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Having lost its exclusive rights to sell Apple’s new phone, the mobile network now seems to have an inverse pricing at its low end to discourage 24-month contracts

O2 has announced the pricing for its iPhone 4 handsets – and seems to be trying to push people away from buying longer-term contracts.

Under the 24-month contracts, the phones are more expensive than the 18-month contracts, by between £70 (for the white 16GB version priced at £209 for 18 months, or £279 for 24 months) and £24 (for the black 32GB version, costing £299 for 18 months and £323 for 24 months). Even though the price plans at that tariff differ by £5 per month, over 18 months the 16GB handset works out cheaper on the lowest tariff by £10.

Pricing plans for Vodafone’s iPhone 4 leaked out earlier this week, although the company has not formally announced them and is only letting people indicate interest in ordering it.

Orange’s charges start at £169 for a 16GB phone on a £30-per month 24-month contract (£229 on £30 for 18 months)

O2′s pricing decision has puzzled people on Twitter: “O2 seems to have forgotten the idea is to lure people onto longer contract by *lowering* upfront costs. Duh.,” commented journalist Scott Colvey.

The decision – tied to O2′s decision to introduce strict caps on data downloads per month, varying between 500MB and 1GB, replacing its previous “unlimited” data contracts that many are still using – may mean a migration of former iPhone customers away from the company, which until last Christmas had the monopoly on iPhone sales in the UK. Now the phone is sold by Orange, Vodafone and 3 – though only Orange and Vodafone have announced prices.

Many iPhone owners who bought the second-generation iPhone in 2008 on 18- or 24-month contracts will be eligible to upgrade with O2 – or possibly to shift to another carrier.

Apple has apologised to would-be customers after overwhelming demand meant that its own and AT&T’s servers crashed when the phone went on sale in five countries on Tuesday. It says that 600,000 phones were ordered on the day – which suggests that it has tapped into huge pent-up demand from owners of older versions, as well as new buyers seeking to join the smartphone bandwagon.

Read Original Story…
(Source The Guardian)

Tags: 10, 12, 3, all, apple, blog, charges, cheaper, compare, comparemobiles.com, contract, gadget, gadgets, iphone, mobile, Mobile News, mobile phone, mobile phones, mobiles, months, new, o2, orange, phone, phones, prices, sol, tariff, tariffs, twitter, uk, vodafone

Ofcom has issued a stern warning to London-based phone and broadband provider
Continental Telecom, claiming it has broken consumer protection rules by using a
form of mis-selling known as ‘slamming’ to switch customers to its services.

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(Source Yahoo UK News)

Tags: 10, 12, 3, compare, comparemobiles.com, consumer, mobile, Mobile News, mobiles, new, phone, service, sol, uk

Comms provider Daisy Group has offloaded its Wimax Spectrum licensing
business to UK Broadband for £12.5m in cash as it looks to focus more on Unified
Communications (UC).

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(Source Yahoo UK News)

Tags: 10, 12, 3, compare, comparemobiles.com, mobile, Mobile News, mobiles, new, sol, uk

LOS ANGELES/NEW YORK (Reuters) – Sales of Apple Inc’s latest iPhone blew away expectations in its first day on the market despite shortages and an embarrassing online ordering glitch that thwarted many shoppers.

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(Source Yahoo UK News)

Tags: 10, 12, apple, apple iphone, compare, comparemobiles.com, iphone, latest, line, mobile, Mobile News, mobiles, new, phone, sol, test, uk

Samsung has tabbed Orange as the exclusive UK carrier for its new Galaxy
Apollo smartphone.

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(Source Yahoo UK News)

Tags: 10, 12, 3, compare, comparemobiles.com, mobile, Mobile News, mobiles, new, orange, phone, sam, samsung, sol, uk

LOS ANGELES/NEW YORK (Reuters) – Apple iPhone 4 sets record sale pace despite gaffe

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(Source Yahoo UK News)

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LOS ANGELES/NEW YORK (Reuters) – Apple iPhone 4 sets record sale pace despite gaffe

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(Source Yahoo UK News)

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Motorola has enhanced its WiMax portfolio with a new service designed to help
facilitate the move to 4G services by allowing operators to upgrade networks to
switch between Long Term Evolution (LTE) and WiMax services.

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(Source Yahoo UK News)

Tags: 10, 12, 3, all, compare, comparemobiles.com, mobile, Mobile News, mobiles, moto, motorola, networks, new, service, sol, uk

Orange has announced its
iPhone
4 pricing plans for pay-as-you-go, monthly and businesses customers,
revealing that contract customers will have to pay a whopping £75 a month for 24
months to get the device for free.

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(Source Yahoo UK News)

Tags: 10, 12, 3, compare, comparemobiles.com, contract, free, iphone, mobile, Mobile News, mobiles, months, new, orange, phone, sol, uk

Tesco Mobile has become the latest operator to confirm that it will offer the
iPhone 4 from 24 June.

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(Source Yahoo UK News)

Tags: 10, 12, 3, apple, apple iphone, compare, comparemobiles.com, iphone, latest, mobile, Mobile News, mobiles, new, phone, sol, test, uk

Major deficiencies in the online sales operations of AT&T and Apple have
been showing up as people rush to register for the
iPhone
4 .

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(Source Yahoo UK News)

Tags: 10, 12, 3, apple, compare, comparemobiles.com, iphone, line, mobile, Mobile News, mobiles, new, phone, sol, uk

Motorola has appointed John Bucher as corporate vice president of strategy for its mobile devices and home business. He will report to Sanjay Jha, the company’s co-CEO and CEO of mobile devices and home business.

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(Source Yahoo UK News)

Tags: 10, 12, compare, comparemobiles.com, mobile, Mobile News, mobiles, moto, motorola, new, sol, uk

RIM has appointed Kondor as its accessories distribution partner in the UK, supplying a full range of BlackBerry products across all channels

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(Source Mobile News CWP)

Tags: 10, 12, all, Blackberry, compare, comparemobiles.com, deal, mobile, Mobile News, mobiles, new, sol, uk

Major problems with both AT&T and Apples online commerce operations have
been showing up as people rush to register for the new iPhone.

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(Source Yahoo UK News)

Tags: 10, 12, 3, apple, Apples, compare, comparemobiles.com, iphone, line, mobile, Mobile News, mobiles, new, phone, sol, uk

Apple has confirmed in the
iPhone
FAQ section on its web site that the micro-SIM from the iPhone 4 cannot be
used in the iPad.

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(Source Yahoo UK News)

Tags: 10, 12, 3, apple, apple iphone, compare, comparemobiles.com, iphone, mobile, Mobile News, mobiles, new, phone, sim, sol, uk

The online encyclopaedia says it has taken an “important step” towards opening up some of its most controversial articles.

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(Source BBC Technology)

Tags: 10, 12, 3, bbc, compare, comparemobiles.com, line, mobile, mobiles, new, sol, uk

BT plans to provide up to two million homes and small businesses across
London with fibre broadband that could offer speeds of up to 100Mbit/s by the
spring of 2011.

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(Source Yahoo UK News)

Tags: 10, 12, 3, all, compare, comparemobiles.com, mobile, Mobile News, mobiles, new, sol, uk

Apple UK has announced pricing details for a SIM-free iPhone 4 direct from
its Apple Store and online.

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(Source Yahoo UK News)

Tags: 10, 12, 3, apple, compare, comparemobiles.com, free, iphone, line, mobile, Mobile News, mobiles, new, phone, prices, sim, sol, uk

Verizon Business has added to its portfolio of enterprise IT services with
cloud storage, hosted storage management and data retention consulting services.

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(Source Yahoo UK News)

Tags: 10, 12, 3, compare, comparemobiles.com, mobile, Mobile News, mobiles, new, service, sol, uk

Steve Jobs denied that Apple is developing a search engine when he was asked on stage at the D8 conference recently – not that that tells us anything about what’s really going on in Cupertino’s labs.

But the speculation persists not about if Apple will move into search, but when, how and why.

It was the acquisition of Siri in April that first raised the flags. The deal for somewhere in the region of £200m, according to TechCrunch, gained Apple a small but established app enabling voice command and search for mobile.

While it might not seem to compete directly with Google’s primary web search tool, anything in search will compete with something Google is working on. And as both Apple and Google have moved further into the mobile space, the two have become increasingly conflicted. (There are subtle indications of the two moving apart; Jobs last week announced that Bing would be added to the iPhone’s search engine options, though Google remains the default.)

So what exactly is Apple developing? 


Photo by Dani Gutiérrez on Flickr. Some rights reserved

Where did Siri come from?

Thanks to xconomy‘s excellent background piece, we know that it was born out of a defence research project at SRI International, where it was funded by US taxpayers at a cost of $150m. The roots of the orgaisation go back to 1946, and included work by Douglas Engelbart in 1968 on pioneering human/computer interfaces, like the mouse. It began work on a military version of a ‘personalised assistant that learns’ in the earlies noughties.

Eventually the Siri app was spun out in 2008 to make money for the project, which is when $24m in venture money was invested. When it sold to Apple for $200m, (give or take $50m) that netted an eight-fold return for the VCs, Menlo Ventures and Morgenthaler Ventures.

Jobs explained last week that this deal is about artificial intelligence. Search, but not as we know it. xconomy explains:

“It’s about the artificial-intelligence insights behind it: the chain of machine-learning, natural-language processing, and Web search algorithms that swing into action with every Siri query. When you can access these algorithms from a mobile device like the iPhone, and prime them with a bit of contextual awareness such as a GPS location reading or an understanding of the user’s preferences, you have a powerful personal tool that Norman Winarsky, SRI’s vice president of ventures, licensing, and strategic programs, likes to describe as a “do engine” rather than a search engine.”

The result – and this is fascinating stuff – will be consumers interacting with their phones in a conversational way, rather than being tied to the conventional keyword searches.

Why is voice command important?

Voice-command technology is an extremely important tool for mobile. It’s hands-free, but essentially just far more practical than typing and means your eyes don’t have to be glued to the screen. If you’ve ever tried using your phone while walking (and of course you have) you’ll know how important that it. Other solutions, like Type n Walk, are more a gimmick than a real solution.

From calling up contacts in your address book to searching the web, voice commands give an entirely new and virtual interface with your phone, and it seems right that the challenge of streamlining and organising that interface would appeal to Apple. It may eventually lead to a entirely voice-controlled mobile, freed from the constraints of a keyboard size. And that means mobiles can get really small, saving those delicious touchscreens for desktops and notebooks.

iPhone already has voice command. I know this because the voice command appears occasionally, like a genie from a lamp, when I sit on my phone. (Holding down the main call button, as it turns out.) But voice control has yet to really impress – especially in the UK, where it only seems to work properly if you use an American accent, and that’s not even stating to think about the task of developing international language versions. What does that leave? It leaves a field ripe for improvement, and for a mainstream consumer solution. Step in, Apple.
 
In keeping with Apple’s product release strategy, expect to see voice search gently expanded. First, there will be the announcement of an improved search built in to the phone, a simple version that will encourage and train us to use it. Further models will make that more and more central to the device.

And in five years, maybe that iPod Shuffle-sized iPhone Voice will be announced. You just know that’s where things are headed.


Photo by SAYER© on Flickr. Some rights reserved

More speculation

Apple analyst Gene Munster at Piper Jaffray confirms Apple will focus on mobile-centric search, presenting very specific competition to Google. They put the likelihood of Apple developing a search engine at 70%.

“An iPhone specific search engine could be a difficult undertaking, but we feel Apple could make a minor acquisition of a search company that has built a web index, like a Cuil, and utilize the index as the base for building its own engine… One hurdle for Apple in developing its own search engine would be generating enough advertiser interest to form a competitive marketplace; however, we believe the rationale for an Apple search product is to protect data rather than generate profit.”

Venture capitalist and former tech journalist Steve Allsopp explains, at around 2:00, why search is relevant to Apple and why they are embedding Siri into “everything they do”:

Read Original Story…
(Source The Guardian)

Tags: 10, 12, 3, all, apple, blog, compare, comparemobiles.com, consumer, deal, free, google, iphone, lg, mobile, Mobile News, mobile phone, mobile phones, mobiles, new, phone, phones, sim, sol, Touch, uk, update, venture