News

Facebook to Become Location-Aware in April

Yesterday, 3:10 PM   by Eric M. Zeman

According to unnamed sources cited by The New York Times, Facebook plans to introduce a new location-sharing feature to is social networking service. The feature will let users share their own location as well as see the location of their friends in their news feed. The Times' source says that Facebook has been working on the feature for a year, and has waited until it is fully ready before releasing it to its 400 million users. Facebook will also make APIs (application programming interfaces) available to third-party organizations who wish to enable location features within their own Facebook apps. Facebook has not said if or how mobile phones will play a role, but many of the site's users access it from devices such as BlackBerries, Windows Mobile, the iPhone and Android handsets -- all of which offer GPS location tools. More details will be made available at the f8 conference, to be held in late April.

Leap Shutters Some Stores, Reduces Headcount

Yesterday, 2:32 PM   by Eric M. Zeman

Leap Wireless recently indicated that it has permanently closed 27 -- about 10% -- of its 269 Cricket Wireless stores. It has also laid off 180 people, trimming its staff level down to 4,200 employees around the country. The company said that the store closings and staff reduction are part of normal retail operations, though the company reported a $64 million loss in its most recent financial quarter. Leap recently announced a new joint venture with Pocket Communications to expand its presence in Texas, and Leap is believed to be seeking another company to partner with on a much larger level, or buy it out altogether.

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Apple Revises iPhone OS 3.2 SDK Yet Again

Yesterday, 2:28 PM   by Eric M. Zeman

Today Apple made a fourth beta of the iPhone OS 3.2 software development kit available to developers. The SDK provides developers with the tools they need to write for iPhone OS, which also applies to the iPod Touch and forthcoming iPad.

Palm Helps Developers Port Games to WebOS

Yesterday, 12:20 PM   by Philip Berne

Palm today announced the Plug-In Development Kit (PDK) for Palm WebOS. The PDK allows developers to use C and C++ in addition to the Web-based framework of the Palm OS. With the new PDK, developers get access to OpenGL ES 1.1 or 2.0, which will improve 3D performance in games and other apps, and the new kit should make it easier to port games from another platform to Palm's WebOS. The PDK works with Windows Visual Studio and Mac's Xcode development tools. This release follows on the heels of yesterday's announcement from Google releasing a similar development package for Google Android devices, including OpenGL ES 2.0 support.

FCC Suggests Free Wireless Broadband

Yesterday, 11:14 AM   by Philip Berne

At the Digital Inclusion Summit, the FCC released a statement supporting free wireless broadband for some Americans in a bid to increase affordable broadband service nationwide. The commission did not specify which Americans would qualify for such a service and how the plan would be carried out, but the FCC did suggest using "spectrum for a free or a very low cost wireless broadband service." The Digital Inclusion Summit aims to connect one-third of Americans without broadband Internet access at home. As part of the FCC's statement, the commission recommended a Digital Literacy Corps of volunteers who would teach users how to access the free or low-cost service.

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Samsung's Stunt Lands at Cricket

Yesterday, 9:32 AM   by Eric M. Zeman

Today Samsung announced that it is offering the SCH-r100 Stunt to Cricket customers. The Stunt is a tri-band CDMA bar-style phone that has entry level features. It includes Bluetooth, speakerphone, and simple messaging services. It costs $100.

NFL Mobile Touches Down on Verizon Wireless

Yesterday, 9:23 AM   by Philip Berne   updated Yesterday, 9:42 AM

The NFL and Verizon Wireless today announced a four year deal that will bring NFL Mobile programming and the NFL RedZone channel to Verizon Wireless phones. Specific phone and pricing information for the new service will be available in August, close to the start of the next NFL season, but Verizon's new service will be live in time to offer coverage of the NFL Draft on April 22-24. Subscribers will be able to watch NFL games live on Sunday and Thursday night, and will have access to live radio broadcasts of every regular season and playoff game from both home and away teams. Sprint representative Mark Elliott says Sprint passed on extending the NFL sponsorship because the high price tag had the carrier questioning its return on investment. Sprint will still offer some sort of football application that will provide professional and college football coverage. Verizon Wireless notably used the announcement opportunity to tout its upcoming 4G network launch, saying the NFL Mobile experience will become increasingly rich as the LTE network launches in 25 to 30 markets this year. With today's announcement, Verizon Wirleess will also become the official wireless service sponsor for the NFL.

Android Develops Enhanced OpenGL Support

Monday, 7:29 PM   by Philip Berne

Google today released the Android Native Development Kit revision 3 (NDK r3), offering expanded capabilities to Android developers. Most interesting to end users is probably enhanced support for OpenGL ES 2.0, now offering improved graphics rendering through vertex and fragment shader programs. Android has been roundly criticized for lagging behind Apple's iPhone OS in gaming support. While the new NDK r3 can be used to target devices running Android 1.5 and higher, the enhanced OpenGL support will only target Android 2.0 and higher devices, like the Motorola Droid or the Google Nexus One. On the back end, the new Android NDK r3 also offers refreshed binaries in line with the GNU Compiler Collection (GCC) 4.4.0, which Google says will generate more compact and efficient machine code.

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Gowalla App Out Now For Android Phones

Monday, 1:08 PM   by Philip Berne

Travel Channel will also bring new content to Gowalla, starting with locations used in "Food Wars."

Asiq Brings Mobile Service to Airplanes Via Bluetooth

Monday, 9:55 AM   by Eric M. Zeman

Today Asiq announced what it calls the first aircraft Bluetooth Access Point. The AP, in conjunction with Asiq's SafeCell application, will allow airlines to offer cellular services (including SMS, MMS, voice messaging and email) on board aircraft during flight. According to Asiq, its technology eliminates the need for a picocell on board the aircraft and instead can make use of the aircraft's satellite link. Asiq says that SafeCell software combined with the Bluetooth AP allow for extremely small file sizes, swift pairing and connections, and the possibility to transmit up to 3Mbps. Only two access points are needed to cover a narrow body aircraft, supporting up to 192 simultaneous connections/users. Asiq's system costs about $10,000 per airplane.

Verizon Wireless Talks Up LTE Speeds

Monday, 9:45 AM   by Eric M. Zeman

Today Verizon Wireless indicated that its preliminary tests of Long Term Evolution in the Boston and Seattle trial markets demonstrate that the next-generation wireless technology can deliver peak download speeds of 40 to 50Mbps and peak upload speeds of 20 to 25Mbps. Verizon Wireless engineers report average data rates of 5 to 12Mbps on the downlink and 2 to 5Mbps on the uplink in real-world environments for LTE, which faster than the speeds currently offered by 3G services. Verizon Wireless also indicated that it is on track to deploy its LTE network in 25 to 30 markets later this year, blanketing some 100 million Americans. According to the 3GPP2 spec, fourth generation networks are supposed to reach 100Mbps downlink speeds under peak conditions. Both Ericsson and Novatel have reached 42Mbps downloads with their HSPA+ networking technology.

Qualcomm Developing Dual-Mode Femto Chips

Sunday, 8:57 PM   by Eric M. Zeman

Qualcomm has announced that it is bringing new dual-mode HSPA+ and EVDO Rev. A and B. chips to femto cells. Qualcomm says the chips are the first to combine 3GPP HSPA+ and CDMA2000 1X and EV-DO Rev. A and Rev. B. The chips will allow femto cells to offer a wide range of options to end users. The chips will include baseband processors, network listen and integrated RF capabilities for all major wireless bands. The chips will be sampling by the second quarter of this year.

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