Hello!And welcome to our Thursday column, Worst of the Week. There's a lot of nutty stuff that goes on in this industry, so this column is a chance for us at RCRNews.com to rant and rave about whatever rubs us the wrong way. We...
Apple Inc. slashed the price of its 8GB iPhone by one-third and, separately, the company launched a Wi-Fi storefront hawking full-track tunes and albums for the device.The company said it lowered the price of the 8 GB iPhone from $600 to $400, and discontinued...
Give Palm Inc.'s CEO Ed Colligan credit for straight talk, which may bode well for the company's new direction and ultimate survival. Colligan yesterday delivered a difficult message with a silver lining to Palm's customers, partners and developers: he's cancelling the Foleo product, which...
Editor's Note: Welcome to On the Margins, a feature for RCR Wireless News' new weekly e-mail service, Mobile Content and Culture. Every week, the RCR Wireless News staff considers events in the wider business world and how they could affect the wireless industry.--NBC Universal...
Nokia Corp. is hoping to build a doorway directly to mobile consumers. Again.But whether carriers will tolerate the move is far from clear.The manufacturer-cum-mobile-media company last week outlined a surprisingly broad cross-platform play, introducing Ovi-which means "door" in the Finnish company's native tongue-at its...
By now you've probably read about the "teen whiz" who unlocked his Apple Inc. iPhone using software commands and a soldering iron. (George Hotz, unlocker from New Jersey, got a free car, three iPhones and a consulting contract from an admiring Terry Daidone, co-founder...
James Baldinger, a partner at Carlton Fields PA, has successfully litigated cases on behalf of Tracfone Wireless Inc. against individuals and groups that have purchased discounted Tracfone handsets, unlocked them and resold them for profit.Based on his experience with such litigation and his familiarity...
Hello!And welcome to our Thursday column, Worst of the Week. There's a lot of nutty stuff that goes on in this industry, so this column is a chance for us at RCRNews.com to rant and rave about whatever rubs us the wrong way....
Nokia Corp. unveiled four handsets along with its "Ovi" Internet-based content services in what appears to be an early example of how the Finnish company will dovetail its hardware business with a future-facing Internet services business model. The handsets appear targeted at the European...
Like a first-year student struggling with the violin, carriers have hit a lot of wrong notes with their music offerings.But that may finally be changing.Verizon Wireless last week garnered headlines by teaming with MTV Networks and RealNetworks on a new, cross-platform mobile music service....
Editor's Note: Welcome to our weekly feature, Analyst Angle. We've collected a group of the industry's leading analysts to give their outlook on the hot topics in the wireless industry. In the coming weeks look for columns from Current Analysis' Avi Greengart, Jupiter Research's...
Verizon Wireless is hoping it can make better music as part of a trio than it did singing solo.The carrier last week announced a partnership with MTV Networks and RealNetworks Inc. to challenge Apple Inc.'s dominant iTunes service. MTV will shutter its Urge music...
If businesses had Ten Commandments, No. 1 would probably be "Know Thy Customer."Easier said than done.Customer information plays a crucial role in customer relationship management, from determining the type of offers and incentives that are made to customers to impacting growth and retention. The...
Verizon Wireless is teaming with MTV Networks and RealNetworks Inc. to take on Apple Inc.'s iTunes service.MTV is shuttering its Urge music download service and will integrate components of the offering with RealNetworks' Rhapsody, an online music subscription service. Verizon Wireless will serve as...
A mistake in a media report earlier this month suggesting that Nokia Corp. had sold as many as 450,000 units of its high-end N95 handset in the United States during the second quarter immediately set chins to wagging.The N95 packs advanced Web browsing, multimedia...
THE IPHONE HAS given birth to the iEcosystem. Whether that's a good thing, though, is debatable.Apple Inc.'s decision to bar third-party developers from building applications for its high-profile device has drawn scorn in the software world. But there is no shortage of Internet-based applications...
A small study by usability consultancy User Centric Inc. found that first-time users of the Apple Inc. iPhone took twice as long to compose text messages on the device as they did with their own phone, and that many users preferred the feel of...
The inexorable pressure to launch a handset-as scheduled-for maximum impact-has created a growing market for mobile device management (MDM) products, including firmware over the air, or FOTA.As network operators increasingly rush to introduce new revenue-generating services and applications, market growth from a modest field...
The nightmarish world of mobile digital rights management may have taken a small step toward sanity.Microsoft Corp. scored a big win last week, agreeing to license its PlayReady anti-software piracy to Nokia Corp. The world's largest handset manufacturer plans to embed the technology on...
WHEN A BEHEMOTH SHAKES ITS TAIL, some rise, some fall. The behemoth benefits.That appears to be the upshot of Nokia Corp.'s announcement last week that it had selected four main chipset suppliers for future business. The move boosted some fortunes and cast off others,...
In case you hadn't heard, Google is going mobile. The Wall Street Journal last week trumpeted the Internet giant's efforts to build handsets in a page-one story that quickly echoed throughout the blogosphere and the trade press. London's Telegraph stoked the rumor mill a...
Nokia Corp. said it will embed anti-piracy software from Microsoft Corp. on its Series 60 and Series 40 handsets. The world's largest mobile-phone manufacturer said it will include Microsoft's DRM solution, dubbed PlayReady, on both Symbian-enabled devices and feature phones beginning next year. The...
There's good news for a beleaguered American handset giant named Motorola Inc.The company's Razr handset-beefed up on functionality and spun off in customized form in myriad colors for all four of the top-tier network operators-represented two of the top five bestselling handsets last quarter...
First, Balda AG and its partner, TPK Holdings, won Apple Inc.'s business for the touchscreen module for the latter's iPhone.Now Balda's shareholders are agitating for the company to spin off its touchscreen business to bring more visibility to that business' value, according to German...
