Searching for a mobile app can be an arduous process if you don’t know exactly what you’re looking. The search functions in app catalogs like Android Market and the iTunes App Store search keywords and categories and rank by popularity, but there’s nothing akin to the sophisticated search mechanisms of the Web. A start-up called Quixey thinks there should be such a sophisticated app search and has set out to build it. (more…)
Unfiltered
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Archive for the ‘Mobile Apps’ Category
Quixey tackles ‘functional’ mobile app search — looking for operator partners
Open Market: Carrier billing will drive more mobile purchases
According to Open Market, which has just launched its mobile checkout solution, the ease of entering a phone number at the point of purchase is five times more likely to result in a purchase than credit card billing. Open Market checkout is already supported by the big four U.S. telcos and mobile checkout is easily integrated into existing platforms.
Of course the pendulum of hype in the mobile payments area will continue to swing back and forth. Yesterday, it was about near-field communications, or NFC (CP: With NFC phones still not here, will it end up just one mobile payment technology among many?). Today, carrier billing gets the hype. (more…)
Amazon’s Android tablet to be media-focused, cheap and wiped free of any hints of Google?
Over the weekend, TechCrunch reported it got its hands on Amazon’s 7-inch (likely Kindle-branded) tablet, which among other highlights is (sort of) Android-based and about half the price of today’s cheapest iPad. With HP’s fire-sale TouchPad’s moving like wildfire at $99 (CP: iPad Who? $99 HP TouchPad selling like gangbusters), customers seem primed for cheap tablets. And by the way, the initial version of the Amazon tablet will have wi-fi but won’t have 3G/4G data service – apparently not even the “whispernet” mobile data service that lets Kindle users download books on the go. (more…)
HP isn’t abandoning all of its device roots
Hewlett-Packard’s newest offering is small, slim, literally 100 times faster than its predecessor and priced to match its selling-like-hotcakes TouchPad tablet.
Too bad it’s a calculator. (more…)
NFC isn’t just about mobile payments, Nokia says
Nokia is encouraging developers to create Symbian and MeeGo apps with NFC. With the largest portfolio of NFC devices, NFC’s cool factor goes well beyond mobile payments. With the launch of its three new Symbian Belle devices, Nokia brings its total number of phones with NFC (near-field communication) technology inside to six, making its NFC-supporting efforts the largest of any manufacturer’s so far. (more…)
Samsung stretches into new mobile form factors
Verizon is the only top-four carrier not jumping on the Samsung Galaxy II band wagon, opting to wait instead, say the rumors, for the (not-so-secretly-Samsung-built) Nexus Prime. Meanwhile, Samsung — the vendor shaping up to be the major smartphone hardware competitor to Apple — is hitting the market with some new device/configurations worth watching. (more…)
Ericsson: 35% of smartphone users use them in bed — ready for the ‘bed-time bundle’?
Daily routine? There is an app for that. It turns out that many early morning users check social networking sites, check mail, check the news and weather before they get ready for real life.
Ericsson ConsumerLab, the organization that surveys 80,000 consumers in 40 countries every year, provides unique insights into how consumers behave. This annual project provides the industry with tools for strategic thinking. Statistically relevant for 1.1 billion people, the interviews result in several different papers. The paper on “apps and everyday situations” provides insights into behaviors that will help shape device, usage, pricing and billing models. (more…)
Openwave jumps into the patent litigation fray, targeting Apple, RIM
If the web of lawsuits and countersuits, claims and counter-claims weren’t complicated enough, make room for Openwave. The mobile browsing and data services company has filed complaints with the International Trade Commission (ITC), asking it to ban the importation of iOS and BlackBerry phones and tablets into the U.S. Openwave has also filed a patent infringement lawsuit against the two vendors in a Delaware federal court. (more…)
With NFC phones still not here, will it end up just one mobile payment technology among many?
While the world waits for the arrival of NFC enabled smartphones and with serious questions being asked about security, are the predictions looking a bit too glossy?
Could be. (more…)
Apple to keep iCloud network load light with iTunes Match feature
As expected, the music load in Apple’s iCloud will be kept light, without the need to upload and store redundant files (CP: Apple’s iCloud might not even have a cloud component). This week, Apple released an iTunes 10.5 Beta 6.1 update to developers, and what has them talking already is iTunes Match, a feature linked to iCloud that saves a lot of uploading by relying on Apple’s own copies of popular songs. (more…)