In this Mobile Badvertising series, I regularly pick on the Guardian. I don't have anything against them - they're my favourite mobile news resource. It's such a shame that the advertising they have on the site is atrocious. Samsung Galaxy S The Galaxy S is Samsung's latest Android handset. There are so many Android phones out there that you need a really great advertising campaign (or a re…
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This is a really geeky app! You know USSD? They're the codes you can type in to your phone to send messages back and forth to the networks. You've probably seen something like *#147# to display the last caller. My second app presents a series of buttons which call the USSD commands - so you don't have to remember if it's the HLR or VLR which is queried by *#103#. Useful, I know.... You can …
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I've been playing around with Android. It's a great platform for development. I really appreciated the speed to release of the Android Market - it's instant. Having worked with iPhone and Ovi stores where approval can take days or even weeks, it's great to have the freedom to publish immediately. The first app I've created is "Advanced Test Card". You can download it by scanning in this QR…
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Once again my wrath is targeted at The Guardian, Barclays and Apple. Three massive companies - each one of whom could have stopped this advertising disaster. Mistake #1 Take a look at this rather charming advert on the Guardian's mobile site. The more astute among you will recognise the problem. I'm being advertised an iPhone game when I'm browsing the site using an Android phone. This is…
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It has been a while since I last posted in the Mobile Badvertising section. Mobile adverts are slowly improving. By every once in a while, I spot an advert of such mind numbing ineptitude that I am compelled to post. Orange Take a look at the latest offering from Orange - a large UK mobile network operator. Orange Advert on Guardian Spot it? It's the microscopic banner hidden away on the…
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If you haven't already heard, I've joined the award winning team at Touchnote ltd. I was overwhelmed by the support of my friends on Twitter and by the excellent bloggers at Mobile Industry Review and The Really Mobile Project. http://www.mobileindustryreview.com/2010/04/vodafones-terence-eden-joins-touchnote.html Starting a new job is never easy - but you guys have given me wind in my…
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I'm a huge fan of Paul Battley's iplayer-dl. In brief, it downloads videos from iPlayer by pretending to be an iPhone. The .MP4 files it grabs are suitable for playback on most mobile devices (480 x 272 and stereo audio). It also downloads radio programmes as .MP3 files. I was having a bit of trouble installing it on my XNAS - running Xebian Linux, so I've written this as an aide-mémoire. I …
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Mobile QR codes are fantastic. They're real-life hyperlinks. Snap them with your phone and go direct to a website. What could be better? The BBC, however, need a few lessons in how to optimise the experience. As part of their Prisoner Zero page - the BBC have an awesome "Wanted Poster". Here's the teaser image. Prisoner Zero - QR Code Let's take a look at the full QR code. This is about…
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It shouldn't come as a surprise to any reader of this blog that I'm a phone geek. And a Doctor Who geek. So, image my utter nerdgasm when we got to see the 11th Doctor using a mobile he'd nicked. The burning question is which phone? Touchscreen It's quite hard to see throughout the episode. It just looks like a standard touchscreen device in a rubber casing. I had wondered if the props team h…
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Weeks before Britons go to the polls, there's still no comprehensive list of candidates. Four citizens' initiatives have joined forces to tackle the problem. They've been gathering basic information about thousands of candidates and making the data public. "It may seem surprising but there simply is no single listing for all prospective parliamentary candidates. We want people to make an…
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If you're outside of the UK, you will see adverts on the BBC site. This also happens on the mobile site. Here's a typical example. BBC Advert Intercontinental are a premium brand. No doubt their mobile advertising is really good. Right? First Impression Intercontinental Advert Page 1 We start off with a mobile friendly page. Almost. There are five flaws here. Large image. While vi…
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People have been very excited to see some new functionality in Dabr - the mobile Twitter client I develop for. But what is it and how does it work? @@ and geotag Reply to All The @@ symbol allows you to reply to all the people mentioned within the tweet. It only shows up on tweets which mention other users - so you should only ever see it when it can be used. Hitting @@ on the above tweet…
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