Nokia has launched its Web Run Time platform for creating and deploying “web widgets†for the S60 mobile operating system. Widgets are essentially web-based applications that can also include Adobe Flash Lite. See how simple it is to turn your Flash Lite application into a WRT widget during this unique eSeminar!
Date: Wednesday 17 September, 2008
Time: 2:00PM (Check local time Zone)
Register here
vivek
Dale Speaking on Adobe Flash Liteâ„¢ and Flash Video in Adobe eSeminar event.
Nokia devices are now shipping with the new Adobe Flash Lite 3 runtime, which means working with mobile video just got a whole lot easier! During this eSeminar, see how simple it is to create mobile applications with Flash Lite 3 – so you can stream FLV video over the mobile internet, and control video as it plays on the device.
Date: Wednesday 03 September, 2008
Time: 2:00PM(Check local time Zone)
Register here
vivek
There is importance of design and good design which we need to understand. Design is everywhere and anywhere 🙂
vivek
An Intresting interview with Raphael Grignani of Nokia Design about Homegrown project. Must read to know about new design thinking on sustainability.
Rachel Hinman, mobile design strategist at Adaptive Path, has conducted an interview with Raphael Grignani of Nokia Design about “Homegrownâ€, a long term research project looking at how Nokia can help people make more sustainable choices.
“With Remade, Andrew Gartrell (Homegrown project lead and Remade father) pushed design beyond skin deep aesthetics. He considered covers, key mats, and displays but also engine, connectors, and other components. We discovered that a typical mobile phone contains around 44 of the 117 elements currently known to science. Andrew’s approach was to de-construct everything and rebuild it from scratch using recycled materials and sustainable technologies — from the inside out.
50% of a phone’s energy demand is backlighting.
Energy saving graphics “concept”
Another aspect of Homegrown that is really interesting is the work we did around prototyping. Andrew designed in CAD over 100 versions of Remade and prototyped 36 — which could be considered obsessive — but it was through that constant consideration and iteration that we were able to arrive at something that was great.
At present, phone chargers waste 300mW of standby power when left unplugged.
Prototyping allowed us to confront our designs — asking ourselves, “Is this the best we can do? What can we reduce? Have we found the essence? What can we make better or what can we make differently?†We questioned every bit of the concepts throughout the prototyping process. Now we can explain every bit of the design; we can rationalize every aspect of it.â€
vivek
You can download updated Flash enabled handsets spreadsheet here.
It’s great news coming around the world using Adobe Flash Lite technology specially in terms of on demand videos entertainment industry straight to your pocket mobile devices.
Recently Singapore Telecommunications Limited (SingTel) launches mio TV on Mobile service using Adobe Flash Lite technology and Nokia Siemens Networks’ Mobile TV streaming solution. SingTel is the first operator in Singapore and one of the first in Asia Pacific to launch a mobile TV client with true TV viewing experience on mobile phones.
“mio TV has revolutionised the way people watch TV, and the mio TV on Mobile service provides our customers with yet another convenient medium to expand their viewing options,†said Mr Wong Soon Nam, SingTel’s Vice President of Consumer Marketing.
“With Singapore’s high mobile penetration rate and SingTel’s customer base of over 2.5 million mobile users, the largest in Singapore, it makes sense to offer compelling content on our mobile platform so that Singaporeans have access to their favourite mio TV content wherever they may be.â€
Expected Launching: July 2008
Price: Â $6 per month for unlimited viewing of the live channels. Ondemand price $0.50 per clip.
vivek
Just found this podcast via core 77 of Nokia’s recent London design event which offering a curtainpeek at their design process, ethnographic wanderings, sustainability initiatives, and plans for the future. Nokia has over 300 designers worldwide, and ships over 1.2 million products everyday. So it’s really keen to know what their designers intake for their creative food 😀
vivek
Nokia Design Studio they calls “open studio.†Works really closer with local experts such as NGOs or even students, Nokia designers went into each city and set up a community based competition asking people to design their dream phone. Results sometimes lead out some interesting concepts and sometime unusual.
“In the not so distant past, the end game of design for Nokia was the phone, Nokia’s head of design Alistair Curtis says. Now the phone is a springboard to all sorts of services, he says. Developing relevant services, he believes, means creating an open platform. Then consumers can eventually bolt on applications as needed. ”
check out this slide show for some concepts of phone model.
vivek
A cellphone shop in Accra, Ghana, which carries and repairs a variety of handsets.
A great article via The New York Times featuring Jan Chipchase and his work style to find about how people use their cell phones, where they keep it, understanding their behaviour in terms of usability, business and Psychology many more ways . . even a simple idea can make a product more innovative and solution providing as mobile phones are getting more personalized mere just not a functional device to talk. The premise of the work is simple – get to know your potential customers as well as possible before you make a product for them.
“This sort of on-the-ground intelligence-gathering is central to what’s known as “human-centered design”, a business-world niche that has become especially important to ultracompetitive high-tech companies trying to figure out how to write software, design laptops or build cellphones that people find useful and unintimidating and will thus spend money on. Several companies, including Intel, Motorola and Microsoft, employ trained anthropologists to study potential customers.”
Chipchase talks to Accra street vendors about what an ideal phone.
Jan Chipchase is 38, a rangy native of Britain whose broad forehead and high-slung brows combine to give him the air of someone who is quick to be amazed, which in his line of work is something of an asset. For the last seven years, he has worked for the Finnish cellphone company Nokia as a “human-behavior researcher.†He’s also sometimes referred to as a “user anthropologist.†To an outsider, the job can seem decidedly oblique. His mission, broadly defined, is to peer into the lives of other people, accumulating as much knowledge as possible about human behavior so that he can feed helpful bits of information back to the company — to the squads of designers and technologists and marketing people who may never have set foot in a Vietnamese barbershop but who would appreciate it greatly if that barber someday were to buy a Nokia.
I really impressed with him, his thoughts to create innovation and more focussed for the people.
vivek
The Strategy Analytics report says, “Silverlight on Mobile will not catch up with Adobe’s Flash Lite in the foreseeable future, but Microsoft recognizes a great opportunity beyond providing an alternative to Adobe’s Flash Lite. This Silverlight strategic offering will boost Microsoft’s online and cross-platform ambitions in the mobile space according to analysts at Strategy Analytics.
“The Silverlight deal with Nokia gives Microsoft access to Nokia’s S60 licensees including LG, Samsung which is vital for competing with Flash Lite,” commented Sravan Kundojjala, Analyst at Strategy Analytics. “They estimates that over 1.7 billion Flash Lite-enabled phones will be shipped globally over the next three years alone.”
Stuart Robinson, Director of the Handset Component Services added, “Strategy Analytics believes cross-platform wars will likely heat up in the mobile space, an argument strengthened by Nokia’s Trolltech acquisition. And also believes that SUN Microsystems will join the fray with its JavaFX platform.”
vivek
A nice article on The New York Times, what mobile designers think behind the scene and workaround for “hoping to Make Phone Buyers Flip“. Forecasting what consumers will want next year, and into the future. Designing a Mobile phone is just not an easy task there are many things to see, evaluate and analyze around the people. Jotting down feelings about features what users are looking for, share their emotions about mobile phone, understanding the psyche of consumers and why they pick one phone over another.
Even interesting designs do not necessarily spell success. The group is the first of its kind at Nokia, the world’s No. 1 seller of mobile phones, bringing together 14 designers and researchers from California and Helsinki, where the company is headquartered. Their charge is to tell Nokia’s top executives not only what consumers will want next year, but 3 to 15 years from now.
“We have the ability to clarify the needs of real people,†said Rhys Newman, who heads the team.
“Design used to be inconsequential: just make it pretty, make it sell,†said Mr. Newman, who, along with three members of his team, was interviewed at Nokia’s design center near a strip mall in downtown Calabasas, north of Los Angeles. Now, he said, “we have to think about human fundamentals.â€
When asked if they felt pressure to design new phones more quickly in an increasingly competitive market, Mr. Jan Chipchase responded with a quizzical stare. “Why do you want to innovate faster?†he asked. “Are you innovating something gimmicky just to sell a product? Or is it saving the planet you are after?â€
So what you think about your mobile phone, how you use it, Do share your emotions, feelings, and what you want in your phone? 🙂
vivek
Nokia N95 just got its Flash Lite 3/Web runtime firmware update. Although not as big an update as v20 was (which introduced demand paging and transformed the speed of the device, remember), v21.0.016 is still a major firmware and well worth installing.
What’s new in v21.0.016:
vivek
Nokia announced the launch of its 2008 Nokia Mobile Filmmaking Awards. Nokia invites everyone to enter in this competitons by creating and submitting their short videos to ovi.com/pangeaday to be considered for inclusion in the first Pangea Day broadcast event on May 10, 2008. With the growing interest in sharing images and videos through mobile devices and services like Share on Ovi, Nokia hopes to encourage more consumers to get creative.
Pangea Day is a global day of films, music and speakers that will be held simultaneously on May 10, 2008 in gathering places around the world. Inspired by the 2006 TED Prize wish of Jehane Noujaim, Pangea Day endeavors to bring the world together and promote understanding and tolerance. Pangea Day is a celebration of what unites us, rather than what divides us, via films made by the world for the world.
So are you ready to direct and make your own films, seems a right time to make and show what your creative eyes can see 🙂
vivek
Just got mail from Forum Nokia that upcoming “Widgets and Flash Lite Code Camps in the APAC” region is now available free for Nokia Forum members.
They will be refunding money back the payment for those who have paid the fees via credit card. Interesting!!
I will be there, hope to see creative people around, catch me 
vivek
Espoo, Finland – Nokia has opened a satellite design studio in Rio de Janeiro reflecting the increasing impact Latin American style and culture is expected to have on the future design of mobile devices and services. Based at the Design School of UniverCidade, it will bring together Nokia designers, students and established local designers to explore new trends and ideas that will influence products for the Latin American and global markets.
The satellite studio is the second in a series Nokia is establishing in the world’s hottest new design capitals. The first was opened in Bangalore, India
Alastair Curtis, Nokia’s Chief Designer, said, “Brazil is an incredibly vibrant and diverse place and one that is constantly transforming and developing itself in new ways. This makes it a perfect place to inspire designers. It also has a wealth of emerging new design talent that will play a key role in shaping many of the global design trends we will see in the next few years. Combining the experience of our global design team with the local creativity and perspective of the students is a very exciting and creative way to explore new ideas in this important market for Nokia.”
It’s really very interesting that mobile companies are focusing more on design and design trends of local as well as impact of regional culture, trends to the global audiences. 🙂
Unfortunately i haven’t found much information about Nokia design studio, Bangalore!! Where it is located or is this studio is just meant for limited accessibility? It will be great if any one is reading this and post some information about it!!
vivek
Nokia Maps is approaching the release of its second major version (2.0). a semi-public beta.The new version brings a number of improvements which includes a new pedestrian mode, enhanced driving navigation mode, satellite maps, much improved search and new real time traffic information.
Some details on features are:
vivek