Alec Saunders SquawkBox

Today was the final day of World Mobile Congress in Barcelona.  We had our wrap call at 5 PM Barcelona time, which was after the show had ended.  What that meant was no WiFi, and no quite place on the show grounds… it was done in a tapas bar across the street from FIRA.

Quality is iffy, for which I apologize.  Enjoy the call. 

 

 Squawk Box Feb 14 [14:34m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

An even more elusive beast than Google Android, Garmin’s Nuvi Phone was a disappointment.  Granted, it’s the company’s first phone, but I was expecting more than an industrial design mock-up, and a device under glass that couldn’t be demonstrated or handled. 

First impressions?  It has a nice heft, and the velveteen paint job gives it a luxurious feel in your hand.  However, the software, when compared with products from Nokia, Apple, or Microsoft, has a decidedly old school look and feel.  Moreover, Garmin positions this as first and foremost a navigation tool, which means that media capabilities that you may enjoy on other devices will be absent - by design.  When asked about Nokia’s new navigation software and their claims that pedestrian navigation is the new frontier, Garmin was quick to dismiss the concept, saying that pedestrian navigation maps do not yet exist.

Hmmm… I’ll take a look again when the device finally releases, but so far it seems a little underwhelming.

Getting into mobile devices was a favorite theme of QNX founder Dan Dodge during the time I was at the company, 5 years ago. But back then it was an aspiration as opposed to having a solid offering for mobile device manufacturers.  So, I dropped by the QNX display (part of the FreeScale Exhibit) yesterday to see what they were showing.

It doesn’t look like a phone, does it?  Well, it’s a prototyping and development kit to allow someone to build a phone.  The cool thing, however, is the software running on that touch display.  It’s all built in Flash!  That’s right.  With QNX’s latest development systems you can build the entire UI for your application in Flash.  That’s a productivity gain for developers as well as a giant potential improvement in curb appeal for end users. 

I’ve just installed WordPy on the N810

This is a full featured blogging client for Wordpress and Blogger that runs on the 810. It supports rich postings with pictures, Flickr and more.

I could see using this in a pinch!

Technorati Tags: Wordpress

This is the Squawk Box recording may yesterday from Barcelona.  We discussed, among other things, the Yahoo One Connect product I saw yesterday, the dance between AT&T, T-Mobile, Yahoo, Google, and Nokia over search and hotspots, and the value of 3G broadband, as demonstrated by the fabulous YoiGo SIM I've been using here in Barcelona. 

 

 Squawk Box Feb 13 [30:28m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download