Take a Peek at BlackBerry

There isn't anything available in the UK that can compete with BlackBerry for a piece of the mobile email space.

Trust me, I've just been through the weird process of buying a new mobile phone. The market is full of widescreen-media-player-phones, high-resolution-camera-phones and social-networking-and-comes-in-pink-too-phones.

But for email - and, more specifically, actually being able to type emails and rely on them being sent and received - the BlackBerry kicks ass every time.

Which is why I'm so keen to see the Peek arrive here as soon as possible. It takes what BlackBerry has done and strips it down even more. No glossy screens, downloadable apps and faux-leather. Just basic email and a keyboard.



Peek's latest PR coup is the TwitterPeek, a device that costs $200 and only lets you interact with Twitter. The killer twist is that the $200 covers your connectivity too, so there are NO BILLS WHATSOEVER. That's so good it actually hurts me a little bit inside.

I remember the first time I had a go on a BlackBerry. I was in the US, it was 2000 and the device itself looked like a pager. Even back then I knew it was going to be massive and was surprised it hadn't made its way to the UK yet. (Note to self: Go dig out the column I wrote about it for Internet World magazine.)

The Peek reminds me of that feeling, and not only because it looks and acts like an old 'Berry. So when will we see it arrive?

Neil Diamond is haunting my dreams

A brilliant story doing the rounds today is about the mysterious man currently haunting the dreams of tens of thousands of people.



Although extremely convincing, the site was created by the founder of an Italian marketing agency known for hoaxes, according to reports.

I would love to believe someone has honed a psychic ability to surf through people's dreams. I will, however, not be disappointed if it turns out to be a marketing stunt for a new Neil Diamond CD (just in time for Christmas).



What's that? He has a Christmas album just out, including the title track Cherry Cherry Christmas, which is "newly written and recorded by Neil Diamond for Christmas 2009" and "destined to become a new Christmas standard"?

Slap in the Facebook

Facebook's new newsfeed has received a bit of feedback - in the shape of 1,231,797 (at time of writing) members joining the 'CHANGE FACEBOOK BACK TO NORMAL!!' Facebook group.

We're seeing an unprecented rise of grassroots action such as this - be it in response to bad journalism, controversial programming or, shock horror, the apparent inability to see what your friends are thinking in real time.

With Facebook and Twitter constantly fighting to improve their interfaces, it'll be interesting to see if Facebook reverses its decision. It appears neither of them have yet worked out that it is possible to exist in harmony as two very different communications platforms.

That said, I barely notice the difference in my Facebook feed - aside from that I get slightly more relevant posts in the new version?

Eight reasons why the Palm Pre got handed back

Synergy was amazing and the keyboard was more than capable. But:

Battery life. Getting to the end of the day with a working smartphone is, you know, important.

The OS. It was slow, and had to think about things. A lot.

Music. The sound was great, but no iTunes or Spotify became crippling.

The browser. No flash support meant broken pages and empty screens.

Apps. I'm not bothered about the number... Just that they're finished before being published.

Alerts. It's very quiet, and you're stuck with fixed SMS and system alert sounds.

Mic quality. People kept complaining they couldn't hear me, or that I was cutting out.

Finish. It was made of plastic, with plastic trim and a plastic screen. It felt, erm, plasticky.

Guardian Jobs website hacked

For most people that work in the media, the Guardian's jobs paper and website are one of the main ways to look for jobs and recruit new talent.

An email sent out on Saturday night just warned all users that the site (run by external supplier Magdex) has been hacked, and registered users' personal data has been accessed.

I've done a quick story on this over at The Media Blog. I've also sent some questions to the team at The Guardian to find out as much as possible about the breach.

Here's the full text of the email:

SECURITY BREACH - GUARDIAN JOBS

We learned yesterday evening that the Guardian Jobs website has been targeted by a sophisticated and deliberate hack, which has breached the security of the data on the site. You have used the site to make one or more job applications and we believe your personal data, relating to those applications, may have been accessed.

We are absolutely committed to the privacy of our users, and would like to assure you that we are treating this situation with the utmost seriousness. The matter has been reported to the police, who are now undertaking a full investigation through the police central e-crime unit at New Scotland Yard.

The supplier who runs the site has identified the manner in which it was hacked and taken steps to prevent a recurrence.

We have no reason to believe that any financial or bank data was compromised in this incident. However the police advise that those whose personal data may have been stolen in this way should take a number of precautionary measures. These are outlined below:

1) Contact your creditors, even if they have not been affected, so that they can monitor your accounts to ensure they remain protected.

2) Contact a credit reference agency: Callcredit, Equifax or Experian provide suggested steps to resolve the situation and prevent it happening again.

3) Contact CIFAS protective registration: If you think you have been a victim of identity theft you should consider subscribing to CIFAS. This places a notice on your credit file indicating that your name and address may be used to perpetrate identity fraud.

In addition the following websites are sources of useful information:

www.met.police.uk/fraudalert/
www.stop-idfraud.co.uk
www.banksafeonline.org.uk
www.getsafeonline.org

We will continue to work with the police whilst the investigation is carried out. Please refer to the following page for updates:

jobs.guardian.co.uk/securityupdate.html

Bus marketing

Bus marketing,
originally uploaded by PR Geek.

I think it's advertising some kind of journey to New York. Or is it a dig at Boris? Erm...

Palm Pre: 10 things you (probably) didn't know (and might not care about)

Synergy is absolutely incredible. I was worried how I was going to get my contacts onto the phone without it being able to sync with iTunes. IT SUCKED THEM IN FROM SPACE.

The battery life is abysmal. On my first full day I got six hours before it turned into a small, highly-polished paperweight. Am now fiddling with settings to make it better.

The keyboard is, erm, OK. It's not as easy to type on as a Blackberry but after a bit of practice it's fine. The main holdup is getting used to a dedicated full stop key, period.

iTunes won't sync with it, but you can drag and drop any videos / song files into its downloads folder and it'll automatically sort 'em in its media player software.

You can't change the sounds for SMS or emails, system sounds or the low battery alert (which you'll hear a lot). That's just stupid.

The built-in ringtones are dreadful (and a bit sinister) but it will play any song you download or send to it as a ringtone. That's very sensible.

The USB / charger port is hidden behind a crappy little door which, we may as well just face it, I'm going to snap off sooner off later.

It makes a 'shhh' sound when you flick an app off the top of the screen to close it.

The gesture area does a couple of hidden things - you can swipe half to the left and it'll go back, or all the way left and right to switch between apps.

The camera gives you a spray tan by making everything slightly orangier than normal.

Google Wave: I'm Waving! Hello? Anyone?

My Google Wave invite came through this morning. I was excited, immediately logged on and...

Waited. Eventually I bumped into four other people I kind of know and we had a little impromptu Wave of our very own.



The experience? It was a cross between email (asynchronous) and IM (synchronous) but with real time typing preview (weird, with comedic potential) and rich content sharing (took a while to work out, but the clue is in the lightbulb).



Am sure it'll be huge (purely due to the mix of synchronous and asynchronous communication - means you don't have to choose how to contact someone) but at the moment it's little more than a curiosity.

The Jackenhacks bitterness in summary

Jackenhacks co-host Steve Earl has stirred up a lovely pot of passive bile on his blog today.

As I know you're a digital person and can only microchunk (and therefore not read his whole post and the 20-odd comments), here's my summary:

Steve Earl: People are taking things a bit seriously, aren't they?
Someone: It's nasty. I'm boycotting it and you.
Someone else: Come off it, it's only a bit of fun.
Another person: I don't like it. It's got too personal.
And another: What's wrong with you all? They're joke awards!
Someone new: I can't bear it. I'm really upset.
Will Sturgeon: Ah well. Let's just all get pissed, eh?

I'm with Will on this (at the bar).

I never thought I'd want a trampoline

Check out Cirque de Soleil's Oli Lemieux limbering up.



(Via Jordan Stone.)

Standard sets the standard

I'm looking forward to my first free Evening Standard tonight. The Standard seller in the Tube station always used to look so forlorn as thousands of people milled past him with their copies of the London Lite or London Paper. Tonight, he fights back.

Hangonaminute... Will they be keeping them on? The newsstand vendor (complete with handwritten headline behind a metal mesh and indecipherable shouts summing up the day's top story) is one of the defining images of London life. Are they going to be replaced by a new hoarde of freesheet distributors, dressed in luminous PVC and branded baseball caps?

According to the statement from the Evening Standard, distribution will be via "260 merchandisers and vendors handing out copies". The number matches the existing vendor community so it looks like they are staying on.

That group used to buy their copies and sell them on... So are they paying them now?

Spotify: Why I ended up buying

A few weeks ago I wrote a post about why I'd never buy Spotify. But after a bit of agonising and envious glances at Spotify working on my friends' iPhones, I took the plunge.

"But why?" I hear you ask. Well...

1. I can't travel without Frightened Rabbit.

I had my motorbike nicked (yeah, thanks) so am now getting the tube to work. Thanks to the free version of Spotify my music tastes had moved on, but my music collection hadn't.

2. The iPhone app is ohmygod awesome.

It looks great, it works great, it feels great. The only problem is that you need to keep it running to hear music. No more playing Peggle on the Tube (but at least I'm reading books again).

3. The adverts got to me.

I'm sure those ads where people leave messages on the Spotify voicemail are designed to force free users to upgrade. Better that than set fire to their computers, or rip their own ears off.

4. I can change my mind again.

It's only a tenner. That's three drinks, for crying out loud. With no subscription, I can cancel my payment with no notice. Like if I get a Palm Pre, or something.

5. Music needs to change.

I don't like the thought that, without support, Spotify might be dead within a year. Spotify is a shining beacon of compromise and normality in a sea of confusion and irrational behaviour*.

OK, OK.

It was mainly reason one.

* I'm looking at you, Lily.

Who am I supposed to ask if Twitter's down when Twitter goes down?

Twitter has dropped its guts again. This time, it has just stopped. Three hours ago. Like it has been frozen in time. I didn't notice until now, so I must've been busy. #comebacktwitterallisforgiven

Google and the newspapers: In for the kill?

Google’s place in the news industry is an ever-evolving and relentlessly fascinating story. CEO Eric Schmidt seems to have set him self a (Google) calendar alert to remind himself to pop up once every few months to comment on the future of news and his employer’s role within it.

A passionate supporter of print, Schmidt continually positions Google as the enabler of a ‘new format’ for news, bringing real-time analysis, powerful search and instant, platform-agnostic information to the fingertips of the masses. This, he says, is going to save news.

But is Schmidt’s ‘moral responsibility’ to protect print journalism based in truth, or is he just a leather-wearing vegetarian, wearing the pelts of dead newspapers to keep him warm?

Google’s recent response to the Newspaper Association of America’s (NAA) request for information on ‘Monetizing Digital Content’ gives us a few clues. Companies including Google, Microsoft, IBM and Oracle responded.

To summarise their thoughts (click to download their response documents in full):

Microsoft: Went for the design and usability angle (which resulted in the nicest-looking response).
Oracle: Only looked at underlying infrastructure of the content management system, stayed clear of everything else.
IBM: Did a lot of research.
Google: Talked about $$$.

Google went in early with revenue, including the promise of a specially designed extension to Google checkout. The rest of its proposal was merely regurgitating info on products it already owns (and could probably fit into a publishing model in minutes).

There were other responses from smaller organisations, but the tech giants’ answers to the fundamental questions facing newspapers seemed to reflect the overall view that content is still king. None of them, aside from Microsoft’s very light attempt, tried to tell the newsmakers how to create the content.

The combination of Google’s expertise in teasing revenue out of existing communities combined with the content and analysis coming from the news industry could be a killer combination. All Google needs to do is leave the writing to the journalists and put its micropayment model into action.

So in his personal address to the NAA, why does Eric Schmidt deem it necessary to explore almost every other topic (freedom of speech, real-time analysis, political innovation, democracy, cloud computing, content choices, usability, mobile design) over the topic of helping the newspapers make money?

There is no doubt that the newspapers are in decline, and need help. At the moment it might not be what Google is doing that is causing that decline, but what it isn’t.

Good luck to the LEWIS Byte Night team

Last year I slept rough in a park in London for Byte Night, in aid of Action for Children. In the run up to the event I felt guilty asking people to give me money to go and get drunk with my mates.

By 5am, as I tried to rub some feeling back into my frozen body despite thermals, two pairs of trousers, two jumpers, a ski jacket, gloves, a scarf, two hats, a sleeping bag and a plastic sheet, I wished I'd asked for more cash. It was *hell*.

It's Byte Night tonight and this year I won't be sleeping out, but have already taken part in a bake sale, PJ day + bacon sarnies, along with sponsoring our team.

If you haven't sponsored them yet, do it.

The link is: http://www.justgiving.com/ByteNight-LEWISPR-2009/

Good luck to Gemma, Louise, Deepali, Jade, Liz and Paul. Wrap up warm!

Google Wave invites: The touts come out

Having been around early enough in the life of Gmail to be one of the invited early adopters, I remember the frenzy around the new and game-changing Google service. ("Unlimited storage on webmail? No way!" we cried.)

We haven't seen anything quite like it since then - until today. Google Wave went into early testing this morning, with 100,000 accounts created for the lucky few developers and Google App customers who made the list.

One Google Wave invite has, according to Mashable, been sold on eBay for $157. eBay in the UK is starting to fill up too. So are you going to part with your hard-earned cash to be one of the early ones?



(Me neither.)