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Top 10 Budget Mobile Phones

2012-03-07T17:48:00.000+00:00

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Top 10 Budget Mobile Phones
by victoriatagg on 11-02-2012 11:00 - last edited on 09-02-2012 16:25

Following on from our post a couple of weeks ago on the best mid-range phones comes our round up of ten of the best budget smartphones on the market right now. These are phones that can be had for around (or in most cases under) £100 and can do the basics. Perfect if you’re after a cheap phone primarily for calling and texting but wouldn’t mind seeing what other features and functions you can get on a shoestring. With giffgaff goodbags starting at £10 a month it’s never been cheaper to start using a smartphone.

1: Texter’s Lab

Talk is cheap - texting is cheaper. For those who prefer to tap away on their phones rather than be constantly answering calls to friends, family members, loved ones and colleagues, then you need a Texter. Phones that make composing and sending an SMS as easy as ABC.
The Samsung E1150i (£10-£20) is more feature than smartphone and is very basic feature-wise, not having a web browser, camera, memory card slot or an MP3 player. But for the asking price it’s perfect if you’re just after a simple phone for calling and texting. Featuring an old school flip design and a long lasting battery, the Samsung E1150i is ideal for those who want a seriously no-frills phone.

Android phones that come with Qwerty keyboards are few and far between but the HTC ChaCha (£120-£135) is one of those. Coming with a 2.6-inch touchscreen and a full four-row Qwerty pad, the ChaCha gives you the best of both worlds; a screen you can scroll, swipe and tap through and a solid physical keypad for that dedicated typing and texting experience.
The BlackBerry Curve 8520 (£80-£110) packs the full email and Qwerty typing experience for which BlackBerry phones are renowned. As well as this you get access to Facebook and Twitter as well as BBM. The lack of 3G means that any net-based services could be a little on the slow side. The giffgaff BlackBerry Add-on offers BBM and email for £3 extra a month.
The Nokia C1-01 (£25-£40) is even more retro than either of these phones. Coming with a 1.8-inch non-touchscreen and an old-school keypad, this is for those who prefer writing their TXT MSGS the old-fashioned way. For those of you who never had a problem with predictive text, we salute you - we could never get the hang of it.

2: Network-Specific phones

Back in the day we used to see more phones that were ‘network specific’, phones that were locked to a network, like the O2 XDA.
There aren’t so many network specific phones going these days but there are a few that are worth your consideration if you’re after a phone on a shoestring. Obviously to use these phones with a giffgaff SIM you’ll need to be wise to the ways of phone unlocking.
Running Android Gingerbread the Orange Monte Carlo (£110-£120) has a big 4.3-inch screen (WVGA 480x800) that makes for easy, roomy web browsing and a 5-megapixel camera with a single LED flash. Internal memory isn’t up to much (160MB-odd) but there’s a microSD card slot so you can expand it.
Though not the fastest phone out there (it has an 800MHz processor) it’s fine for the basics and the large screen comes into its own for web browsing, checking Google Maps and viewing pictures in the gallery.

The Orange San Francisco II (£70-£120) also runs Android Gingebread comes with many of the same specs and features as the Monte Carlo, but it has a smaller 3.5-inch screen and a sleeker design. There’s a 5-megapixel (LED flash) so you get a similar picture taking quality and there’s a VGA camera on the front for self-portrait shots as well.
The T-Mobile Vivacity (£90-£120) also rocks a 5-megapixel camera with a flash, a VGA front-facing camera and a 3.5-inch screen. Despite running Android Gingerbread, physically it also bears a striking similarity to the iPhone 4/4S. So for a fraction of the price of an iPhone, you could perhaps fool your less tech-savvy friends with the T-Mobile Vivacity...

3: General all rounders

These phones do the basics and are easy to use. No powerful, flashy cameras or big touchscreens for these unassuming phones. For those who want something inexpensive to handle the every day phone functions then one of these general all rounders will be for you.
The recent HTC Explorer (£99-£130) is a perfect example of this. It’s got a 3.2-inch touchscreen which is very responsive. Despite its relatively small size, texting, checking Google Maps and browsing the web is effortless on the Explorer - its name is particularly apt in this respect.

The Huawei Blaze (£60-£115) similarly has a 3.2-inch screen but is easy to operate, responding well to the touch. Running Google’s Android OS it has a solid, chunky feel in the hand and is excellent value for its price. Internal storage is a paltry 256MB, but you can expand this with a microSD card up to 32GB. Huawei might not be as well known in the UK, but don’t let that put you off, the Blaze offers a lot of features for the money.
Same goes for the Android Samsung Galaxy Mini (£80-£100). It has a slightly bigger 3.14-inch screen and despite the low resolution (QVGA 320x240) the phone is easy to use thanks in part of the responsiveness of the screen and the simple layout. The virtual keyboard perhaps isn’t the easiest to text on, but Swype, the next-gen predictive text keyboard, comes pre-installed, which makes up for this.
Have we missed any handsets that should have made our top 10 budget phones? Let us know in the comments below.

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Top 5 Android Productivity Apps

2012-03-07T17:28:00.000+00:00

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Top 5 Android Productivity Apps
by wsjudd on 10-02-2012 18:00 - last edited on 09-02-2012 16:10

For anyone that's working, whether as a student or a bona fide professional, your smartphone is your go-to resource for staying organised and getting things done. The easiest way to make sure you're working effectively (apart from uninstalling Angry Birds) is to make sure you've got the right apps for the job, whether it's keeping tabs on the latest headlines in your field, taking notes or checking your shared projects on the go.
For that reason, I've compiled a list of the five best productivity apps for Android. If you want to download any of the apps below, just click on the link in the title (e.g. where it says 'Google Reader' if you want Google Reader). Let's get right into it!

Google Reader

Google Reader is as indispensable on Android as it is on any other platform. If you want to keep up with the latest news from across the web, then there's no better way to do it. Reader makes it simple to add new sites, automatically finding RSS feeds on a given site and subscribing you to them. You can also have Google Alerts sent to your Reader feed, allowing you to know when sites mention things you're interested in - like, for example, your company or products.

Once you're all signed up, it's just a case of swiping through the day's stories, reading the ones you're interested in or starring them for later perusal - perfect for keeping up to date with the headlines on the way to work. There's also an Android widget, making it even quicker to have a quick looksie at the latest news.

Wunderlist

Wunderlist is a cloud-based list program for Android (as well as iOS, Windows & Mac) that makes it easy to share lists with your colleagues or just let you access them via any platform. Where other task management apps try to stuff in as much functionality as possible, Wunderlist takes a different approach, focusing on ease of use and style - you can tell that this was originally a Mac application. Wunderlist also looks fantastic, with a choice of 12 well-crafted backgrounds (from simple colours and textures to finely crafted digital art) that mesh nicely with the streamlined interface.

That said, Wunderlist does provide all of the standard features you'd expect - you can organise items into lists, mark them as important, and set up reminders and due dates. The app also comes with an Android widget which shows the tasks due today, allowing you to mark them as completed from the home screen. Wunderlist really takes the humble to-do list app and makes it beautiful.

Evernote

Evernote is the mother of all note-taking apps, providing unparalled functionality. While it isn't as streamlined as more focused productivity apps like Wunderlist, it compensates by letting you do much more - you can add notes of pretty much any flavour: text, audio, pictures, videos, files or web pages. Evernote also provides cloud storage and multiple platforms, so you can get at your saved content wherever you are.

Evernote excels at being extra storage for your mind - if you need to remember or note down anything from anywhere, Evernote is the way to do it. As with the other apps on this list, Evernote comes with a rather useful widget, allowing you to create that mind-to-Evernote bridge even quicker.

Dropbox

Dropbox is a great program for accessing your work files on the go. I use it to get at my saved articles and pictures, whether I'm on my PC or out with my Android. The program also makes it easy to share files on your phone with your desktop or friends, with a simple interface for uploading your files to the cloud.

Dropbox is also ideal for project work, letting you read and write files that are shared with your team members. Where Google Docs insists on using its own web editor in order to modify your files, Dropbox allows you to edit files using any program installed on your Android. That also opens the door for working on files not supported by Google Docs, including PDFs and source code.
The default storage space is 2 GB, which is plenty for most users, but can also be extended in a number of ways. You can invite other users for an extra 250 MB of space each, and right now you can download a beta version of Dropbox for desktop clients that gives you an extra 500 MB for each 500 MB of photos you upload, up to 5 GB of extra space.
Dropbox is an essential download. If you'd like to sign up, you could do it via this link, which would give you (and me) an extra 250 MB of storage space. You can also sign up, referral free, via the app itself.

Google Docs

Google Docs is the app on this list that I use the most, but is the least polished. As you'd expect, it's an Android interface to Google Docs, allowing you to edit documents, spreadsheets and more. While you can access all of the documents you've got online, the actual editing process could use some improvement, with it being difficult to edit multiple cells in spreadsheets or apply formatting to text, things you think that a rather well-endowed company like Google could work on for one of their premier services.

Still, Google Docs is the go-to application for sharing editable files online, and app is perfectly suited for making that initial share or viewing a file - just stick to the desktop version if you want to get some real editing done.

Conclusion

So that's it then - five of my most-used apps for getting things done. I didn't notice until I was writing the article, but all of the apps on this list are cloud-connected and available for every major platform, letting you access whatever content you add to them on whatever environment you're in. It's a sign of the times, eh?
So what apps do you find essential for productivity on Android? I've gone for some rather well-known applications here, but I'd love to discover some new apps I've never heard of, and share them with the rest of our good readers in a later article. Let me know via the comments below, or you can even hit me up on Twitter @wsjudd. Thanks for reading, and be sure to let me know what you think!
William Judd is a copywriter and technology blogger based in Bristol. If you'd like to hire me or just say hello, feel free to visit my website at williamjudd.com or chat with me on Twitter.

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Friday Poll Results 10/02/2012

2012-03-02T12:56:00.001+00:00

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Friday Poll Results 10/02/2012
by zobia22 on 10-02-2012 11:17

Hi guys,

hope you're well!

Last week we asked you: how attached are you to your mobile number?

The top answer that most of you voted for is: 'I've always kept the same mobile number' with 'I would like to keep this mobile number' following closely behind.

Thanks to all 356 of you that voted

In this week's Friday poll we are asking you: does the company you work for block access to social network websites at work? Vote and discuss here!

Thanks.

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Being a social business and customer service challenges

2012-03-02T12:53:00.000+00:00

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Being a social business and customer service challenges
by clairekav on 09-02-2012 19:38 - last edited on 10-02-2012 10:39

With an increasing number of ways to connect to friends and share information, businesses are trying to keep up with changing customer service expectations and finding ways to hold their customers attention, keep them up to date and help them out if needed.

Increasing use of social channels such as Facebook and twitter has changed the way customers interact with their service providers. Seeking a path of least resistance – no longer are people willing to wait at the end of the phone waiting for a customer service agent to pick up or searching through hundreds of pages of no so “Frequently asked questions”. Headstream are collecting nominations for their Top 100 Social Brands report, (last year we placed #4) which got me thinking about how things have changed over the past year and of some of the challenges, we as a Social Brand are facing (some new, some old).

We’ve got some exciting changes coming up this year which will help improve member experience across all these different social channels – but I thought it might be interesting to pop a few of the things we’re trying to tackle/improve this year:

Some challenges with being a social business:

- Creating Fans and followers: With social channels increasingly being used for customer service, it is at times difficult to make space for content (ie a video, link to something interesting) which makes it more interesting for people to follow you/ become a fan of your Facebook/Twitter site etc.

Invariably any content you post will be commented on with a service query. The challenge is how do you make things interesting for your followers while balancing answering member questions.

- Multiple views of a single customer: People aren’t always easily identifiable when they pop up in different channels - you don’t always identify yourself as the same person – with different “Ids” across all the social channels you interact with (ie you might be John Smith on Facebook, @Smithy on twitter and JSmith on the giffgaff Community) it is difficult to work out you’re the same person.

It is possible with things like Facebook / twitter connect to tie identities together if the email address is the same across all of the channels. However, typically businesses with older databases and data structures are struggling to match all these “personalities” to create a single view of the customer

-Changing expectations, faster and 24/7: We did a survey early 2010 where it said most were happy to receive a response to non urgent within the same working day, 10% within 10minutes (note to self, must resend the survey to measure changes), luckily questions asked within the community are answered on average within 70 seconds.

58% of consumers want companies to respond if they leave a comment on a social networking site like Facebook or Twitter (2011 Customer Experience Impact Report by Harris Interactive). Plus younger people are increasingly turning to social channels as their first port of call (15% of 16-24 year olds according to econsultancy.com), business need to scale up their support in these social channels to support their younger demographics.

Social channels “open” 24/7, typically customer service operations are not. Setting customer expectations about the level of service and response times is difficult. In the old days, you’d look up a business’s opening hours before calling, with social channels you don’t need the other end to ‘pick up’ so you can tweet/ post in the moment. The challenge is having resource/ mechanisms to provide response outside of opening hours/ setting the right expectations in an environment where customers are becoming increasingly impatient.

- Different strokes for different folks: A recent survey of our members you told us that you would like information - 56% said from our community, 33% Facebook and 11% via Twitter.

It is a challenge to deliver interesting content and support across different channels which is consistent to our brand and fit for the channel – Twitter’s limitation of 140 characters makes for some crafty copy writing challenges, additionally the demographic and the interests of those following us on twitter can be slightly different to those that are fans within Facebook – which boils down to you can’t please 100% of people 100% of the time.

- Minimising costs: giffgaff is all about keeping its costs down. The most cost efficient way to support a customer is via the community where hundreds of members are ready to answer their query. However, as per the above, some people prefer to use a channel that they’re already familiar with – twitter, Facebook etc.

We’ve got some clever Community integration which means if someone asks a question within Facebook Help and twitter – it can be turned in to a question within the community. We’ve got some very handy members who help direct members needing assistance from our Facebook wall to the community as well.

The fastest way to help is searching the Community / Help section – there aren’t too many questions that haven’t been asked already.

If you can’t find an answer there – you can pose it to the community Community Help > don’t be shy, our members are really friendly and amazingly there 24/7 Facebook Need Help > if you’re in facebook, you can post a question under Facebook Need Help (see our facebook.com/giffgaffmobile > Left hand side “Need Help”), this will pop your question in to the community (note, the fastest way to help is posting under “Need help” not on the fan page wall) Twitter stream > within the community, you can see on the Righthand side ”twitter stream” picks up mentions of giffgaff – members are then able to answer these tweets and turn the tweet in to a post directing them to where members are answering their questions.

A few challenges which I certainly see as opportunities this year to find solutions for and make improvements. It’s an exciting time to be in Customer Experience Management and sitting within giffgaff where we are constantly challenged to do things a little differently – watch this space for some exciting customer service improvements and content throughout the year.

Our social channels if you fancy following us: Google+
Twitter: twitter.com/giffgaff
Youtube: http://www.youtube.com/giffgafftv
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/giffgaffmobile
LinkedIn: giffgaff group

Oh, nearly forgot - to nominate a brand you love for this years "Social Brand 100", simply tweet a message to @SocialBrands100 using #SB100

Cheers, Claire

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Mobile Chat and Instant Messaging Applications: BBM & Alternatives

2012-03-02T12:38:00.000+00:00

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Mobile Chat and Instant Messaging Applications: BBM & Alternatives
by kenlo on 09-02-2012 18:00 - last edited on 07-02-2012 17:07

BlackBerry services launched here at giffgaff last week. For £3/month, you can add the BlackBerry add-on to your goodybag giving you full access to BlackBerry Messenger and other BlackBerry services.

Commonly abbreviated BBM, BlackBerry Messenger is one of the most popular smartphone instant messaging applications in the world. It’s a great way to stay in touch with your friends who also have a BlackBerry with several key benefits over text messages including being able to attach pictures to your messages and being able to see whether your message has been received and read.

In this article, we’ll take a closer look at the BlackBerry Messenger service. We’ll also look at some alternatives for owners of iPhone and Android smartphones such as WhatsApp, Google Talk, iMessage and Facebook Chat.

BlackBerry Messenger

BlackBerry Messenger is one of the most popular instant messaging applications in the world with around 50 million active users. It has become a popular alternative to text messaging and has several key benefits over SMS: whilst text messages are limited to 160 characters per message, BBM messages can be up to 2000 characters in length and can also include multimedia such as photos, videos and maps. One handy feature of BBM is being able to send your current location to a friend using GPS – useful when arranging a place to meet up.

In order to use BlackBerry Messenger, you’ll need a BlackBerry tariff. Once logged into BBM, you’ll need to add your friends via their “BlackBerry PIN”. This is an 8-digit code which is uniquely linked to a BlackBerry device (even if your phone number changes, your BlackBerry PIN will never change).

BBM is only available on BlackBerry devices such as the BlackBerry Bold, BlackBerry Curve 9360 and the BlackBerry Torch. The combination of the BlackBerry’s hardware keyboard with BBM’s fast-paced instant messaging features (such as being able to tell whether your friends are online and when your messages have been read) have made the BlackBerry a popular device for socialites and businesspeople alike.

The downsides of BBM are that you won’t be able to use it to chat to your iPhone and Android-toting friends and colleagues. This has led to the development of cross-platform alternatives such as WhatsApp and Google Talk.

WhatsApp: Cross-platform alternative on iPhone, Android and BlackBerry

WhatsApp is a cross-platform alternative to BBM available on iPhone, Android, BlackBerry and Symbian-based Nokia devices. The feature set is roughly comparable to that of BBM – like on BBM you can send messages which are longer than 160 characters and you can include photos, videos, voice memos and maps in your messages.

As well as its cross-platform availability, one benefit of WhatsApp over BBM is that it integrates into your existing phone book to find all of your friends who have WhatsApp installed. Whereas BBM users need to share their BBM PIN numbers to build up a new contact list, WhatsApp automates the entire process of building your contact list. The disadvantage of this approach is that you’ll need to give out your phone number to everyone that you’d like to chat with.

WhatsApp is a 69p download for iPhone and is a free download on Android, BlackBerry and Nokia. The service is free for one year and costs $1.99/year after the first 12 months.

Google Talk: Cross-platform alternative, built into Android

Google’s rival to BBM and WhatsApp comes in the form of Google Talk – the instant messaging application built in to the Android operating system. If you’ve got an Android-based smartphone such as the Orange San Francisco, Samsung Galaxy Note or the Galaxy Nexus, Google Talk will have automatically been set up on your phone.

Compared to BBM and WhatsApp, Google Talk is a much simpler application. Messages are purely text-based: you can’t attach pictures or videos with your message. The flipside of this is that Google Talk can be used on many platforms: it’s on all of the major mobile platforms, is integrated into Gmail and Google+ and can also run as a desktop client on Windows. Whilst BBM and WhatsApp only allow you to chat with friends who are on their smartphones, Google Talk also allows you to chat to your friends who are at their laptop.

Android smartphones will come with Google Talk pre-installed and phones running Android 2.3.4 or later will also be able to make video calls through Google Talk. BlackBerry owners can download the Google Talk for BlackBerry application and iPhone owners can use Google Talk through their web browser.

iMessage: Apple’s instant messaging application for iPhone

iPhone and iPad owners running version 5 of the iOS operating system will have iMessage built in to the ‘Messages’ application. iOS will detect when you are trying to text someone with an iMessage-enabled iPhone and will automatically send an iMessage instead of a SMS text message. iMessage has many of the same features that BBM does, including group chats and being able to see when your messages have been received and read. You can also attach photos and videos to your iMessage.

iMessage can only be used on the iPhone and iPad and is not available on any other operating system.

Other Instant Messaging Applications & Your Thoughts

In this article, we’ve discussed the BlackBerry Messenger instant messaging/chat application and alternatives such as the cross-platform WhatsApp, Google’s “Talk” application which comes with Android and Apple’s iMessage service. Looking beyond these, other alternatives include Facebook Messenger (iPhone, Android and BlackBerry), ChatON (iPhone, Android and Bada) and Kik (iPhone, Android, Windows Phone and BlackBerry).

We’d like to know your thoughts on instant messaging applications. Do you use applications such as BBM, WhatsApp and Google Talk or do you prefer plain old SMS text messaging? Does instant messaging on your smartphone help you to stay in touch with your friends or do the messages become an unwelcome distraction throughout the day? Do you prefer a hardware keyboard or an on-screen software keyboard for instant messaging?

Ken Lo writes about mobile technology and the mobile industry at Ken's Tech Tips.

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'Unlock a phone, Unlock a chicken' is back.

2012-03-02T12:20:00.000+00:00

Latest news from the giffgaff blog

'Unlock a phone, Unlock a chicken' is back.
by tom on 08-02-2012 10:15 - last edited on 08-02-2012 10:15

Sometimes you need to let something speak for its self but before you click the play button...

Last summer we ran a campaign called ‘Unlock a phone, Unlock a chicken‘. This campaign not only gave people a splendid giffgaff SIM to pop in any unlocked mobile phone, but when the SIM was ordered through the campaigns Marketing channels, giffgaff would donate money to Wood Green, The Animals Charity. Wood Green would use this donation to unlock and re-home battery chickens. The campaign proved really successful and was one of the best we’ve run, on our Social channels.

New legislation came into play in 2012 with a change to the size of the chicken cages and asked for better basic care (food, water and ventilation). The good news is that British egg producers have followed the EU directive however we are a long way from any complete ban on battery farmed eggs (if this is even achievable) and there are still many thousands of chickens that will need support. Life expectancy is still only 18 months.

So, here is round two of ‘Unlock a phone, Unlock a Chicken’. We want to spread the word as far as we can about giffgaff and the positive change people can make by joining us.

Having interesting (and hopefully entertaining) things to read, watch and most importantly have conversations about, play a vital role in getting our message and a bit of buzz about giffgaff out there. Sometimes, you need a little help from your friends, so we have enlisted some 80’s icons and arguably the worlds most famous bird to help out. Who doesn’t love a bit of 80’s nostalgia done in a giffgaff way.

So watch our new ‘Unlock a Phone, Unlock a Chicken’ video and if you like it, pop the video on your Facebook, Twitter, Google+, blog...I’m sure you’ll get some interesting comments!

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A round-up of the best free Photo Sharing Apps

2012-03-02T12:14:00.000+00:00

Latest news from the giffgaff blog

A round-up of the best free Photo Sharing Apps
by daisyw on 06-02-2012 12:16 - last edited on 09-02-2012 14:52

Hi giffgaffers,

My name is Daisy, I am the new office manager here at giffgaff. I love my job, no day is the same and I get to be super busy which suits me just fine. It’s great being part of the team and I look forward to getting to know you all!

Whichever way you share your pictures, there are a vast number of apps worthy of your consideration. If, like me you’re on the hunt for a new photo-sharing service that is secure, fun and has a cool UI (user interface), you should definitely check these out. Happy snapping!

Please note that the apps I have listed are not in any ranked particular order, I’ve just been playing around with lots of photo sharing apps for the last few weeks and these were some of the ones that I stumbled across along the way. I’ve scored them out of 10 but none of them get less than 7 as I really think that they are a good bunch of apps and none deserve a bad score.

Each of the apps have their ups and downs but I wanted to share them with you all and get your opinions on them. Oh, and they’re all free so there’s no reason not to try them!

PATH
9/10

I’m starting you off with a good one here. Path provides a savvy way to share pictures about your life with the people you care most about. I’d say it was one of the best apps for doing just that. The UI is super simple to use and really does look well put together. I love how Path feels like an on-line journal of your daily life in beautiful images. I don’t think this one will disappoint you- download it (if you don’t already have it) and have your say. Hope you get on with it as well as I did.

PICPLZ
8/10

Picplz seems to be a very popular photo-sharing service amongst bloggers. I found a lot more of my friends knew about this app or were using it over most of the other photo sharing apps. The app lets you see which of your Twitter followers uses Picplz, so you can quickly produce a good number of your friends to share with. It strikes me more as an app that users will use to share with the wider public rather than with a private group of friends...so it might not be exactly for you if that’s what you prefer? Another cool addition to this app is that it allows the user to filter photos into albums from cities all over the world. You can flick through photos that people have uploaded from your very own city, or, if you are feeling nosy you could even see what’s going on in Tokyo, Madrid or New York!

LIGHTBOX
8.5/10

I think that this one is a really excellent photo-sharing app that you’ll want to check out! Lightbox is a fairly new photo sharing app designed by the ex- Google and YouTube product manager, Thai Tran. Lightbox provides a service with an exceptionally rich UI and even comes with a built-in camera to encourage you to get snapping asap. The app is perfect for professionals to access presentations, videos and images via the secure online servers. Lightbox allows you to send one file or a group of files, share and collaborate with colleagues or friends all in a matter of seconds. A mass of cool filters let users post, not only to your own Lightbox profile, but also Flickr, Twitter, Tumblr, Facebook and FourSquare.

KIK
9.5/10

Easy as A, B ,C. It seems that lots of people know and love kik. I think it is one of the best apps that allows you to share your photos quickly and securely with your friends and family. It’s not been around for that long but already has a big fan base. Blackberry, Android, IPhone and Windows all offer this service. It’s free of charge as well, so you guys may as well give this app a go. The popular video-recording application works well with the iPhone’s video-capable camera to live-stream video to the kik website direct from your phone. Try sending a funny home-made video to your friend- it really is easy. Once kik is set up, it’s a brilliant way to share your images and videos with family and friends on a chat thread.

LIVESHARE
7/10

LiveShare is another photo sharing network that has both a mobile and web provision. The mobile offering is unfortunately quite basic. You can upload pictures relatively easily, add friends, view other streams and so on but this app feels a more than unfinished and I think lacks a genuine community feel. Do you think this is fair? Maybe I should give it another go...

PHOTOBUCKET
9.5/10

Photobucket is a prominent photo sharing site. This is another brilliant way to privately share pics with friends, not just uploading them for the world to see on Twitter and the like. The app allows you to upload and download pictures to and from the site~ pretty cool. They have also released another app called Snapbucket, which lets you edit your photos...fun times all round. This is a good one which allows you to send your favourite images to your favourite people. Simple New users will surely be pleased with the gorgeous UI that the app offers and the ability to tag photos. Viewing pictures is a truly pleasurable experience. There is even an auto-upload feature. Due to this, if you are looking for a simple solution for storing and sharing apps, look no further!

STREAMZOO
8/10

Of all these photo-sharing apps, I think that Streamzoo seems to possibly have the strongest community feel to it. It benefits from genuinely brilliant photos too. Check it out! This app certainly ensures that you flex your creative muscles. The app is complimented by an inspiring UI and the ease of being able to share your creations with your favourite social networks. However, if you just want the app to send over pictures to your best friends then this is your ticket…it’s so easy, you can’t grumble.

ANIMOTO
9/10

I love this app! If you can’t be bothered with a complicated video assembly but you love to create love-y slideshows with tear-jerking background music, then you’ll think Animoto is a great tool! It has won countless awards, which is pretty cool. You select around 10 photos from your iPhone and then choose a tune to go with it- Animoto lets you choose from various songs and genres. Although, if I had to point out one negative, I think that it would be the limited selection of songs to choose from. Would you agree? If you download this app or already have it, it would be great to hear what you think. My favourite bonus feature of this free app is that you can email your slideshow to your family and friends. Remember, Valentine’s Day is just around the corner...

Once last thing...I have not forgotten Whatsapp! I think that this really is a cool way of chatting to your friends and family and showing them the images you want to at the click of a button. I love how you can take a photo and send it straight away or, choose from your album and send it in a flash!

So giffgaffers, I ask you, which is your favourite of all these apps? Can you suggest any others that are worth a look? I’m sure I have overlooked some great ones but these were all I could squeeze on for now...

Catch you later,
Daisy

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5 A Day [5th of February]

2012-03-02T12:05:00.000+00:00

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5 A Day [5th of February] by zobia22 on 05-02-2012 15:46

Today's 5 a day is filled with some very cool social media statistics, a cute boy showing off his dancing skills and more!

Oh, and if you haven't already, please vote for Vincent for the 'community manager of the year' awards. Click here to vote!

Scary stuff!

Anyone want to climb up these stairs?! Thanks drupad2drupad for this image

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How good is this little boy at dancing??

Share This by clicking 'Share' button at the bottom of the post or supporting on Reddit and Digg. Would you ever consider this?? 'An 83-year-old woman with a badly infected lower jaw had the entire thing replaced with a 3D printed titanium/bioceramic replica.' Click here to read more.

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So interesting!

Check out this very cool image of all sorts of social media things that happen in 60 seconds. < Click the link for the zoom version!

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This song is quite catchy! Thanks rochessel for sending in this video

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So which one was your favourite? Personally mine was social media in 60 seconds. But, the azonto dance is a close runner up

p.s. 'Best of 5 a day' will be posted on Friday's blog

Til tomorrow!
Zobia

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BlackBerry Curve 9360 review

2012-03-02T11:55:00.000+00:00

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BlackBerry Curve 9360 review
by victoriatagg on 05-02-2012 10:00 - last edited on 06-02-2012 08:54

The new BlackBerry Curve 9360 is a new latest addition to RIM's mobile phone range and part of the cheaper 'Curve' range. Running the latest version of RIM's operating system: BlackBerry OS 7 and equipped with RIM's secure email and BBM, is the BlackBerry Curve 9360 the ultimate messaging phone?

Do you have a Curve 9360 - what do you think of it? As a follow-up to the Curve 9300 how does it compare?

Have you used the Siri-like voice recognition functionality - how good is it? Would you switch away from touchscreen to a hardware keyboard - tell us your thoughts in the comments below.

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Mobile Technology and Development: How mobile phones are transforming lives in developing countries

2012-02-15T02:41:00.000+00:00

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Mobile Technology and Development: How mobile phones are transforming lives in developing countries
by kenlo on 03-02-2012 18:00 - last edited on 31-01-2012 00:42

In the UK, our lives have been transformed by our mobile phones. Smartphones have given us access to the internet on-the-go and we’re increasingly using our phones for shopping, commerce, GPS navigation and more. Meanwhile, the development of international calling and roaming has made it possible for us to instantly get in touch with almost anyone in the world by dialling just a few digits – it doesn’t matter whether they’re in the Great Plains of America or at the summit of Everest. We can even communicate across linguistic barriers with some clever translation technologies.

Whilst mobile technology has led to some exciting social benefits here the UK, the social benefits of mobile technology in developing countries are even more exciting. Mobile phones have been found to be closely linked to economic growth and development in developing countries. Mobile technology is able to develop these social benefits by offering low cost and convenient access to mobile banking, health and educational services and by encouraging trade.

In this article, we’ll explore the role of the mobile phone in developing countries. We’ll look at how mobile banking, health and education are conducted in some developing countries and what that might mean for all of us in the future.

Mobile Banking in Developing Countries

We often take banking for granted in the UK and it’s incredibly easy to forget how important a role the banks play within society. For example, we rely on our banks every time we receive a pay check at the end of the month, every time we pay our utility bills, whenever we buy something in a shop or online and everytime we want to save towards the costs of our child’s university education. Without access to banking services, paying for goods and paying bills becomes incredibly difficult and it’s tricky to invest for the future or for a rainy day.

Many people in developing countries currently lack access to a bank account and the associated services that banks can provide. Poor public infrastructure and low population density means that the nearest bank could be several hours drive away – not particularly convenient for use on a day-to-day basis. Furthermore, it can be dangerous to transport large quantities of cash and storing money at home by stuffing banknotes into a mattress is also risky.

In these places, mobile technology has a huge potential to improve quality of life by making banking more accessible. Building a traditional banking network is expensive: there are huge costs associated with laying down new roads, erecting electricity pylons, building reliable electricity networks and building new banks with secure cash storage facilities. In contrast, an entire area could be given access to a mobile-based banking service simply by erecting a new mobile phone mast.

This approach is taken by companies such as Kenya’s M-Pesa. M-Pesa leapfrogs traditional banking services and allows banking to be conducted using SMS text messages. Rather than facing a long drive to the bank, users can transfer money using M-Pesa which travels as quickly as a text message. Over 50% of Kenya’s population is already using M-Pesa and for a variety of things: for example to pay bills, to transfer money to relatives and to pay for goods at the local store. Furthermore, the ease and security of storing money in a mobile-based banking service encourages people to save for their future (e.g. to invest in new machinery or education) or in case of a rainy day (for example a crop failure or a medical emergency).

Through initiatives such as M-Pesa, the mobile phone industry association GSMA hopes that 20 million people earning less than $2 a day will have access to mobile banking by the end of this year.

As well as banking through a mobile phone, mobile commerce is also delivering many social benefits in developing countries. The Google Trader service in Uganda helps rural farmers to find buyers for their goods and to ensure that they’re receiving a fair price for them. This reduces the chance of farmers being unable to find a buyer for their produce and the amount of time spent travelling between different markets.

Mobile Healthcare in Developing Countries

Healthcare is another area where mobile technology has the potential to deliver social by giving people access to medical information and medical advice wherever they live. This is especially true in places where it has historically been difficult to access healthcare in the past.

India’s TeleDoc service was set up to close the disparity between healthcare provision in urban India and rural India. The TeleDoc application links together village-based healthcare workers to specialist doctors who can give rural villagers a remote diagnosis and treatment. The ability to access specialist healthcare locally rather than travelling to the city makes it much more affordable and accessible.

Disease monitoring is another area which has been revolutionised by mobile technology. The Episurveyor data collection application has been used by organisations such as the World Bank, the World Health Organisation and UNICEF. Instead of monitoring the spread of diseases through paper forms as was done previously, Episurveyor allows health information to be collected via a mobile phone and to be reported back instantly over the mobile network. By allowing health issues and the spread of diseases to be monitored centrally in real-time, it is possible to foresee potential epidemics and to stop them in their tracks.

Mobile Education in Developing Countries

Just like how many of us in the UK use our smartphones to look up information such as recipes, product reviews and more, the mobile phone also has an important role in making information and educational resources available to people in developing countries. Without access to a PC and a broadband internet connection (partly due to an unreliable and intermittent electricity connection and partly due to the lack of a telephone line) the mobile phone is the primary way of getting information from the outside world.

The “Farmers Friend” service in Uganda provides a way for farmers to obtain information about planting, harvesting and storing their crops. The service can also answer queries relating to the health of livestock or crop diseases. Offering farmers access to this knowledge base reduces the chance of a failed harvest and the poverty or malnutrition that could result from one. The service also provides weather forecasts allowing better decisions to be made on when best to plant and harvest crops. Increasing agricultural productivity in this way is a key way to get out of poverty.

Beyond the specialist services offered to farmers, mobile operators such as Orange are beginning to make Wikipedia access free over 2G and 3G in parts of the Middle East and Africa. By making information and educational resources available free of charge, the hope is that this will help to improve education levels. However, with only 10% of people in Africa currently owning a mobile phone capable of 2G or 3G internet connectivity, it’s the SMS-based services such as M-Pesa (mobile banking), Google Trader (mobile commerce) and Farmers Friend (agricultural education) which will be in more common use for the next few years.

Your thoughts…

The mobile phone, and subsequently the smartphone, has transformed society here in the UK in more ways than we can imagine. Looking towards the developing world, the implications of mobile technology can be even more exciting. From SMS mobile banking and payment services to remote medical diagnosis and monitoring applications, there are huge opportunities for mobile technology to improve the quality of life in developing countries.

How has your mobile phone changed your life? With developing countries having pioneered mobile banking and healthcare, how long do you think it’ll be until we see those services here in the UK? Can you think of any innovative new mobile applications or services that could help to achieve the UN’s Millennium Development Goals?

Ken Lo writes about mobile technology and the mobile industry at Ken's Tech Tips.

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5 a Day [3rd February 2012]

2012-02-15T02:27:00.000+00:00

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5 a Day [3rd February 2012]
by will23 on 03-02-2012 17:11 - last edited on 03-02-2012 17:21 by zobia22

All this stuff is pretty cool in one way or another. Enjoy!

This pet really is just for Christmas! (in before "lol who gets snow at Christmas?!?")

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I could totally use a self cooling drinks can on occasion... though in this weather it seems a little unnecessary. Check it out here http://www.gizmag.com/west-coast-chill-self-chilling-drink/21316/

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SpaceX, the private spaceflight company, has recently tested out its new SuperDragon rocket engine. Read more about it here http://www.gizmag.com/spacex-test-fires-superdraco-engine/21300/

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Just a cool T-shirt. Not a lot else. I'm fully appreciating the cookie monster as well.

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I could totally do this

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So which one was your favourite? Personally I love space and things so it has to be the rocket.

Til tomorrow! Will

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Friday Poll Results 03/02/2012

2012-02-15T01:46:00.000+00:00

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Friday Poll Results 03/02/2012
by anthony_c on 03-02-2012 14:49 - last edited on 03-02-2012 14:50

Last week we asked you what will win the Oscar this year for best film. 56% of you voted in favour of War horse.

Here are the results:

This week; we ask you how attached you are to your mobile phone number. Have you always had the same mobile number? Do you now have a number that you want to keep for a long time? Do you like your number, but don't mind changing it? Are you not bothered about what your number is? Or do you dislike your number and want a change?

Let us know in this weeks poll!

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Life, The Universe and The Agent Team

2012-02-15T01:44:00.000+00:00

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Life, The Universe and The Agent Team
by adele_s on 02-02-2012 15:31

Hi Everyone,

Let me introduce myself as some of you will have already been chatting to me or in contact with me before now! My name is Adele, and I have recently joined giffgaff as the Member Services Delivery Manager - although I have been helping out in giffgaff for quite some time.

What do I do, I hear you say? Well, my role is to manage and deliver customer services to you all, so my main task is managing and improving the Member Services team who deal with your cases raised via Ask an Agent.

As you are well aware, the Member Services team have had a lot of challenges over the last couple of months. As giffgaff has grown, so has the number of people needing help, and the number of and complexity of cases we work on. However they have worked really hard to bring the volume down and are now working well within service levels.

Over the next month we will be introducing the team to you again, as it has been a while since they have been on the forums so you will get a chance to say hi to them. Along with a series of blogs to explain a bit more about what Agents do and what case they see, we will be asking for ideas and improvements (the same way we do for everything at giffgaff) on our overall customer services to help us provide you with customer service excellence.

Over the last month, we have worked hard to make improvements within the team. One of the first steps we took was to increase the number of members on the team. These new Agents have all completed their training and are now live working on your cases. It will take a little while for them to settle down (everyone is new once!), and they are doing really well currently and loving the giffgaff life J Now that the team is bigger and giffgaff overall is bigger, we will be looking at areas like updating training and improving the overall quality of the team.

The first big launch and change for this year is the go-live of Blackberry services (very exciting!) which is now with you. The team have completed their training and are ready to rock and roll!! Another big change which will help the management of cases is a new Ask an Agent form which is currently being developed, and I will keep you updated with more information and when this will launch. This new form will ask you more questions about your issue, and you will have to select some mandatory fields. This is by no means to limit people asking questions in any way - these new fields in the form will help us identify the issue you are facing quicker. As the new form is not launched as of yet and in order for us to identify Blackberry cases in the queues can you complete the following when raising an ask an agent case for Blackberry issues:

If you need to submit a case on Blackberry related issues:

Select the category – “Mobile services” and place in the subject line “Blackberry”.

Should you have an issue that could possibly be related to your Blackberry handset, make sure you check out the fab Blackberry simulators on the below link in the FAQ’s; they give a walk through on how to setup your handset and you can even check where to find your settings.

Blackberry Simulators: http://support.giffgaff.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/664
Blackberry FAQs in our Help Section: http://support.giffgaff.com/app/home/kw/blackberry
Ask The Community!: http://community.giffgaff.com/t5/Help-Ask-the-community-got-stuck/bd-p/QA1

As normal, the team will only be supporting sim/account based queries (things that require sim technical support on a network level, or that involve personal information to your account). If the simulator above hasn’t helped with your queries, we also have a great set of FAQS and of course the community on hand to help. Using these can often get you the answer you require very quickly if it’s a handset, settings or basic query that doesn’t require an answer from the Agent team.

In the future, the Member Services team will have monthly blogs so you can meet and catch up with all the team and help us with improving our service. It's great being on board and I look forward to getting to know and work with you all!

Adele

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Blackberry...the wait is over.

2012-02-15T01:41:00.002+00:00

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Blackberry...the wait is over.
by tom on 01-02-2012 12:49 - last edited on 01-02-2012 12:51

I’m really pleased to announce that from today you’ll be able to get Blackberry services on giffgaff. You can now get a Blackberry add on to your goodybag for an additional £3, which will give you access to full Blackberry services, such as BBM.

We’ve had lots of giffgaff members asking for us to provide Blackberry services both here on the Forum and in our Social networks, especially on our Facebook page.

Unfortunately we had to delay the launch of Blackberry due to some service issues which impacted our core infrastructure however with fixes made (and being made), I’m happy to say that we are now in a position to push Blackberry live. For those giffgaffers who buy the Hokey Cokey goodybag, you’ll have a little longer to wait (sorry) as we are still working on adding the functionality to buy it with Hokey Cokey.

We had some handy giffgaffers helping with the testing of Blackberry so thank you to all of those who helped out.

So, that’s it, giffgaff meet Blackberry, Blackberry meet giffgaff. Why not pass on the good news and let your friends who are on Blackberry know that giffgaff is up and running with BB.

Tom

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MWC 2012 - The Next Big Announcements, Part 2

2012-02-15T01:40:00.000+00:00

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MWC 2012 - The Next Big Announcements, Part 2
by wsjudd on 31-01-2012 18:00 - last edited on 31-01-2012 12:40

The smartphone world never seems to stop turning. We've barely finished with the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, and we're already only weeks away from the Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona. While CES was a largely American affair, MWC is all about European and world-wide releases, so it's definitely the expo to watch if you're living in the UK.

Yesterday in Part 1 we looked at some of the biggest names in the business: Asus, Fujitsu, HTC, Huawei and LG. Now we're moving on to the other major players, including Microsoft, Nokia, RIM, Samsung, Sony and ZTE. Let's get going!

Microsoft - Entertainment Rating: 3/5, Surprise Rating: 4/5

Windows Phone makers Microsoft are expected to have a good presence at MWC. We’ll likely get a look at their low-specification Windows Phone Tango operating system, and Windows Phone 8 Apollo if we’re really really lucky. The new operating system should be another big step for Microsoft, and it'll be exciting to see if they debut it on some new hardware as well.

Verdict: Hold out hope for our first peak at Windows Phone 8!

Nokia - Entertainment Rating: 2/5, Surprise Rating: 2/5

With the rumours flying around about a likely EU launch for the Lumia 900, it’s quite possible that we’ll see the new top Windows Phone at MWC. The EU model could come with a bigger 12 megapixel camera than the 8 megapixel American version, so that could be a nice bonus. Otherwise, I doubt we’ll see much of interest for non-Nokia fans.

Verdict: Skip unless you’re a massive Nokia fan.

RIM - Entertainment Rating: 1/5, Surprise Rating: 1/5

Research in Motion will have a small presence at the Mobile World Conference. While no new phones are expected, it has been confirmed that we’ll see BlackBerry OS 10 working for the first time. Small steps, RIM, small steps.

Verdict: Skip.

Samsung - Entertinment Rating 5/5, Surprise Rating 5/5

With Samsung, it’s all about one phone: that Samsung Galaxy S III. Will we see it, or will we not? We’ve heard rumours going in both directions, with some saying that Samsung would be fools not to launch the highly anticipated phone here, but others countering that Samsung want to minimise the gap between its announcement and the US release, which was several months for the phone-of-the-year Galaxy S2. The new phone would definitely be the star of Samsung’s presentation, and is expected to include an upgrade to an HD display, Ice Cream Sandwich, and (maybe) use the Exynos 5250 high speed dual core processor.

Besides the S III, we’ll also likely see an upgrade to the Samsung Galaxy Tab line, as they haven’t been refreshed in a while. Expect to see quad-core processors and HD displays abound, if only so that Samsung will be able to keep up with Joneses (read: HTC). There'll also likely be more on the already-leaked Samsung Galaxy S Advance, a new phone that'll sit between the popular Galaxy S2 and Galaxy S.

Verdict: Tune in, but you may be disappointed if the S III doesn’t launch.

Sony - Entertainment Rating: 3/5, Surprise Rating: 4/5

Sony is going to be another interesting firm to watch at MWC, with the Sony Xperia U (codenamed Kumquat) and the Sony Xperia P (codenamed Nypon) expected to be announced. The Xperia U is a mid-range handset that we’ve already heard about, which should debut with a 3.5” display, 1 GHz dual core processor and a five megapixel camera. The Experia P is expected to be slightly worse than the Xperia S, offering a dual core processor and 4” qHD screen. We may also very well see some new tablets as well.

Verdict: Could be a good one, so definitely tune in if you’re a Sony fan.

ZTE - Entertainment Rating: 3/5, Surprise Rating: 4/5

ZTE is another budget handset provider that has started to make some waves. The success of its ZTE Blade last year proved that ZTE are capable of making solid, high value Android smartphones. ZTE is also due to show off its first Windows Phone, which could be be a great addition to its line-up - and Microsoft's.

Verdict: Definitely a good one to watch for Windows Phone folks.

That's All, Folks

And that's all for now - are you excited for the Mobile World Congress as much as I am now?

Be sure to read Part 1 if you haven't already, and stay posted for more of the latest smartphone news and other excellent articles from giffgaff. Thanks for reading, and farewell for now!

William Judd is a copywriter and technology blogger based in Bristol. If you'd like to hire me or just say hello, feel free to visit my website at williamjudd.com or chat with me on Twitter.

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MWC 2012 - The Next Big Announcements, Part 1

2012-02-15T01:13:00.000+00:00

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MWC 2012 - The Next Big Announcements, Part 1
by wsjudd on 30-01-2012 18:00 - last edited on 30-01-2012 13:54

The smartphone world never seems to stop turning. We've barely finished with the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, and we're already only weeks away from the Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona. While CES was a largely American affair, MWC is all about European and world-wide releases, so it's definitely the expo to watch if you're living in the UK.

Here in Part 1, we'll be looking at what smartphones and tablets we can expect from some of the biggest names in the business: Asus, Fujitsu, HTC, Huawei and LG. Let's get started!

Asus - Entertainment Rating: 4/5 | Surprise Rating: 1/5

The Taiwanese consumer electronics giant has been very open with its MWC offerings – officially confirming that the Asus Padfone will be launched at the Mobile World Conference. The unique phone-in-a-tablet was on-hand at CES and unveiled (hilariously) last year, so we know the basics already: It’s a 4.3” smartphone that can be housed in a 10.1” tablet dock, for when you need a little extra screen space. The Padfone is expected to come with Ice Cream Sandwich, and launch sometime this year.

Aside from the Padfone, we may also see more of Asus’ other tablet offerings, including the Asus Transformer Prime HD or the Asus MeMo.

Verdict: Tune in, if just for the Padfone.

Fujitsu - Entertainment Rating: 2/5, Surprise Rating: 1/5

Fujitsu are afirm who aren’t expected to shock with their MWC announcements. The one thing to look out for will be more information on their Fujitsu Arrows prototype, which proved popular at CES with its 6.7 mm frame packing serious quad-core Tegra 3 heat.

Verdict: Skip.

HTC - Entertainment Rating: 5/5, Surprise Rating: 4/5

Taiwanese smartphone superstar is looking set to provide some of the most exciting new phones and tablets of MWC. According to numerous leaks throughout the tail end of last year, we’ll be looking at seeing perhaps five new products, including four smartphones and one tablet.

The HTC Primo is one that’s been making the rounds recently, and seems quite likely to launch. It’s the ‘manly’ version of the HTC Rhyme, a mid-range smartphone that’ll be packing Beats Audio integration (as will all HTC phones this year.) Another solid mid-range phone could be the HTC Ville, which should be made from a single piece of brushed aluminium and be thin to boot, at less than 8 mm. It’s also reckoned to have an excellent point-and-shoot quality camera.

On the upper end of things, we’ve got two possible phones. The more likely is the HTC Edge, which also may be called the HTC Endeavour or HTC Supreme. It’s expected to be a quad-core Tegra 3 powered smartphone with a 4.7” HD display, making for one of the most powerful smartphones ever. We’ve also heard (and mostly discounted) rumours of an even stronger smartphone, the HTC Zeta. The Zeta was said to be just a concept when it was revealed last year, but may have moved closer to reality since then. It’d come with a 2.5 GHz quad core processor, quite a step above the 1.3 to 1.5 GHz quad cores in other Tegra 3 devices. Still, it seems to be an unlikely reveal.

The last thing we’ll see from HTC is a tablet. Expected to be powered by Tegra 3 as well, the quad-core HTC Quattro (see what they did there?) should be a full-sized follow-up to the moderately successful HTC Flyer of last year. Expect a low resolution display (e.g. current iPad 2, near 1280 x 768) and an HTC Scribe stylus to be included.

Verdict: Must-follow. HTC are looking to announce some amazing gadgets, and we may not yet know the half of it.

Huawei - Entertainment Rating: 4/5, Surprise Rating: 3/5

Huawei are very likely to show off their latest phones, the Huawei Diamond Series. These phones are supposedly a step up from the Huawei Ascend P1 S, which demoed at CES and packed a surprising amount of firepower into the thinnest chassis ever. We could conceivably see quad-core Tegra 3 and HD displays strapped into these miniscule bodies, which could prove quite a success. Following their surprisingly great Honor launch, Huawei are on a great streak and will look to continue to show up the bigger firms with excellently designed phones.

Verdict: Tune in – your next phone could very well come from these guys.

LG - Entertainment Rating: 3/5, Surprise Rating: 4/5

After a disappointing 2011, LG will be looking to hit the ground running with a strong MWC launch. They’re expected to be announced two phones, the LG Optimus 3D Max, the follow-up the LG Optimus 3D, and the LG X3, the follow-up to the LG Optimus 2X. The 3D Max will offer a 3D display in a much smaller chassis than last time, but has the 3D boat already sailed? The X3 looks like a more steady bet, rumoured to come with the now-standard Tegra 3 quad-core and some other impressive stats. Both of their predecessors sold poorly and got middling reviews, so LG will have to really excel this year to have a chance against Samsung and HTC.

Verdict: Hard to predict, LG have a mixed track record of late but could still easily come out with something truly exciting.

That's All, Folks

And with that, we come to the end of Part 1. Be sure to check back here tomorrow at 6 PM to read the next installment, where we'll cover more of the biggest names in the smartphone and tablet businesses - Microsoft, Nokia, RIM, Samsung, Sony and ZTE. The Mobile World Congress this year looks like it's going to be a massive one, so definitely tune in!

Thanks for reading, and farewell for now!

William Judd is a copywriter and technology blogger based in Bristol. If you'd like to hire me or just say hello, feel free to visit my website at williamjudd.com or chat with me on Twitter.

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Protecting your privacy.

2012-02-09T14:12:00.000+00:00

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Protecting your privacy.
by gaffer on 30-01-2012 15:01

If you’ve been following our forum announcements you’ll have seen that last week a serious data privacy problem was discovered that affected giffgaff members – it meant that the mobile number of giffgaff members was made available to websites in the “header” information that is passed between web servers and mobile handsets during web browsing.

The problem affected O2 and some of the partners that use its network, which is why giffgaff was affected, and after being detected on Wednesday morning it was quickly fixed by 2pm on Wednesday afternoon. However, the fault had actually been in place since 10th Jan so any web browsing that our members did since between that date and last Wednesday would have been equally vulnerable.

I’d like to reassure all our members that we take data privacy very seriously, and will be working with O2 to ensure that this problem does not re-occur. Like all companies who hold customer data we have a privacy policy that outlines what data we hold and how we use it. We also have a policy of never selling or giving your data to third parties.

The fault occurred when some maintenance work meant that mobile numbers were shared with all websites and not special, trusted sites. This has raised some alarm as it not generally known that your mobile number can be shared in this way – although it has been standard practice in the mobile industry for over 10 years and the vast majority of networks work in this way.

These trusted sites are ones that need your mobile number to either verify your identity or to bill for content – most ringtone and wallpaper sites work in this way. Our members have been debating whether mobile numbers should be made available in this way – the answer isn’t as straightforward as you might imagine since anytime you call a business without blocking your number that business could very easily log it and use it to call you back or text you (although what they could say to you is quiet restricted under data protection laws - they certainly couldn't sell your number to a 3rd party).

My personal view is that mobile number sharing on the web should use the same controls as for voice calls – so if you withhold your number it works for websites too. It would mean that some websites wouldn’t work properly, but then if you withhold your number many people you call will decline to answer. It’s about personal choice after all.

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5 a day [29th January 2012]

2012-02-09T14:11:00.000+00:00

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5 a day [29th January 2012]
by the_joseph on 29-01-2012 14:35

Every Sunday we do a round up of the best links from this weeks 5 a Days, as judged by your comments in each thread.

Here's this weeks roundup!

This moose has been pulling some funny pictures at a camera in Wyoming's National Forest, I love the smile on it

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We've had 2 Cat vs Alligator videos this week - both with an unlikely winner. Which is your favourite?

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Is this the future of technology? A beautiful but creepy vision of the "smart glass" future.

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This is too cute, he must be so soft. Now with updating reaction!

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Check this video of a snoring doormouse

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So which one was your favourite? Personally mine was.... either the polar bear or the doormouse! Both so cute and funny at the same time.

Til tomorrow!
Joe

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5 A Day [27th January]

2012-02-09T13:59:00.000+00:00

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5 A Day [27th January]
by zobia22 on 27-01-2012 16:27

Want to know how to calm an angry girl down and how a dormouse sounds when it snores? Well it's your lucky day as it's all in today's 5 a day

How amazing is this shadow photography?! Thumb up!

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'Jumping spiders, as their name implies, don't capture their prey in webs. Instead, they make sudden leaps to reach and rapidly disable their targets. As you might imagine, that requires very accurate depth perception. Get the distance wrong and the spider could come up short of its prey, allowing it to escape.' Click here to read more.

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How true is this??

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Check this video of a snoring dormouse

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So which one was your favourite? Personally mine was number one - shadow photography. It is amazinggg!

Til tomorrow!
Zobia.

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Friday Poll Results: How would you rate your computer skills?

2012-02-09T13:49:00.000+00:00

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Friday Poll Results: How would you rate your computer skills?
by the_joseph on 27-01-2012 08:44 - last edited on 27-01-2012 09:06

Good morning giffgaffers!

This week we asked you how you viewed your own computer skills.

In the off-topic thread we found some truly experienced coders and computer users, and a majority of people who have good computer knowledge; be it they can upgrade their PC with ease or have basic coding knowledge/understanding.

This ties up perfectly with the results of the poll, with 57% of people rating their skills as above average, and nearly 27% claiming to have extensive knowledge. This is great news that we have a very technically proficient community. I apologise to the 0.93% of people who don't understand where this is coming from and may be scared of the glowing interweb box machine.

This Week: With the oscar nominations this week, we ask you what you think will win the academy award for best picture?

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The Biggest Announcements From CES 2012

2012-02-09T13:47:00.001+00:00

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The Biggest Announcements From CES 2012
by wsjudd on 26-01-2012 18:00 - last edited on 26-01-2012 13:10

Now that all of the hubbub has subsided from the Consumer Electronics Show, we can have a nice look at the biggest announcements it provided. CES, which is held in Las Vegas every January, is always a hotbed of product announcements and demonstrations and this year was no different. With thousands of products on display, I’ve narrowed it down to the top 6 biggest reveals of CES 2012: three smartphones and three tablets. Let’s get started!

Phones

The Sony Xperia S: An Android Behemoth

The Sony Xperia S is a gorgeous looking smartphone that turned quite a few heads at CES this year. It’s also a bit of a powerhouse as well, rocking a gorgeous 4.3” 720p HD display, a dual-core processor at 1.5 GHz and even a 12 megapixel camera.

Sadly, the phone will launch with Gingerbread, an older version of Android. Sony have insisted an upgrade to the latest version, Ice Cream Sandwich, will be released by June, though. Previously known by its codename Nozomi, the phone is the first Sony handset to drop the Ericsson branding, a result of Sony’s purchase of Ericsson’s share in the business. The Xperia S will reportedly launch here in the UK at the end of the month: January 30th.

The Nokia Lumia 900: Latest and Greatest Windows Phone

Windows Phone was ably represented by the latest Nokia handset, the Lumia 900. It’s a bigger version of the Nokia Lumia 800, with a rather crisp looking 4.3” AMOLED display. As well as the bigger screen, Nokia have also squeezed in a front-facing camera for video calling, a rather handy addition.

The biggest addition though is LTE, the fastest currently available cellular networks. These won’t be in Britain until 2015, but a GSM version of the phone, the Nokia Lumia 910, is rumoured. Along with the HTC Titan II, another big-screened Windows Phone launched at CES, the Lumia 900 represents the forefront of Windows Phone development. It's rumoured to launch here in the UK in either May or June, depending on who you believe, and may even come with an enhanced 12 megapixel camera. Not too bad, then!

The Lenovo K800: Intel’s Mobile Phone

Whilst CPU-maker Intel controls a vast share of the desktop market, they’re absolutely nowhere in the mobile market. Almost all smartphones today use processors based on designs from British firm ARM. Intel are hoping to change that by releasing their own line of mobile chipsets, called Medfield. We got to see the very first phone to use these Medfield chips at CES: The Lenovo K800.

Despite only having a single core clocked at 1.3 GHz, it outperforms the latest dual-core Android and Apple phones in web browsing and 3D graphics. It’s also got comparable battery life, giving it outstanding performance overall. Sadly, the Lenovo K800 will only be released in the last quarter of 2012 in China, so we’ll have to wait for a worldwide release on Intel’s next phone. That could come sooner than you think, with both Lenovo and Motorola signing multi-phone agreements with Intel.

Tablets

Acer Iconia Tab A700: The First Full HD Tablet

The Acer Iconia Tab was rumoured for a few weeks before CES, but at CES it was finally confirmed. It’s one of the most powerful tablets yet, with a quad-core Tegra 3 processor, a full HD display at 1920 x 1200 and Ice Cream Sandwich, the latest version of Android.

The tablet, which is expected to ship in the second quarter of 2012, is also surprisingly light and thin, measuring 9.8 mm. Apart from its performance though, this looks like a fairly pedestrian tablet that is lacking a killer unique feature.

Asus Transformer Prime TF700T: The Transformer Prime in Full HD

Asus have a winner on their hands with the critically acclaimed Transformer Prime. The quad-core tablet is one of the fastest available and comes with a handy keyboard dock and external battery ensemble. With the announcement of the full HD Iconia Tab A700 though, they were behind on that all-important display element.

To equalise, they’ve simply installed a higher-resolution 10” screen, jumping from 1280 x 800 pixels to 1920 x 1200. That’s slightly more than full HD, as you’d get on a Bluray, and keeps the Transformer Prime at the very cutting edge of tablet technology. Asus have also made a few other enhancements to the device, upgrading the front-facing camera and improving wireless connectivity with a new back design.

The tablet will come at $100 more expensive than its predecessor, and will see a worldwide release date of mid 2012.

Razer Project Fiona: The Gamer’s Tablet

Tablets have a tendency to all look and sound pretty much the same – they’re just small black rectangles. When you turn them on, there are apps sitting on a screen. You can poke them with your finger, and they respond. Even at CES, most of the tablets were quite expected: The same as last year’s, but with bigger screens and faster processors. Razer’s Project Fiona is something marvellously different.

Fiona is a Windows 7 gaming tablet with two affixed handles. Each handle has a thumb-stick, four buttons and two triggers. Even the internals are different, with Fiona coming with a powerful i7 processor and an un-named desktop-class graphics card. It’s enough to handle Skyrim, one of the most graphically demanding games ever released, on its highest settings. While it isn’t the thinnest or most long lasting tablet, it’s certainly the most unique. Fiona is expected to be released by the end of this year, and will cost about $1000 – also making it one of the most expensive tablets around.

That’s All, Folks

So there you have it – six of the biggest smartphone and tablet announcements of CES. Be sure to let us know what you think of the new gadgets in the comments below, and if we’ve missed a winner then tell us about it!

If you’re hungry for more of the latest gadgets, you don’t have long to wait – the Mobile World Conference, another hotbed of product announcements, is only a month away. We’ll be covering what you can expect to see there later this week, so keep it posted to the giffgaff community blog. Thanks for reading, and farewell for now!

William Judd is a copywriter and technology blogger based in Bristol. If you'd like to hire me or just say hello, feel free to visit my website at williamjudd.com or chat with me on Twitter.

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Blackberry Playbook Review

2012-02-09T13:41:00.001+00:00

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Blackberry Playbook Review
by victoriatagg on 25-01-2012 18:03 - last edited on 25-01-2012 18:28

Take a look at our short video review of the Blackberry Playbook, find out the best and worst of the new tablet.

Have you thought about investing in the Playbook, or do you already have one? Tell us what you think of RIMs first entry into the tablet market.

Don't forget that you can tether your Playbook to your device with a Pay as you go data plan for 3G and email.

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Mobile Commerce: Paying for stuff with your mobile phone

2012-02-02T17:10:00.000+00:00

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Mobile Commerce: Paying for stuff with your mobile phone
by kenlo on 24-01-2012 18:00 - last edited on 23-01-2012 19:53

The mobile phone is now an integral part of our everyday lives and fulfils a whole variety of functions including e-mail, music, photography, social networking, exercise and heart rate monitoring – it can even replace pen and paper. Having everything integrated into one always-connected device means that we no longer need to carry round an entire backpack of gadgets: we can do it all with just one simple portable device.

With the trend towards multiple functions converging into the mobile phone, it’s only a matter of time before our wallets, debit cards and loyalty cards also become integrated into our mobile phone.

Over the last months, we’ve covered NFC mobile payments and a range of mobile applications which can help with your Christmas shopping and price comparison. In this article, we’ll look at the state of mobile commerce: the apps which currently allow you to pay with your mobile phone. We’ll also look east to see what high-tech restaurants in Japan are doing and we’ll see how NFC could revolutionise mobile payments and allow your smartphone to replace your wallet.

Paying with your mobile phone today: Barcodes, SMS & Pizza

As of January 2012, the main ways of paying with your mobile phone in the UK are either through smartphone applications or through premium rate text messages.

The first method of paying through a smartphone application is offered by companies such as the coffee chain Starbucks and the restaurant Pizza Express.

Starbucks currently allows you to pay for coffee through their iPhone application. The application works on a similar basis to a Pay As You Go mobile or an Oyster card with a pre-paid “account balance” which needs to be topped up from a debit card or credit card. When it comes to paying for your coffee in-store, the application displays a QR Code barcode on the phone’s display. This barcode is scanned in-store and when used, deducts the cost of the coffee from your account balance. The Starbucks application does not require a NFC-enabled phone as it uses barcode technology rather than NFC technology. Barcode technology is also used by loyalty card applications such as Tesco Clubcard and Subway’s Subcard.

Pizza Express offers an iPhone application which allows you to pay for your pizza electronically through your smartphone. Instead of settling your bill using cash or a credit card, the application allows you to pay for your meal using PayPal. Once you’ve finished your meal, you’ll need to enter the 12 digit code from the bottom of your receipt into the application. The application handles the payment through PayPal with an electronic confirmation of the payment being sent automatically to the restaurant tills.

The second method of paying using your mobile phone is through a premium rate text message where the cost is added onto your mobile phone bill. This has been a popular way of paying for ringtones, applications and for donating to charity. Fundraising services such as JustGiving allow fundraisers to set up their own SMS shortcode from which they can collect charitable donations towards their chosen causes.

Paying with your mobile phone tomorrow: Sushi & NFC

The trend towards paying for things using our mobile phones is only set to continue in 2012 with the ability to order direct from your phone. Meanwhile, NFC technology promises a quantum leap in the speed and convenience of paying for things with your phone.

We’ve already discussed applications which allow you to pay for coffee or pizza using your smartphone. It doesn’t take a huge leap of imagination to see how these applications could be adapted in the future to take orders too. In Japan, it is common for sushi train restaurants to take orders electronically through a touchscreen with a complex conveyor belt system being used to deliver food direct to the table. Such a system could be adapted to work on a smartphone and would allow you to place orders for food in a restaurant or drinks in a bar using your smartphone. The bill would then be charged automatically to your card or PayPal account in the same application.

In terms of paying with your phone in grocery stores and on the high street, Near Field Communication (NFC) is a promising technology because it’s fast, secure and convenient. NFC on your phone would work in the same way as London’s Oyster Card does today: simply tap your NFC-enabled phone on a reader to pay for your goods, to redeem relevant vouchers and to collect loyalty card points.

NFC potentially offers huge time savings compared to the current method of paying for goods: passing through the supermarket checkout currently involves the cumbersome process of searching through your wallet to find your credit card, the relevant store card and any relevant vouchers you wish to use. Each card needs to be handed over individually to be read or processed. Today’s basic barcode-based and app-based mobile payment technologies make things slightly better - however the process is still cumbersome as it’s necessary to load up the relevant apps. With NFC technology, the entire process would be automatic, transparent and would take only a fraction of second.

In the UK, there are currently very few phones with built-in NFC functionality. The Samsung Galaxy Nexus is one notable exception with Google offering the “Google Wallet” payment system to US-based owners of the phone (unfortunately Google Wallet isn’t available in the UK). The number of NFC-enabled devices is likely to increase in the coming years with Visa having recently certified phones such as the Samsung Galaxy S II, BlackBerry Bold 9900 and LG Optimus NET NFC for use with their "PayWave" technology. Stores such as McDonalds and Subway are also now accepting NFC-based contactless payments.

The benefits of mobile payments & a mobile wallet

There are several key benefits to being able to pay using your mobile phone:

More secure. Paying through NFC is more secure. Unlike a traditional wallet, a mobile phone can be secured with additional measures such as a PIN code (or facial recognition with Android 4.0). During the payment itself, transactions above £15 are still secured in the same way as “Chip and PIN” transactions would be. In the event you lose your smartphone, it can be remotely tracked, locked or wiped using software such as Apple’s “Find my iPhone” or Lookout Mobile Security for Android. It is also possible to transfer your electronic wallet to another phone. In contrast, losing your physical wallet causes much more problems as it cannot be tracked and each credit and store card must be cancelled individually.
Faster. There is no need to fumble around in the supermarket checkout to find the relevant credit card, loyalty card and vouchers from around your wallet – during a NFC payment, your phone can pick out all of the relevant cards and vouchers automatically.
More capacity. Whilst a physical wallet can only hold a limited number of cards, there is essentially no limit to the number of cards you could hold on your phone.
No more receipts. Moving to an electronic wallet means we can dispose of paper receipts. Not only is this greener, it would be possible for smartphone apps to keep track of your spending and automatically collate VAT/expense claim forms.
The obvious downside of a mobile wallet and paying with your mobile phone is that when you run out of battery, you’ll lose access to your electronic wallet too. With today’s smartphones sometimes faltering before the day is out, this could be a significant problem for early adopters of the electronic wallet and mobile commerce.

Your thoughts…

In this article, we’ve covered today’s barcode-based payment technologies, application-based payment technologies and SMS based payment technologies. The next few years are likely to see the introduction of NFC technology which could transform the world of mobile-based payments and commerce.

Do you think you’d like to pay for things using your mobile phone or do you prefer paying with cash? Do you think mobile payments will take off or are battery-life and privacy worries too much of an issue for you? Are you looking for NFC technology to be inside your next mobile phone?

Ken Lo writes about mobile technology and the mobile industry at Ken's Tech Tips.

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5 A Day [22nd January]

2012-02-02T16:27:00.000+00:00

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5 A Day [22nd January]
by zobia22 on 22-01-2012 16:16

Every Sunday, we will be posting a special '5 a day' blog with 5 of the best stories from this week. We read your replies and then judging by what you guys say, we work out the most popular 5 a day story for that particular day. This is how it will end up on Sunday's 5 a day blog

Here is the first edition of 'best of 5 a day'.

This may be the world’s most epic cake. This beautiful cake was created for the hungry patrons at the Arisia Sci-Fi Convention in Boston, MA. The stormtrooper stands at 6 feet 4 inches tall, weighed at least 300 lbs, and fed nearly 600 hungry conventioneers. Read more about it here.

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I love these space chocolates, even if they don't look edible...

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'About 700 light years away sits the expanding death cry of a star: the Helix Nebula, a four-light-year wide gas cloud blasted out when a star that was once like the Sun gave up its life. A new image of it in colors just outside what the human eye can see shows just how much it does look like a screaming star.' Visit http://giff.ly/z045S4 to read more.

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Think about trying to teach your dog to sit; this dog has balance skills to rival most acrobats!

Check it out, can your pets do anything like this?

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And finally, this video did make me chuckle

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So which one was your favourite? Personally mine was the image of the star! It is beautiful

Til tomorrow!
Zobia

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5 a Day [20th January 2012]

2012-02-01T16:25:00.000+00:00

Latest news from the giffgaff blog

5 a Day [20th January 2012]
by the_joseph on 20-01-2012 15:32

Augmented reality Lego? Acrobat dogs? Slumdog Billionaire? Find it all here.

First up we have the future of Lego kits, augmented reality booths to show you the kit in 3D

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A great drawing of the two happiest keys on the keyboard (right handed only)

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An Indian Teacher contacts his bank about a slightly error in his balance - namely that he thought he should have about $200 worth (10,000 rupees) and actually had a balance equivalent to $9.8 billion. He wouldn't of been able to withdraw it if he had tried, but still what a shock to have! Read more here. Would you have done the same, or kept quiet?