MobileTV App for Android

SPB TV for Android phones, announced today, a subscription-free mobile IPTV viewer, designed for tuning in to publicly available digital TV channels from all over the world.

Developer SPB Software says the SPB TV features exclusive and patent-pending usability innovations like picture-in-picture mode, and gives the mobile subscribers easy access to over a hundred of international TV channels, directly from their phones.

The freeware version has limited features and channels. A full version is available for 9.95 USD from the Android Market. SPB TV requires a reliable 3G or WiFi network connection for proper streaming.

SPB TV 1.0 is available for smartphones running Android 1.5 with HVGA screen resolutions, as well as Windows Phones running Windows Mobile 5 and later Professional and Standard editions, S60 3d edition FP1 or higher, qVGA, VGA, Square QVGA, and WVGA screen resolutions are supported.

SPB Software says it’s been a stratigic partner for many carriers, who manage a wide range of mobile devices. With this release SPB TV becomes available for Windows Mobile, Symbian and Android platforms providing diverse mobile carrier customers with the next generation mobile TV experience.

In other video-related news, Portland’s Rick Turoczy, who writes Silicon Florist Blog, which covers local startups, is now producing a weekly video called memePDX.

Hosted by Rick and Cami Kaos of Strange Love Live, it features both local and national tech developments.

Newsy.com is a multiperspective online video news site that synthesizes video news clips.

Newser’s coverage of Apple’s rejection of Google Voice (above), illustrates their approach to video aggregating.

Source: Dailywireless

Smartphones: Data Tsunami Coming

Smartphones are double-edged swords for carriers. They attract big-spending customers, but tax networks designed for simpler times, explains Fortune.

Independent telecom analyst Chetan Sharma estimates that the typical wireless subscriber consumes 120 megabytes each month; typical iPhone owners use four times that.

And it’s just getting worse. By 2010, global mobile data traffic is expected to exceed 200 terabytes per month, six times last year’s levels, according to Cisco Systems.

“3G networks were not designed effectively for this kind of usage,” says John Donovan, AT&T’s chief technology officer, referring to the current generation of broadband wireless. “We fight the day-to-day guerrilla warfare as the customers move around.”

Many of AT&T’s 60,000 cell towers need to be upgraded, with new 850 MHz gear and backhaul. That could cost billions of dollars, and AT&T has kept a lid on capital spending during the recession. AT&T will delay their LTE upgrade, upgrading its HSPA 3G network from 3.6 Mbps to 7.2 Mbps, instead.

Verizon plans to have 30 US LTE Markets by 2010. Verizon will use their nation-wide 700 MHz band. The carrier hopes to have a data-only LTE trial service available in Seattle and Boston later this year.

It can’t come soon enough. The tsunami is about to hit. Android phones from Samsung, LG, and Motorola are due in stores by early 2010. Motorola will launch their Android portfolio on September 10th. The data-oriented Palm Pre, which operates on Palm’s WebOS platform, is already on Sprint and should be in Verizon stores early next year.

A Cisco Mobile Forecast for 2008-2013 noted that a single high-end data phone today generates more data traffic than 30 basic-feature cell phones, while a single laptop air card generates more data traffic than 450 basic-feature cell phones. Cisco projects that mobile data traffic will increase a thousand-fold over the seven years from 2005 through 2012, with video being a significant component.

AT&T offers free Starbucks WiFi (with a paid data subscription) while Verizon is partnering with Boingo to deliver free WiFi access at hotels, airports, restaurants and coffee shops (with a data plan). PCCW, the Hong Kong operator, has started using Wi-Fi hot spots to ease the load from smartphones and its digital TV service.

AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson has said that the most active 5% or so of data users are causing problems for the other 95%. AT&T is working on a revamped data plan whereby light data users would pay less, and heavy users would pay a premium rate — or leave.

Source:  Dailywireless

AdMob: iPhone 60% of U.S. Smartphone Usage

AdMob reports, “the iPhone represented 60 percent of U.S. smartphone usage in AdMob’s network in July 2009, followed by RIM and Android devices at 13 and 12 percent, respectively.”

AdMob surveyed over 1,000 iPhone, iPod touch and Android users to find our more about their interaction and download behavior with apps. Other highlights:

• Android and iPhone users download approximately 10 new apps a month, while iPod touch owners download an average of 18 per month
• More than 90 percent of Android and iPhone OS users browse and search for apps directly on their mobile device instead of their computer
• Upgrading from the lite version was the top reason given when users were asked what drives them to purchase a paid app
• iPhone and iPod touch users are twice as likely to purchase paid apps than Android users.
• Users who regularly download paid apps spend approximately $9 on an average of five paid downloads per month

AdMob says (pdf) that Apple’s iPhone store sells some $200 million in applications every month (about $2.4 billion a year), with about 1.5 billion apps downloaded from the App Store in total. The Android marketplace, by comparison, generates about $5 million a month (about $60 million a year).

“However,” reports VentureBeat, “users who purchase paid apps on either platform exhibit similar downloading and spending habits, indicating the potential for paid apps on Android Market as it develops.”

The survey asked more than 1,000 Android, iPhone, and iPod Touch users about their download habits, and found that those who regularly paid for apps spent similar amounts of money — roughly $9 per month on five downloads — regardless of whether they were iPhone or Android users. Source:  Dailywireless

Despite The iPhone, App Developers Remain OS Agnostic

With all you hear about the iPhone and its thousands of available apps, you’d think it’s the only mobile OS that developers are interested in.  A new study reveals that while the iPhone is an important piece of the puzzle, developers are still remaining OS agnostic- meaning they’re developing their apps to run on multiple mobile operating systems instead of going platform-specific.

Sponsored by research firm Chubby Brain, the study looked at venture-backed 2009 mobile app start-ups and determined that 67 percent are developing their applications to work on multiple platforms- namely, the top six mobile operating systems: iPhone, Palm, RIM, Android, Symbian, and Windows.  In addition, 33 percent are developing for a single platform- primarily the iPhone.

Of the 67 percent of developers that are developing for multiple platforms, more than 3/4 (76 percent) are developing their apps to run on all six primary operating systems.  Additionally, 12 percent are developing for only two out of the top six- that being RIM and the iPhone.

It’s interesting research, though likely skewed due to the fact that the sample size included only venture-funded app start-ups.  With VC funding, it’s likely the developers want to get their apps to as many consumers as possible, and being platform-specific would be limiting.  If the research included all apps being developed right now, you would undoubtedly see a spike in iPhone-specific development. Source: Mobile Marketing Watch

Android Weather Widget

I was playing around with the Android Widget API over the weekend and so far I am quite impressed. It’s easy to use and very powerful. I already have tons of ideas for things I would like to build. There’s a relatively easy tutorial on the Android Developers blog but I preferred learning by browsing the source code of their ‘Word of the Day’ demo.

As an example I built a simple widget addition to my weather application which shows the current London temperate in Celsius on my home screen.

I do have some concerns though. When waking the phone up from a long period of inactivity and then changing the screen orientation a few times the Home screen hung on me and I had to reboot to resolve the issue. This may be bad 3rd party code but it’s definitely a problem. Source: http://www.paxmodept.com/telesto/blogitem.htm?id=782