Symbian in Motion

Hot on the heels of the recent purchase of Plazes, Nokia is at it again, this time with a huge scoop! In a press release and on the 10th anniversary of Symbian (coincidentally) Nokia has made an offer to buy the 52% of shares it doesn’t own of Symbian. As of yet, it has an agreement to buy 91% owned by  a combination of Sony Ericsson, Ericsson, Panasonic and Siemens at EUR 3.647 per share. The total cost of the whole purchase would be EUR 240 million ($370 million USD).

“This is a significant milestone in our software strategy” said Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, CEO of Nokia. “Symbian is already the leading open platform for mobile devices. Through this acquisition and the establishment of the Symbian Foundation, it will undisputedly be the most attractive platform for mobile innovation. This will drive the development of new and compelling, web-enabled applications to delight a new generation of consumers.”

This is another strategic move by Nokia to move the Symbian OS forward along with Nokia handsets. It’s obviously a move to ensure that moving forward Nokia also has it’s own OS and can manipulate the market whilst having full control (much like Google’s Android OS), but with Symbian already accounting for 60% of the mobile handset market, thing’s seem to be much brighter for Symbian and Nokia.

Nokia just announced the agreed acquirement of Plazes, a location based, social status sharing website. This looks like a move to integrate location based social status updates for Nokia’s GPS enabled Symbian handsets.

Members of Plazes are able to update their location through their laptop or mobile phone, and update their online presence with their current, past and future whereabouts. That way Plazes provides location-based context and real-life value when coordinating with friends, family and business partners.

With Google acquiring Jaiku a few months back, it seems Nokia is also keen to integrate live social updates and presence on their handsets for the consumer. Obviously Social updates are a the hype at the moment, with Twitter, Jaiku, Plurk, and many others flooding the internet.

The questions remain - when will we expect the first handset with this sort of live, location based social updates integrated into handsets? Who will be the first? Google or Nokia? And more importantly, who will succeed?

Full Nokia Press release

Something is brewing people, and I’m not quite sure what it is but consider my interest piqued. The peculiar image shown above found its way to my inbox this morning under the heading “Have you seen this man?”

So it would appear that Anssi is on the loose and while most would say that he isn’t dangerous, you can never be too careful. Don’t let the smile fool you. He was last seen (curiously) waiting in line at a phone booth - seemingly showing off his N96 to someone else in queue. I’m not positive but it looks like he’s either trying to impress her and possibly get her number… Or he’s distracting her so that he can cut ahead of her in line. Either way, he must be stopped.

According to the WANTED poster, there is a reward for capturing this man. We don’t know yet what the reward might be or even how we should go about capturing him (please don’t attack Anssi if you see him on the street ;) ), but I would expect more details to come along quite soon. A tie in with Share on Ovi perhaps? Nokia Sports Tracker? Widsets? What do you guys think?

During the Nokia Virtual event, the anticipated Nokia E71 and E66 were revealed. Details of the devices have been already leaked, but this is the official specs form the Data Sheets. Key features and promotional videos can be found below.

First impressions are very positive, especially the E71 in my opinion. The white version looks absolutely awesome. Expect more info and opinions on these devices soon. Also note the E66 in white for fans of that device.

Nokia E71 Featured Specs:

Key Features

• Optimized mobile email and messaging experience with full QWERTY keyboard and pocket-size for one handed typing.
• Two customizable Home Screen views with active stand-by plug-ins and application shortcuts – fast and easy switching between e.g. business and personal modes.
• Quick access to applications with One-touch keys (Home, Calendar, Contacts, Email).
• Intelligent input with auto-completion, auto correction and learning capability ensuring fast and error-free typing.
• Nokia Calendar and Contacts for Eseries applications with improved features.
• Built-in A-GPS and Nokia Maps
• HSDPA data connection up to 3.6 Mbps for fast web browsing and downloading

Additional features

• 3.2 megapixel camera with auto-focus and flash, front camera for video calls
• Music player, Media player, Visual Radio
• Nokia MiniMap browser
• Online sharing: Share on Ovi
• Built-in mobile VPN for convenient intranet access
• Data encryption for both phone memory and microSD
• Nokia PC Internet access (via Phone as modem functionality) Email solutions
• Nokia Intellisync Wireless Email
• Mail for Exchange and other corporate server mail formats
• POP/IMAP
• 3rd party email solutions

Email solutions

• Nokia Intellisync Wireless Email
• Mail for Exchange and other corporate server mail formats
• POP/IMAP
• 3rd party email solutions

Nokia E66 featured Specs:

Key Features

• Excellent personal information management in modern slide design
• Two customizable Home Screen views with active stand-by plug-ins and application short-cuts – fast and easy switching between e.g. business and personal modes
• Turn-to-full view – switch from portrait to landscape by turning the device
• Quick access to applications with One-touch keys (Home, Calendar, Contacts, Email)
• Easy email set-up with settings wizard
• Nokia Calendar and Contacts for Eseries applications with improved features
• Built-in A-GPS and Nokia Maps
• HSDPA data connection up to 3.6 Mbps for fast web browsing and downloading

Additional features

• 3.2 megapixel camera with auto-focus and flash, front camera for video calls
• Music player, Media player, Visual Radio
• Nokia MiniMap browser
• Online sharing: Share on Ovi

Email solutions

• Nokia Intellisync Wireless Email
• Mail for Exchange and other corporate server mail formats
• POP/IMAP
• 3rd party email solutions

Some High resolution pics of the Nokia E66 and E71 below, click to see full sizes.

Nokia E66

Nokia E71

I wrote up a piece yesterday on The Outsidr that discusses a relatively new web service called Only2Clicks. If having your bookmarks presented to you visually - on any computer or mobile browser - is of interest to you, I highly recommend you head over and give it a read. The concept and implementation are excellent; it has quickly become a useful tool for me. Just last night in fact, my area suffered a power outage that lasted about 15 hours. Because I now work exclusively on my desktop (lappy is dead) I had to head out and find a different computer to work on. Thankfully, Only2Clicks not only prevented this from being a total nightmare, it made it quite simple.

After publishing the article, I started thinking. I noted near the end thatOnly2Clicks provides an iPhone interface that allows you to not only access your bookmarks on any computer, but also on any full-browser equipped mobile. Here’s a screenshot from my N95-4:

What this made me realize however, is just how different my computer and mobile browsing habits really are. Here I have the real internet in my pocket (as Apple would say), and about 90% - 95% of my mobile browsing is done on mobile-formatted websites. Why?

1. “Real” webpages are too big
2. Mobile processors are too slow
3. Connectivity options are too slow (yes, even HSDPA and WiFi)
4. Mobile screens are too small

Why go to jaiku.com when I can go to m.jaiku.com and interact 10 times as fast (more like 50 times as fast sometimes)? Why use standard Google services when the mobile options are so light and fantastically fit for mobile consumption? I do visit some full pages from time to time but I’ll never spend much time on any one or click through several pages.

If you’re reading this blog, chances are pretty good that you have the real internet in your pocket as well. Do you use it?

(of note, I’ve created a “Mobile” tab that stores all of the sites I frequent from my mobile. In other words, Only2Clicks is still usable [and awesome] on my N95-4.)