ThoughtFix of TabletBlog has just posted his CES 2008 interview with Victor Brilon, Sr. Product Manager, Home Networking Solutions, Convergence Products (yup, you’ve heard of him before). Here’s an excerpt:
I think we’re doing a good job initially appealing to what I call in a very loving way the “Alpha Geek.” These are the people who understand gadgets and the needs they fill. They’re the people whose family calls them and asks which digital camera they should buy. I think we got a lot of those people excited about the Internet Tablet. I think we’re doing a good job of moving the Internet Tablet in the Consumer Space. I’m not going to lie to you and say the Internet Tablet is something my mother will buy, but the N810 is something my wife (who is not technology focused) will use.
Read the full interview.
Nokia Beta Labs has just released an update to the Internet Tablet Video Converter. According to Victor Brilon (vbrilon), Nokia Sr. Product Manager:
The new version now provides support for Windows Vista as well as XP. In addition, we’ve made some serious upgrades to the codecs used so the video quality should be significantly enhanced. Many of the bugs reported have been fixed by this release…
The utility is currently Windows only but a Mac version of the converter is rumored to be coming.
3rd party developers interested on extending the utility can make use of the API which is publicly available at Maemo.org.
Links: Internet Tablet Video Converter - Nokia Beta Labs
Marcus Couch of The Scene Zine just sent me a quick note to tell everyone the he will be doing a Nokia N810 video podcast gig which will be launching soon. Nokia has agreed to somewhat sponsor the show by giving away a 15% off Nokia N810 coupon code if purchased directly from any selected Nokia online stores.
Coupon Code: SceneZine
This brings the Nokia N810 price down by $72/£49.35 which I think beats any online retailer. A 2-day free shipping is included if purchased from the Nokia US online store.
Links: Nokia US Store, Nokia UK Store
Ferenc Szekely of Maemo.org just sent out an email to the maemo-develpoers mailing list explaining why most of us experienced numerous problems downloading the OS2008 update, as well as the repository problems from our Internet Tablets:
The infrastructure is built so that the content from repository.maemo.org is served thru a huge caching network. We were supposed to use the same network for the firmware downloads as well, but due to a misconfiguration and _my negligence_ all the requests ended up at our origin server (stage.maemo.org).
Ferenc also thanks everyone who seeded the OS2008 updates via torrent.
I would like to take this opportunity too to thank all the members who took time to help other members by hosting the updates, writing how-to’s, and for tirelessly replying to other members to help with their Internet Tablet problems. That says a lot about our community!
Read the full email.
Ok guys, here’s the latest scoop I got from CES 2008. From talking with some Internet Tablet Product Managers at the Nokia booth, there seem to be some clear indication that a WiMAX Internet Tablet is coming soon. How soon? How about the second quarter of this year? Woohoo!
It will be using Sprint’s WiMAX, now called XOHM WiMAX as announced at CES 2008. Here are some text from the XOHM - Nokia partner page:
In collaboration with Xohm, Nokia is developing WiMAX-enabled devices that will offer users on-the-go broadband access to the information and services important to them.
Note however that XOHM WiMAX is currently running only at Chicago, Baltimore, and Washington DC but its launch to major US cities will soon follow.
There is still no info about the device itself. The specs and how it looks are still very much confidential.
As for CES 2008, a last minute trip made me catch the last day of the event. I have posted pics of the Nokia booth over at the gallery.
Nokia has just announced the ‘Internet Communications Software development update 2‘ for OS2008. The new update features support for more Instant Messaging protocols (mostly all of what Pidgin supports but not all protocols are currently active), local network chat, a chat log history viewer, and SIP support.
This update is BETA. Note that you have to be in ‘red pill mode‘ in order to install the update. Some limitations still exist such as, no audio/video call support for the new protocols and local network chat, no avatar support for local chat, and no new contact authorization for the new protocols.
The new list of supported IM and SIP protocols are as follows:
- IM: AIM, Google Talk, ICQ, IRC, Jabber, MSN, Yahoo
- Local: Link-Local (XMPP)
- SIP: Ekiga.net, FreeWorldDialup, SIP, Sipphone.com
I haven’t installed this update yet on my Internet Tablet so if anyone would be kind enough to take a screenshot of the new protocols screen as well as the local network chat screen, that would be great!
More screenshots after the jump.
Continue reading ‘OS2008 Instant Messaging Upgrades’
