile will be allowed to sell iPhones in the UK in six weeks' time when O2's two-year deal comes to an end. However, before everyone jumps up for joy, O2 will be given exclusive rights to sell the faster iPhone 3GS model. The Palm Pre currently is restricted to O2 under another exclusive deal.

Is it just another Apple rumour. or are we finally going to see the iPhone unlocked just in time for Christmas. Forget the Kindle coming to the UK, the unlocking of the exclusive with O2 may be a far bigger generator of revenue as many may upgrade and stay with their current carrier and the device offers far more for all.

The move will also push the Apple app store, iTunes and of course the resultant bandwidth usage. The other mobile manufacturers have so far failed to dent Apple’s iconic ‘must have’ status and opening up the iPhone is just as much about the pull of the app store as much as the device itself.

Apple now must open its offer up to more. We see its biggest competitive threat being that other new player on the block, Google and their Android offer and we all know that they will play with anyone and everyone.