Author: Stuart Dredge
MWC 2008: Vacuous corporate stand slogan roundup: Part One
One of the defining things about Mobile World Congress is the huge number of dreadful stand slogans. Y’know, the lines companies have chosen to sum up what it is they do. Revolutionising the mobile value chain? Driving the convergence zeitgeist? Shattering the usability barrier? Cobblers, all of ’em.
Well, I’m not standing for it. It’s time to name and shame the worst examples, starting with perhaps the all-time worst corporate slogan, with more after the jump. Watch out for more throughout the week.
MWC 2008: Zlango has a 20-foot God on its stand
What’s this? A 20-foot God sitting astride the stand of mobile messaging firm Zlango? Sounds like a good idea to us: it’s not as if there are loads of Catholics in Spain who might get offended and… Oh.
LG's MusicStation Max handset offers free unlimited music as part of your tariff
LG has revealed that it’ll be the first handset maker to launch a phone with Omnifone’s new MusicStation Max service built in. What’s that? It involves buying a phone on a monthly contract from an operator, with free, unlimited music downloads bundled into the tariff.
MWC 2008: NVIDIA shows off iPhone-busting concept phone
NVIDIA has a big stand at Mobile World Congress, including a concept handset showing off a user-interface powered by the company's new APX 2500 mobile CPU And I'm not getting over-excited when I say it looks awesome. Scrolling, zooming, transparent overlays, the works. Check the demo running on a big screen:
MWC 2008: Spice Movie Phone has a built-in optical disc drive
Indian handset manufacturer Spice is unveiling its innovative Movie Phone later today, but I’ve had a go on it already. It’s the first handset to come with a built-in optical disc drive for playing movies, and goes on sale in India this June. The discs are a proprietary format, but they use blue laser technology, and the compression uses the H.264 standard.
MWC 2008: MixDJ application makes your phone a superstar DJ
Poor old amateur DJs. If it wasn’t bad enough being kicked off the decks of house parties by the popularity of iPod playlists, now they’re even being usurped by mobile phones. That’s the idea behind MixDJ, a new application developed by NXP Software.
MWC 2008: LG unveils GPS-enabled LG-KT610 Symbian mobile
The internet is due to collapse tomorrow under the weight of press releases being issued at the Mobile World Congress show in Barcelona, so some companies are being smart and getting in early. Like LG, which has revealed a new GPS-enabled smartphone, the LG-KT610.
Fancy a $6 million home cinema system?
Look, there’s no point me going into the details of this home cinema system created by a bloke called Jeremy Kipnis. I could tell you about the projector, the screen, the various video sources, speakers, amplifiers and comfy sofa that go into it.
Euro operators cut roaming data charges. Well, some of them…
I’m off to Barcelona next week for the Mobile World Congress trade show, but I certainly won’t be firing up my mobile web browser while I’m there. Even small data consumption when overseas is outrageously expensive under current tariffs. Thankfully, the European Commission is on the case, pressuring operators to cut data roaming costs.
WooMe brings speed dating to the online masses
Speed dating was a sensible response to the problem of a generation of time-poor singletons who are too busy working to have time for slow, boring old traditional courting. And it worked. But now everyone spends their downtime on Facebook and YouTube, what to do? Easy: Web 2.0 speed dating.
