gHacks technology news » mobile phones

Japan: Mandatory DRM Software In All Mobile Phones To Fight Music Piracy

Martin — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 21:29:58 +0000

Japanese mobile phone developers, companies and the recording industry of Japan are in talks currently to agree on new anti-piracy measures to fight music piracy in Japan according to the Financial Times. The proposed solution offered by the recording industry suggest digital rights management to be build into every mobile phone sold in Japan. The software would query an Internet server (DRM server) whenever a user would try to play a song to check if the song was purchased legally. It would play if the return would be positive and otherwise refuse to play the song. The proposed system could be launched as early as 2011.

The mobile phone market in Japan is different from that of the rest of the world as Japanese mobile phone companies control the software on the mobile phones meaning it would be very unlikely that these measures, if agreed on, would be introduced in other markets as well.

The article fails to address several difficulties of such a system. The most important ones are the following:

What happens to songs that have been ripped from legally bought CDs? Won’t they be played at all? (this assumes that it is legal in Japan to rip CDs)
What happens if no connection is available currently? (Will it be possible to play songs without net connection?)
Who pays for the traffic that the song checks create?

Please post your opinions in the comments.

Tags: cell phones, drm, japan, mobile phones, music, Music Industry

5 Things we’re still missing from our Smartphones

Orrett Morgan — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 07:22:10 +0000

With the iPhone, Pre, and a whole host of Android devices out the door, the race for the control of the cell phone market is heating up. As things usually go in the cell phone world, there are more battles of who had what first then who actually made it work right. That said, I thought it would be a good idea to cover five functions/features we absolutely need in our cell phones err Smartphone’s.

FLASH: At the top of my list is flash. For those of you who think flash is only there to watch Youtube and Redtube videos, think again. With estimates running at 60% of all websites have some sort of flash embedded, it is imperative that we get this and get it soon. We’ve had Javascript for some time and that’s nice, but nothing can beat good old flash.

For this to happen though, we are going to need faster chips in our phones. So I suggest to Smartphone manufacturers to start looking to Snapdragon and Tegra as viable options. At least Palm and Apple aren’t too bad in the specs arena but a 1GHz chip would be much better.

Not to worry though, Adobe is working on bringing Flash to Windows Mobile, Palm, Android and Nokia by October of this year. No word on Blackberry and Apple though.

OLED Displays: VGA, WXVGA and LCD are so yesterday. It’s time that we move forward and embrace new technology. As it currently stands, OLED technology is pretty cheap (Sony has a 32GB walkman with one of these stuck in it for only $400). I was ecstatic when I heard the rumors that the iPhone 3GS would be getting the OLED treatment, only to have my hopes shattered. But its not too late, more Android, Palm, Blackberry and Window’s Mobile devices are due in the near future, lets see which one of them decides to blaze the trail.

And while I am on the issue with the screens, it would be nice to have bigger screens. The iPhone and Pre do an excellent job of navigating webpages, but 3 inch screens are tight on the eyes. Someone must be able to create a flip out 4 or 5 inch screen in the near future.

Better Productivity Programs: As the saying goes, if I cannot edit my presentation, it’s not a smartphone. But seriously doc, spreadsheet and presentation editing are standard now. Its time to innovate and what better way to start with some mobile apps that tackle such things as photo and video editing, database management, server management and not to mention full desktop control.

Some of these have been imitated but so far nothing has come close to doing justice to the situation. I’m not asking for much here. I wouldn’t expect a full fledged mobile version of Photoshop but at least allow me to insert an iPhone into President Obama’s hand. We do have progress though, as the iPhone 3GS made the first move in this direction with the ability to edit video clips.

HD Video Recording: Every month cell phones become a little more advanced in the digital photography arena by adding more megapixels and better CMOS to their specs. But we’re still stuck with the same old VGA video shooting. It’s time for someone to break the norm and bring us HD video shooting. I’m not asking for full 1080p. I would be satisfied with 720p or even 480p to begin with but don’t tell me its impossible because the Mini HD flip is just a little bigger then most Smartphone’s and its packing midrange HD capabilities.

In terms of chips and processors, Atom, and Tegra are two mobile chips that are more then capable of handling this feature and they are not that expensive to stick into a mobile phone. Its about time I am able to view videos recorded on a mobile phone without and properly distinguish a head from a trash can.

More Wireless Features: For a device that was built around the premise that we should have less wires in our lives, our cell phones sure do require a lot of wires to operate. There has been some progress in this area but it is slow. Such things as software updates, tethering, charging, printing etc. are things that should all be done wirelessly. Thankfully these options are all available now but in different models so no device carries it all.

Hopefully if Bluetooth 3.0 makes it out on schedule, a lot of these will begin to make their way to the mainstream—that is if the service providers will allow it.

So what are some of the things you require from a smartphone that currently isn’t available? Let me know in the comments below.

Tags: android, apple, atom, cell phones, mobile phones, paml, smartphones, tegra

iPhones: they aren’t as bad as you think

Joe — Sat, 16 May 2009 12:46:54 +0000

A couple of months ago, I did something I thought I never would do: I bought an iPhone. Technology enthusiasts generally seem pretty torn about these devices: some see them as fantastic whilst others see them as an expensive device which isn’t very functional.

I, too, was torn. I vowed never to buy an iPhone, on account of their price and lack of certain features (saying that, I too vowed never to run Windows XP but I ended up using XP about 3 years after its release, in 2004). I was strongly considering a Symbian-based smartphone, generally seen as a phone of someone a little more tech-savvy than an iPhone user. When I got my iPhone, I was shocked. iPhones are actually very good.

Whilst they do have many little annoying flaws, such as the fact you can’t use a landscape keyboard to compose an email or SMS (not until the next version of iPhone OS, anyway), they are remarkably user-friendly and after a little jailbreaking pretty flexible. I have yet to find something I would like to do, but I can’t do.

LCARS theme on iPhone

I found the selection of applications, in the App Store and other unofficial places, absolutely amazing. I have many games – ranging from a mobile version of Sim City to an NES emulator – and I also have many tools and utilities, like a Google Docs editor, SSH terminal and SSH server. My only complaint with applications is how quickly you end up spending a small fortune in App Store: I still find it amazing I have to pay £5 for the official UK train network’s program.

Another popular complaint people have with the iPhone is the lack of hardware keys. However, I soon became accustomed to the touch screen, because it has somewhat of a LCARS feeling – especially after you install a LCARS theme! There are some hardware keys though: volume control, a switch to turn it on or off silent mode, the ‘home button’ and a lock button.

Still, the most popular complaint is the price. I find myself paying 35GBP a month and about a 100GBP lump sum. For that, 600 minutes and 500 texts. Pretty expensive, but I am quite satisfied with the data plan that is also included in that price.

So, do you have an iPhone? If not, why not?

Tags: apple, cell phones, cell-phone, iPhone, mobile phone, mobile phones, Nokia, smartphones

Nokia Map Loader

Martin — Sat, 09 May 2009 14:46:20 +0000

Nokia Map Loader is a software program for the Windows and Macintosh operating system that has been designed by Nokia. The application can download maps for the Nokia Maps service directly to the cell phone. This could for example be used to download maps of cities or regions before traveling there. The other available option would be to download the maps directly to the cell phone without preloading them on a computer system first. The first option is obviously the less expensive and faster one as downloads directly to the cell phone are usually quite expensive and slower.

Nokia Map Loader can be used to download selected maps directly to the cell phone using a computer’s Internet connection. The maps come in different sizes ranging from a few Megabytes to 20 and more Megabytes. The size of all maps offered exceeds 3 Gigabytes which would cost a fortune when downloaded over the air directly.

Some user had problems using the Nokia Map Loader application. They did experienced interrupted downloads and criticized that they could not delete single maps once they were downloaded to the cell phone. That’s where the direct download links to all Nokia Maps come in handy. The download links point directly to the files on the Nokia servers and can be downloaded with download managers or directly in the web browser. The page does contain instructions on how to add these maps to the Nokia cell phone as well.

Tags: cell phones, maps, mobile phones, Nokia, nokia map loader, nokia maps

Send Videos to Your Mobile Phone with Vuclip

Cheryl — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 15:55:46 +0000

Almost everyone has a mobile phone today and phones themselves have gone beyond just devices to use to talk to people. Today’s phones come ready with a whole bunch of bells and whistles for their owners to play with. One of these includes support for video.

One of the best resources for an owner of a video-enabled phone is Vuclip. Formerly called blueapple.mobi, this site is like YouTube for mobile phones. Users can stream video clips from different video-sharing sites directly to the phone via the site’s search function or just browsing different categories.

As a bonus, Vuclip lets you save videos directly to your phone without any format or codec conflicts. When you see a video you like, just enter your name and phone number and click the ’send to phone’ button. Vuclip will transcode the file to the necessary phone format and send it to your phone so you are saved the hassle of converting the file format yourself. Registered users have access to additional features like creating cliplists and video alerts among others.

Vuclip claims to produce videos that are compatible with 2,000 different phones from various brands. In addition, the Vuclip service is available for more than 130 countries. The only downside is that although the service is free, users might still have to pay for accessing the internet from their phones as well as for data transfer. Of course this depends on a user’s service provider and the type of billing plan.

What do you think of Vuclip? Would you use this site and its services? What features would you like to see the site offer? Let me know in the comments.

Tags: mobile phones, transcoding, video sharing, vuclip, youtube

Free Cell Phone Ringtone

Martin — Sun, 09 Nov 2008 13:36:35 +0000

A search on the Internet for free cell phone ringtones usually leads to websites that claim to offer free ringtones but normally require the visitor to signup and pay for the ringtones anyway. Ringtones are quite a bit market which is somewhat surprising considering that many cell phones are capable of using audio files on the cell phone as ringtones. A visit to a site that can convert the audio of Youtube videos ensures that basically any song can be downloaded for free.

But some cell phones do not provide this opportunity yet. One way for owners of such cell phones is to use a free cell phone ringtone creator to create the ringtone. The website My MusicRings does require registration but does not send a verification email on the other hand and is therefor perfectly suited for creating a free ringtone in no time.. The service itself could not be more straightforward.

The user uploads an mp3 from his hard drive to the ringtone creation service in step 1. He will then have the option to select 29 seconds of the song for his ringtone by moving a slider on the waveform back and forth.

All that’s left is to pick a title and artist for the cell phone ringtone. The ringtone will be created and the option to download it to the computer or to send it to the cell phone is given on the final page of the process.

An url for cell phones is provided as well which can be used to access the page with the cell phone directly. Interestingly enough the pages can be shared with friends which also means that anyone can access all previously created cell phone ringtones by manipulating the url of the service.

http://mymusicrings.com/song.php?id=4900

Changing the ID from 4900 to another number will load the ring tone with the corresponding number.

Tags: cell phone ringtone, cell phone ringtones, cell phones, free cell phone ringtone, free ringtones, mobile phones, ringtone maker, ringtones

Nokia Ovi Suite

joshua — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 09:13:10 +0000

2009 should be an interesting year for mobile phones, with the iPhone growing rapidly in popularity, the much talked about Windows Mobile, Google Android making it’s way onto more devices and the push from the major phone companies to bring more applications and services to their phones.

The Nokia PC Suite is the standard set of software for managing your phone and multimedia and was recently updated to version 7.0 which was a marked improvement on the previous version. While it’s an improvement I would describe the software as ‘adequate’ rather then good. It does the basics, sometimes a little more but generally does little to impress, especially the media management tools and performance.

What Nokia has been working on however which is fairly impressive is the Nokia Ovi Suite which has been designed from scratch and will eventually replace PC suite totally I presume. I think it’s only being released in a few countries at the moment, if it’s not released in yours you may have to change your system language settings.

Ovi is a great example of the ‘software + services’ concept going through most of the technology industries and inspired by the success of Apple’s iPod + iTunes system.

Ovi includes all of the PC suite functions and features while having additional features and generally improving substantially upon everything including predominantly a far more intuitive and attractive user interface. The software is also connected to the online Ovi services for uploading, download and sharing media such as music, images and games.

If you’re currently using PC Suite I would really recommend giving this a try, it is an improvement in every way, even including performance.

Tags: mobile phones, Nokia, Ovi

iRSS Mobile Phone RSS News Feeds Reader

Martin — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 09:18:48 +0000

Mobile Phones, smartphones, pocket PCs and oder mobile devices have been around for a while but using them to connect to the Internet is a trend that manifested itself in the last years. Apple’s iPhone is one prominent example of a phone that offers many functions that require an Internet connection.

One of the popular reasons to connect to the Internet is to catch up on the latest news. This can be done by browsing to websites and reading the news there or by installing an RSS News Feed reader and use its interface to read the news. The advantage of the latter method is the concentration of news in one application, the notifications of new messages and reduced bandwidth costs.

The iRSS mobile phone RSS News Feeds reader is just one application that can be used to read rss news feeds on a mobile device. One advantage of it is the compatibility with lots of different devices like smartphones, mobile phones and PDAs.

The news reader can store up to five feed groups and one hundred RSS News Feeds which should be sufficient for mobile usage. It supports rss, xml, atom and rdf feeds and is compatible with RSS 0.91, 1.0 and 2.0 feeds. It also comes packed with a few popular feeds like Yahoo Technology News or Youtube Recently Added Video News.

Tags: irss, mobile phones, pdas, pocket pcs, rss news feed, rss reader, smartphones

WiFi for Symbian S60 Mobile Phones

Martin — Mon, 30 Jun 2008 12:18:26 +0000

Mobile Phones that support WiFi connections have a huge advantage over those that do not. Connecting to a wireless hotspot makes it possible to use services that would otherwise cost lots of money. How about free services like VOIP phone calls, checking emails or surfing the Internet ? Best of all you can do all that with a free software that does all of that for you if your handy is using the Symbian S60 operating system and is currently supported by the developer.

In case you are wondering, HandyWi is the application that can be installed on many Nokia mobile phones including the Nokia N78, Nokia N95 and the N93. A list of supported devices can be found at the developers homepage.

The process is pretty simple. The HandyWi software has to be installed on the mobile phone which will alert the user whenever a free WiFi spot has been discovered. The user can then connect to that spot and start using services like VOIP or Internet surfing for free.

This works pretty well in combination with Notebooks as well especially if your Notebook’s wireless card is not supported by the usual applications like Netstumbler or Easy WiFi Radar.

HandyWi features:

Filtering of hotspots, separated view for public WLAN networks
HandyWi clearly shows which access point is secure and which is not
Single internet access point (HandyWi APN) for all applications (mail, web browser, char etc.)
Easy account management, several user accounts possible (scratch card, prepaid etc.)
Access to the location based media information, loaded each time you connect (works on selected WLAN networks only)
Automatic hotspot discovery and alert feature
Automatic connection to the hotspot which has stronger signal
Secure RSA encrypted communication with HandyWi server
Automatic application startup after install and on boot

HandyWi works pretty well and can be installed directly or by downloading it to the PC first.

Tags: mobile phones, N78, N95, Nokia, nokia wifi, wifi, wireless

Youtube for Symbian S60 Phones

Martin — Thu, 20 Dec 2007 23:47:00 +0000

When Apple released their iPhone they never forgot to mention that the iPhone was able to play Youtube videos. I think they mentioned it as a key feature and several television ads showed this feature as well. If you do not own a Apple iPhone but another mobile phone, mabye like the Nokia N73 (my phone) or Nokia N95, you will be delighted to hear that a Symbian S60 application brings Youtube to those phones.

It gets even better. The Nokia N95 has a special version of that application that uses the phones accelerometer to rotate the video on screen if you rotate the phone to change between portrait and landscape mode. The emTube applications makes it possible to play Youtube movies either from the local flash memory of the phone or by downloading / streaming videos to your phone instead.

Videos can be browsed on Youtube and several comfort settings, like configuring the number of search results or if you want to start the video manually or automatically, make emTube a wonderful application that looks really promising.

via Tech Yard

Tags: mobile phones, Mobiles, Nokia

Send SMS to your Girlfriend/Spouse for free with Google Calendar

Daniel Pataki — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 23:03:35 +0000

I have to admit, I’m not the cheapskate, I don’t try dodging costs and I don’t employ the technique described here, but it is a fairly easy way to get rid of SMS expenses once and for all. There are numerous ways to minimize mobile costs nowadays, I have a “family pack”, which means that if I buy more than one SIM card, I can call that card any time for free, it only costs about a flat $4 a month. Sadly, this doesn’t include SMS.

As we all know, Google Calendar has the option to send free SMS reminders of tasks. Now all you need is to set up a calendar for your significant other using your own phone as a reminder, and one for yourself, with his/her phone number. Set the default reminder to SMS, for 5 minutes before the event takes place

Now if you want to send her an SMS, just create an event, and write the text as the “What” text. Set the event about 10 minutes ahead to be safe, and save. Sadly only 60 characters will be shown in the SMS, but this is still enough for a quick message. You can create events 1 minute apart and have 3 events span a single SMS if you want. You will have a “reminder” sent to your partner, quickly and for free!

Tags: free, mobile phones, Mobiles, sms

Books in your mobile phone

Martin — Mon, 29 Oct 2007 05:23:25 +0000

Reading books using a mobile phone is probably not the most pleasant way but it surely is better than sitting around doing nothing at all. Books in My Phone provide hundreds of books that can be downloaded and transferred to your mobile phone. The user can chose between two ways to transfer the books to his mobile phone.

He can either download the books to his computer and transfer them afterwards using the normal means of connecting his mobile phone to the computer or he can connect with his mobile to the Internet and download the books directly. The second option is probably only advisable if you have a free data contingent.

The books are optimized for mobile phones, some of the features are:

Adjustable font size settings. Make the letters bigger or smaller according to your personal preference.
Night-vision mode. Makes it easy to read in a dark room.
Chapter navigation. Navigate the book by chapter.
Pause & Auto-resume function. Automatically pauses and resumes to accommodate incoming calls.
Auto-bookmark. You never have to remember where you’re up to in the book.

I would say the books are mostly classic literature books from authors such as Charles Dickens, Jules Verne, Joseph Conrad and Sir Walter Scott. All books are out of copyright in the United States which means it is perfectly legal to download those books to your mobile phone.

Two versions are always offered. The first offering a better reading experience but requires a modern phone while the other does work on older phones as well. I would try the first version and see if it is supported by the phone and only if it is not supported I would download and use the second version.

Read More:

Books in my phone

Tags: books, iPhone, mobile phones, Mobiles, Nokia

Nokia recalling more than 46 million batteries

Martin — Thu, 16 Aug 2007 18:00:24 +0000

It seems to become common for electronic companies that produces items with batteries to recall batteries with a manufacturing defect that could lead to mobile phone explosions under certain circumstances. I was concerned that my new phone, the Nokia N73 Music Edition, was one of the phones that could have a defective battery but I was lucky this time.

There are however lots of mobile phones affected, here is the full list of phones that could be effected:

Nokia 1100, Nokia 1100c, Nokia 1101, Nokia 1108, Nokia 1110, Nokia 1112, Nokia 1255, Nokia 1315, Nokia 1600, Nokia 2112, Nokia 2118, Nokia 2255, Nokia 2272, Nokia 2275, Nokia 2300, Nokia 2300c, Nokia 2310, Nokia 2355, Nokia 2600, Nokia 2610, Nokia 2610b, Nokia 2626, Nokia 3100, Nokia 3105, Nokia 3120, Nokia 3125, Nokia 6030, Nokia 6085, Nokia 6086, Nokia 6108, Nokia 6175i, Nokia 6178i, Nokia 6230, Nokia 6230i, Nokia 6270, Nokia 6600, Nokia 6620, Nokia 6630, Nokia 6631, Nokia 6670, Nokia 6680, Nokia 6681, Nokia 6682, Nokia 6820, Nokia 6822, Nokia 7610, Nokia N70, Nokia N71, Nokia N72, Nokia N91, Nokia E50, Nokia E60, Nokia Wireless GPS Module LD-1W, Nokia Wireless GPS Module LD-3W

A lot of phones, don’t you think ? Not all of the phones are affected, it depends on the type of battery that is placed in the phone. Only the BL-5C battery model is affected, take a look at the screenshots to find out if your phone uses one of those batteries.

The first step would be to turn the mobile phone off, take the battery out of the case and check the battery model. The battery model is shown on the screenshot below. If the model is not BL-5C you are finished and save.

If it is one of the affected battery models you need to look at the back of the battery and enter the battery identification number on a Nokia Advisory website to check if your battery is affected.

Tags: exploding batteries, mobile phones, nokia battery recall, nokia phones

Unlock your Nokia Mobile Phone

Martin — Sat, 08 Jul 2006 06:42:31 +0000

Most mobile phones are locked and can only be used with sim cards from the provider that sold you the mobile in the first place. The operator is able to unlock your mobile for you so that it is working with other operators as well, but you will have to pay for it most of the time. Would not it be great if you could unlock the phone by yourself without paying money for it ?

If you answered the last question with yes read on. I found a website on the internet that generates the unlock code for your Nokia mobile. You enter this unlock code in your phone (with the sim card taken off) and voila your phone is unlocked. (if the code is working of course).

The procedure is pretty straight forward, you need to know your IMEI number which you recieve when you enter the code *#06# in your phone with the SIM card not inside the phone. Enter the unique number into the websites form field, chose your operator and country and the Nokia model. After that click generate code and a code will be shown that unlocks your mobile.

Tags: mobile phones, Nokia

gHacks technology news » mobile phones

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