Mobile Phone Blog:

Well folks, today was the day when Nokia took to the podium, to announce their next wave if Windows phones, and that means we have a brand new flagship to talk about. Say hello to the Nokia Lumia 920…

Oh, and they also announced a successor to the Nokia Lumia 800, as well, in the form of the Lumia 820, but since that phone’s not as exciting as the new flagship, I’m not going to talk about it much. Suffice to say that, as a mid-ranger, it’s pretty bleedin’ impressive, but that’s not the reason we’re here, is it? No, we’re here to see the main event… (more…)

Right then, you may very well have never heard of the Remote Device Access service that Nokia offers, and to be frank, neither had I till today. What it is, as far as I can gather, is a way for developers to connect remotely to hardware, to test out apps on the actual hardware in question. What it also is, though, is where the Nokia Lumia 900 was leaked before it was officially released.

And now, according to TechCrunch, it’s where another possible new phone has appeared. As you can see in the piccie over there, it’s called the Nokia Lumia 1001, and we basically know precisely nothing about it, other than the fact that it might actually be a real phone, although of course, there’s a chance that it’s not… (more…)

Right then, folks, we all know that Microsoft unveiled Windows Phone 8 last week, and we also all know that anyone who’s got a current gen Windows phone won’t get that newest version of the platform; so, what will they get, instead? Let’s find out…

Yup, instead of the Windows Phone 8, current Windows Phone users will get upgraded to Windows Phone 7.8, which at least adds some of the features of the all-new spangly version, right? Well, actually, no, not quite… (more…)

I am a self-avowed nerd, and I spend a lot of time on the internet, so it’s the law that I have to like Batman. It’s something that’s just programmed into me, at a genetic level, so there’s very little I can do about it at this point, even if I think that Green Lantern is a far, far better comic.

Anyway, as all nerds round the world know, the third and final part of Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy is going to be released this year, in the form of The Dark Knight Rises. As seems to be the case for big summer blockbusters like this, we have a limited edition phone to go along with it, according to Pocket-Lint. It’s a Nokia Lumia 900, and naturally, it’s black, because this is Batman we’re talking about, and he’s not The Shiny Knight… (more…)

Okay, I’m going to confess that when I first read about this, I wasn’t entirely sure of the point behind this new app, that Nokia are releasing on their Windows phones over here in Blighty (as well as in a select few other countries); in fact, I was so convinced it would fail, that I made the image to the right, to show why it would fail.

And do you know something? After reading about it, I reckon my first instincts were wrong. Y’see, the app is called Nokia Reading, and to put it simply, it’s an e-book reader; thus, when I first read about it, my first thought was that the Amazon Kindle app would smash this wee upstart into the dirt. However, there’s actually a very good reason why that won’t necessarily happen… (more…)

After the lukewarm reception to the Nokia Lumia 800, the last thing Nokia needed was there to be a problem with its big brother, the Nokia Lumia 900. I reckon it’s fair to say that there’s a lot riding on this phone, so the fact that there is a problem with the Lumia 900 (or, at least, some Lumia 900s) is a bit bad, really.

According to WPCentral, the problem is colour-related; more specifically, some Lumia 900s have a purple tint to the screen, so that where the user should see grey, they’re seeing a sort of purple-y colour, as you can see in the pic. The good news, though, is that the problem is apparently limited to a small percentage of the Lumia 900s out there, but there’s even better news than that… (more…)

I’ve gone on record as saying that I’m not the world’s biggest fan of Stephen Elop, and it’s also well-known that I reckon the Windows Phone platform is a bit, well, underwhelming. It’s not bad, it’s just a bit disappointing, and the same can be said of the Windows phones that Nokia has released so far (largely due to the OS, not the phones themselves, if I’m honest).

According to CNet, I’m not the only one who has concerns about the Finnish manufacturer. Y’see, they’ve interviewed a former Nokia executive, Lee Williams, and he had some damning things to say about what’s currently going in their headquarters.

So, what’s the crack? (more…)

Well, according to IntoMobile, Nokia have posted their financial results for the first quarter of this year, and I can honestly say that I was not expecting to see what I’m seeing. I mean I knew things were not brilliant for the Finnish manufacturer, but ye gods, I didn’t think they were this bad. Yes, it seems that Nokia’s sales are down from last year, by 3 billion euros, and that is really not an insubstantial figure.

That translates to a net loss, during Q1, of around 1.3 billion euros, or, to put in less Euro-friendly terms, just over a billion quid. Just… wow, how is that even possible? How has Nokia, once the undisputed king of the mobile world, gone from the very top of the pack, to losing a billion quid in three months? (more…)

Right then, I’ve been wanting to do this blog post for ages, but I’ve not been able to until the night, for the simple reason that I only just saw the film in question, tonight (gawd bless my sister, and her popping in Asda on the way home from work, where she found it on sale for a fiver). Yes, the film in question is Attack The Block, and it could most accurately be described as chavs vs. aliens.

Well, sort of, anyway. Let’s go with what the tagline on the poster, and say that it’s inner city vs. outer space. And because it’s about gang kids fighting wolf gorilla alien things (can’t type what they call them, it’s not allowed), then yes, of course it has mobile phones in it. In fact, it’s the first film in ages that does mobile phones realistically… (more…)

I am on record as saying that I love e-books. I’ve had many long conversations (well, alright, arguments) with people (really, really annoyingly technophobic and pretentious people, or as I call them, luddite idiots), who say that e-books are evil. You know the drill, some new technology comes out, and people clamour to be the first to decry it, usually to try and show how vast and non-mainstream their brains are.

Anyway, the point is, e-books are not bad. They are, in fact, awesome. They’re good for writers (who can avoid legacy publishers altogether and get fantastic royalties through the Amazon Kindle) and they’re good for consumers (they pay less per book, so they can afford more books)… (more…)