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- The Roundabout Tapes – RjDj Plans To Game Reality With Sound [TCTV]
- Yandex To Become Default Search Engine On Windows Phone In Russia
- FlyScreen Launches An iOS 5-Like Lockscreen API For Android
- Dream Come True: Ice Cream Sandwich Comes To The HTC G1, Unofficially
- AT&T Takes Two Steps Back With Hopes To Inch Closer To T-Mo Deal
| The Roundabout Tapes – RjDj Plans To Game Reality With Sound [TCTV] Posted: 25 Nov 2011 03:22 AM PST  RjDj’s Michael Breidenbruecker, also a Founder last.fm, has certainly opened up the avenues for sound apps on mobile platforms. The startup’s apps have become platforms for musicians, but are gradually evolving into augmented reality mobile apps. Most recently the company partnered with screenwriter Christopher Nolan on Inception: The App, which reached 4 million downloads. The amount of “dreamtime” (time spent listening to the app ) was over 94 years. The average listening time per session is over 30 minutes. This was not your average app!
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| Yandex To Become Default Search Engine On Windows Phone In Russia Posted: 24 Nov 2011 11:27 PM PST  Yandex, the Russian online search and advertising giant, has teamed up with Microsoft, Nokia, HTC and Samsung to become the default search engine on the latest – and upcoming – Windows Phone smartphones in Russia. Yandex's search engine is currently installed on Samsung’s Оmnia W, which is already on sale in Russia, as well as on Nokia's Windows Phone-powered Lumia 800 and Lumia 710 smartphones, which will hit stores in December. Following the launch of Windows Phone-based Titan, Mozart and Radar smartphones last autumn, HTC is also planning an update release with Yandex as the default search engine on its handsets. The news comes on the heels of the announcement last month that Yandex became the main search provider on bada-powered smartphones available in Russia and the CIS. Yandex points out it has already developed some apps for Windows Phone, including mapping service Yandex.Maps and online marketplace Yandex.Market, and that it will build more applications for the platform and other mobile operating systems in the future. According to LiveInternet data, Yandex's share of the Russian search market averaged 62.7 percent in Q3 2011, trumping Google by a margin. The company, which raised over $1.4 billion in a NASDAQ IPO earlier this year, recently reported revenues of RUR 5.2 billion ($161.9 million) for the third quarter of this year, up 65 percent compared with Q3 2010. Aside from Russia, Yandex also operates in Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Belarus and Turkey.
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| FlyScreen Launches An iOS 5-Like Lockscreen API For Android Posted: 24 Nov 2011 02:00 PM PST  I know, I know. Apple totally stole its new Notifications Center for iOS 5 from Android. But let’s be honest, they did a pretty good job with it. (Except for those impossibly small “X” buttons, that is.) As someone who switches between both platforms, one thing I really like about iOS 5′s Notification Center is that it’s available from the phone’s lockscreen, too. On Android, you typically have to unlock your phone in order to view your notifications. Well, until now. Thanks to app maker FlyScreen and its brand-new “SuperFly API,” Android users may soon get their own lockscreen notifications, too. The API is just launching today, with messaging app Kik as the first API partner. The company is also taking sign-ups from other interested app developers via a form on the SuperFly homepage. Further down the road, the API will be publicly released so all Android apps can integrate with the service through what CEO Itamar Weisbrod says is just 5 lines of code. At first, these SuperFly notifications will be just an icon and text, as they are by default on iOS 5 and Android, but the company is working towards making them richer and more interactive in the future. When it goes live, the notifications lockscreen will be a part of the redesigned FlyScreen app for Android. FlyScreen updates, missed calls, SMS messages and email previews will be supported, too. While the I love the idea of a better, customizable lockscreen for Android users, the challenge will be getting Android app makers to sign up. FlyScreen will need to do more than just offer a public API – it will need to actively court partnerships to make this thing a success. However, it sounds like the company is doing just that. Weisbrod says there are “more big apps to come soon” and they already have some “big ones” in testing now. The new notifications section is already live in FlyScreen’s app in the Android Market, but Kik’s integration won’t arrive for a week or two. And as new developers sign up to use the SuperFly API, they’ll be added right away, making the app gradually more useful. If you’re interested in testing the new FlyScreen, you can grab it here from the Android Market.
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| Dream Come True: Ice Cream Sandwich Comes To The HTC G1, Unofficially Posted: 24 Nov 2011 11:06 AM PST  HTC’s G1, the first Android phone, had a long and interesting life until it was retired last year, and although I loved the phone, I’ll be the first to admit that being limited to Android 1.6 was kind of a disappointment. Naturally modders had their way with it, but development slowed down long ago in favor of newer and more popular phones. But today, in a feat of nostalgia and hacking skills, XDA-Dev poster Jcarrz1 has made a working AOSP port of the latest version of Android, Ice Cream Sandwich, for the venerable G1. It may not extend the life of many phones out there (most have been long since abandoned, though not mine), but definitely demonstrates the flexibility of the platform. Of course, with a lot of work, you could probably get Ubuntu to run on the G1, or Windows 95. But Really, this is a very pleasant development. It’s amazing to think that the G1′s paltry 528MHz processor and 256MB of RAM (paltry compared to modern phones, anyhow) can run a mobile OS designed to debut on one of the most powerful mobile devices out there right now, the Galaxy Nexus. Naturally not all is well in G1 town. This is just an AOSP port, not a fully customized ROM, and is labeled as “Alpha 1,” which should give you an idea of the state of the thing. Wifi and Bluetooth don’t work, no doubt owing to incompatibility with the wireless chipset used, and a number of hardware features are unsupported, like some buttons and lighting controls. And of course it runs like a dog. On the other hand, the browser is apparently snappy, calling and SMS work, and interestingly, using the trackball produces a little cursor like a mouse’s. This last detail, if it’s not just a holdover from debugging, indicates ICS will have support for external pointing devices, since few if any phones include a trackball or trackpad any more (though the pointer does feature in Google TV and the Asus Transformer and is in the ICS settings, as commenters note). What’s next? Now that basic compatibility has been shown, a custom ROM with unnecessary stuff snipped and better support for the G1 hardware will probably appear in the next couple weeks. Thanks to Jcarrz1 for his hard work.
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| AT&T Takes Two Steps Back With Hopes To Inch Closer To T-Mo Deal Posted: 24 Nov 2011 07:16 AM PST  Well, this isn’t the strategy I was expecting, but it seems the FCC’s request to investigate the AT&T/T-Mobile deal under the lens of an administrative law judge last week just doesnt sit well with AT&T. Rather than be scrutinized, the company has instead withdrawn its application for the merger. But don’t let that confuse you. Buying Deutsche Telekom AG’s T-Mobile is still big blue’s end goal — the FCC just happens to be blocking the road at the moment. What may be more interesting is that AT&T’s confidence seems to be dwindling. According to an official release, the company agreed to pay a $4 billion pre-tax charge on its fourth quarter accountancy sheet, which is the exact amount it would owe to affected parties should the deal fall through. $3 billion in cash would go to Deutsche Telekom as a default payment, while another $1 billion would go to the book value of spectrum that big blue would be forced to relinquish. In other words, AT&T is preparing for the worst in a very real way. Well, the worst for them, not necessarily the worst case scenario for everyone. What I find most interesting is that AT&T decided to release this information on Thanksgiving. Maybe they assumed we media types would be stuffing our faces with stuffing (ha!). Either way, AT&T is still putting on a brave face, officially stating the following:
The question now is, will a deal between AT&T and T-Mobile ever really be “practical”?
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