I tried playing a couple games and could only get the "Mansion Impossible" and FlashChess to work. Wanted to play Alchemist but it won't load, just sits on a white window.
Our IT consultant stopped by today with a Samsung Galaxy X phone today. I gotta say it's a really nice looking Android phone. I think it's the Samsung Vibrant on Tmobile. Pretty much an exact copy of the iphone's form factor but with a OLED screen (remember Samsung isn't selling their OLED screens anymore to HTC but keeping them for their own phones) and 1Ghz hummingbird processor. It was silky smooth and he said Exchange hooked up no problem (Android 2.1). He was coming from a Blackberry that he hated... Maybe there is hope for Android to be a business class phone.
Why the Verizon iPhone is already too late
Apple should have gone to Verizon in 2009 before Android took off
Verizon Wireless might get an iPhone this January? It's about time. Or is it too late? New reports show that Google's Android is eating the iPhone's lunch. And by clinging to AT&T exclusivity and staying clear of Verizon, Apple is effectively serving up that lunch on a shiny silver platter.
For a decade, Apple played Ice Man in a calculated dogfight of product design and marketing. It rarely made a misstep, and its successes were legendary as a result. This year, Apple has not shown itself to be so level-headed.
You could cite Antennagate or the missing white iPhone as evidence Apple is losing its cool, but these are mishaps, destined to follow previous iPhonapocalypses and Applegeddons into the void of the forgotten past. No, the biggest reason is that it miscalculated how much a prolonged exclusivity with AT&T would cost. The deal has been lucrative God knows AT&T pays well for the privilege but the downside has been that Apple has let a reasonable iPhone copy become the No. 1 selling smart phone platform in America.
It let this happen, by simultaneously creating a burning desire for an app-driven touch-screen smart phone, and then denying it to two-thirds of the American populace. That might be an old rant, but the detrimental result of this decision or rather, the detrimental result of sustaining the decision for so long are only now becoming apparent.
Droid fever
Look at Android's momentum. Just last week, NPD said that Android phones accounted for a third of all smart phones purchased in the U.S. , with RIM's BlackBerry at 28 percent and the iPhone at 22 percent. Apple launched iPhone a year earlier than Android, with more immediate critical and consumer success. In fact, the first Android phone, the T-Mobile G1, wasn't even taken seriously as an iPhone competitor. It wasn't until more than two years after the iPhone's AT&T exclusive deal had begun, that it was time to stop waiting for a call from Cupertino, and instead release an iPhone competitor that could fight and win.
Along comes Motorola's original Droid, launched in the fall of 2009 by Verizon Wireless as the anti-iPhone.
Let's not forget that Verizon has advertising dollars to burn they would have gladly burned them on an iPhone, but that was not to be. The campaign slogan was "iDon't, Droid Does." But just like the Biblical anti-Christ, the anti-Jesus-phone bears a striking resemblance to its nemesis. People bought the Droid not because of its hardware keyboard or its LED camera flash; they bought it because they could get apps and do GPS navigation and check e-mail and Twitter and all that iPhone stuff ... but on Verizon.
Verizon has spent years strictly controlling a fairly nondescript line of phones, and charging generally the highest prices in the business. The result is consistently high customer satisfaction rating and the perception one backed with some reasonable evidence that it has the largest and most reliable digital network. (I know from testing that AT&T has the fastest, but its 3G footprint really is much smaller than Verizon's.) Now that Verizon's phones offer the same functionality as an iPhone, it's looking a lot prettier.
If Apple had ended its exclusivity in 2009, after two years, it could have quashed the nascent Android menace with ease. But this spring, the two iPhone models weren't able to outsell the combined Android army, including Motorola Droid and HTC Incredible on Verizon, and HTC Evo on Sprint.
iPhone, your phone
It's at this point that Apple devotees note, perhaps huffily, that iPhone sales were obviously stalled in the three months leading up to the launch of the iPhone 4. It was, thanks to an unplanned early look, the most eagerly anticipated handset since the very first iPhone. They will also note that despite Antennagate, sales reached record numbers, that Apple is rumored to be ordering extras made to meet demand, and that even this columnist downplayed much of the controversy surrounding the iPhone 4's design flaw (at the risk of being labeled "fanboy").
The third quarter might prove to be wondrous for iPhone sales, but Android phones are selling out too, and besides, there has been a chilling effect. It's best measured by a survey from the research firm ChangeWave. The percent of "very satisfied" iPhone customers has fallen, from the 3GS's 82 percent to the iPhone 4's 72 percent. Twenty percent said the antenna on the iPhone 4 has caused them grief, but still, the biggest ding was the exclusive carrier deal. Twenty seven percent don't want to be forced to use AT&T, the bulk of those complainers citing coverage and quality of network.
Ultimately, this will have a serious impact on iPhone sales. The market research firm iSuppli just put out the most damning numbers: In terms of global smart phone market share, iPhones will peak at 15.9 percent in 2012, then fall to 15.3 percent two years later. Android will snatch 19.4 percent in two years, and keep on growing, hitting 22.8 percent in 2014. The firm's stated reason for the limited Apple growth? "While Apples family of iPhone products continues to be the standard by which all other smart phones are measured, the proprietary nature of the iOS and Apples closed system business model will limit the number of smart phones with the operating system." Meanwhile, "the flexibility Android offers for hardware designs and its appealing business model" is already luring in loads of eager hardware makers.
Deja vu
Sound familiar? Or maybe exactly like Windows vs. Mac, the decades-long personal computer battle? You know, the one that had one clear winner and one clear loser, at least in terms of market share? I'm hardly the first person to identify Android as the new Windows, and maybe that's something we can talk about in depth at another time. What's surprising to me is that Steve Jobs didn't see this coming, didn't see how too much control over the hardware supply might once again prevent him from grabbing the brass ring. A little control can be a good thing, but a chokehold, well, that's strangulation, brutha.
I'm not asking for authorized iPhone clones. God knows, nobody wants to relive the StarMax years. But I am saying that when one phone platform is available on all four carriers in a variety of shapes, sizes, software configurations and monthly plans, and the other fashionable, sure, but no longer a league above is tied to just the one carrier with the one pricing structure, good people who exercise sound judgment will be forced to pick the former, despite the latter's halo of awesomeness.
And when the halo of awesomeness starts shimmering less brightly, well, even people more susceptible to peer pressure and marketing will start looking elsewhere.
Exclusive: Sony Ericsson to introduce Android 3.0 gaming platform and PSP Go-like smartphone
There's no question that gaming on the Android platform has heretofore been relatively underwhelming, but that looks like it's all about to change. It seems that Sony Ericsson -- a company that has yet to even introduce an Android 2.0 device -- is at work on a project to redefine gaming on Google's mobile platform. We now know (via a trusted source) that the company is actively and heavily developing a brand new gaming platform, ecosystem, and device (possibly alongside Google) which are already in the late stages of planning. And we've got the goods on it.
Here's what we can tell you about the hardware: if you're a gaming fan, this is exactly the kind of phone you've been waiting for. The device is described as cross between the Samsung Captivate and the PSP Go -- in other words, it's a landscape slider with game controls in place of the typical QWERTY keyboard. The D-pad is here, but instead of the small joystick, the device will have what was described as a "long touch pad" for analog controls, along with standard PSP buttons and shoulder buttons. The phone has a large display, described as being between 3.7 and 4.1 inches with WVGA or better resolution, a 5 megapixel camera that we're told might not be final, and it'll likely have a 1GHz Snapdragon CPU on board. The phone is mostly black with some silver highlights, and the gamepad area is white / silver in color. Apparently it's currently branded as a Xperia device, but it looks like it will carry PlayStation branding as well. Those who've seen the phone say it looks "pretty damn sexy." The mockup above probably doesn't do the actual hardware justice, but it should give you an idea of what you'll be dealing with.
On the software side, it looks like the device will be running Gingerbread (Android 3.0) with a phone-specific skin, and there will be a new area of the Android Market specifically for the games. That content will be initially accessible only by the halo device, but from the sounds of things, these titles might be made available to other Android phones if their specs and button layouts meet requirements. Games will be graphically in the range of PSX or PSP games, meaning true 3D gaming is headed to Android. Titles currently being shown off seem to be focused around some older PSX as well as new PSP offerings, with God of War, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, and LittleBigPlanet possibly on tap, and future plans for titles which incorporate augmented reality features.
In terms of release, it's possible that the phone and ecosystem could be introduced as early as October of this year, but we have yet to confirm.
Right now we're working on getting even more detail about the phone and partnership, but we can tell you now that this is not a random rumor -- we have reason to believe that what we've heard and seen is real and coming to market. It makes perfect sense in a way -- Google gets a much-needed push into the gaming and entertainment space for Android, while Sony (via its partnership with Ericsson) finally delivers the PlayStation phone users have been wanting. We see it as a major win for both companies and the consumer... and we always need another distraction. Stay tuned to this space for updates as we get them, and in the meantime, start socking away the pennies
Sony Ericsson hasn't even released their damned Xperia X10 in the US yet. I don't even know if its out any place else ...
SE is really behind when it comes to releasing new technology. They start planning on super cool shit well before any other company does, but that's all they do. They sit on the plans for so long that other companies catch up, and then by the time SE starts developing, other companies are nearing releases of their products :-/
I hate SE now, after they lured me on about the Xperia X10 for over a year now.
Edit: Xperia X10 is out in the U.K. Look's like that's it.
Yes, this guy is quite gay but check out the new voice search options for 2.2....
Speak any of these commands to perform a Voice Action on your phone:
send text to [contact] [message]
listen to [artist/song/album]
call [business]
call [contact]
send email to [contact] [message]
go to [website]
note to self [note]
navigate to [location/business name]
directions to [location/business name]
map of [location]
And of course, you can still con
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