Communication Breakdown
Communications from the world of, er, communications. And other stuff.
Monday 11 February 2008, 2:14 PM
Liveblogging from Microsoft's press gig
I'm currently sitting in Microsoft's big Mobile World Congress press conference. Last year's equivalent event proved very useful for liveblogging, what with a bunch of announcements like Windows Mobile 6 and, er, DRM.
But that was 3GSM in 2007, and this is MWC in 2008. Word is, Microsoft doesn't have many interesting announcements this year... let's see if that's true.
I will update this post as we continue... Right now I'm listening to Robbie Bach, MS's entertainment and device somethingorother president. So far, so dull...
UPDATE 1: Microsoft is acquiring Danger, the Sidekick people (more relevant in the US than the UK, thus far, but brings with it lots of social whatnot and messaging talent). Interesting... Bach is going on about "tremendous software services". "We'll be incorporating Danger into the work that we do". Ha! I thought the Yahoo! fiasco had already proved that...
UPDATE 2: Pieter Kanook now, as last year. Going on about consumer services... multimedia etc. An advertising business model that "we see expanding and moving us to new areas". Hmmm...
UPDATE 3: Windows Mobile momentum: more units sold than iPhone AND (not my caps there) BlackBerry. New deal with the Russian operator MTS - consumer provision of mobile laptops. Telefonica is apparently taking up MS's "PlayReady" DRM for music downloads etc.
Come on! There must be something interesting coming out of this. Surely?
UPDATE 4: Showing off the UI of a new Vodafone handset. And a mobile phone picture of La Sagrada Familia. Oh yes, we're in Barcelona, aren't we? Good to see love for the locality.
UPDATE 5: Oh, here's Zumobi's browser. It's not pretty. And my battery is dying, so this may be my final update. Just time to let you know they're currently showing off a port of Amiga's Invasion game. In other words, there hasn't been much hard news from Redmond today. The rumour mill was right.
UPDATE 6 (from a PC in the press room): There wasn´t much to report after my battery went pfft. A snide remark or two about Apple, and a blanket refusal to discuss Yahoo! in the Q&As. No surprise there. It would have been far too interesting.
Friday 8 February 2008, 11:00 AM
Nice try, Vodafone
Along comes a press release today from the Vodafone Group, entitled "Vodafone builds on its leading daily data roaming tariff with cut-price monthly option". The release begins: "Vodafone today announces a price reduction of up to 45% to its monthly data roaming tariff for European business travellers."
After O2 recently announced some pretty impressive data roaming rate cuts and Ofcom chief Ed Richards complained that the high charges were hurting businesses, this made sense. Until we looked at the details.
What Vodafone are actually announcing is, by the admission of their press department, "a blueprint for all the operator companies" within the Vodafone Group, as to the maximum they will be able to charge their customers for monthly data roaming. According to the press release, the maximum that Vodafone companies can presently charge is €75 per month, to be cut to €60 per month from June. The minimum data usage within those tariffs will be increased from 100MB to 150MB.
But hang on... doesn't Vodafone have a £95 (that's €130 thank you very much) per month tariff, offering business travellers 200MB of usage? They did half a year ago and, according to their press department today, they still do. Whoops.
Annoyingly, it would appear that Vodafone is: a) trying to squeeze as many "Vodafone cuts data roaming prices" stories out of the media as possible - expect another one in May or June, of course, when Vodafone UK announces what it will actually charge - and b) use this coverage to convince the regulators that it's playing ball, but without actually clearly detailing what it will charge. Commercial confidentiality, you understand.
We'll wait for May or June, thanks.
Wednesday 6 February 2008, 4:53 PM
Fasthosts offers SaaS-ish MS Office
Blimey - this one came in quietly. Fasthosts, the ISP and hosting company, are offering Microsoft Office on the software-as-a-service (SaaS) model. That means that, from £5 plus VAT per month, you can use Office as an online service with no need to buy the software outright.
Except... is it truly SaaS? The FAQs suggest that software needs to be downloaded, which is a bad start. Also, the cheapest version of the product is the educational version, which ordinarily requires some kind of verification that you are actually a student or whatever. However, in this case: "This is on a self-certification basis, and we do not ask you to provide evidence of eligibility". Que? I smell licensing issues...
Fasthosts' CTO, Mark Jeffries, calls it "an excellent way to obtain the very latest versions of the software we all need, affordably, on a pay-as-you-go basis".
"Its low monthly cost and easy installation will suit a great many home and business users," he added.
I was on the phone to a senior Microsoft executive (admittedly on the mobile side) when I saw the Fasthosts news. "I didn't know you could do that with Office," I said.
"Neither did I," he replied.
Weird one, this. I'm waiting to hear back from MS's press office, and will report further details shortly...
UPDATE: Microsoft Office's spokesperson has refused to comment on this one, due to commercial confidentiality issues with MS partners blah blah. Chasing their licensing people now... This is extremely odd.
Monday 4 February 2008, 3:48 PM
Teaser for new Motorola phone
I just received an email from some Motorola PR guy with a link to the clip below. It's admirable of the struggling manufacturer to have cottoned onto this "viral marketing" business at last, but... for heaven's sake. Watch the clip. Are they saying that you can now get mobile handsets that do music, video and other PC-ish stuff? Really? Have I just wormholed back to 2003?
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