The Hippest Phones » Midst

Adobe expects Flash on 250 million smartphones by end of 2012

Vladislav Savov — Fri, 11 Jun 2010 21:20:00 +0000

While in the midst of fixing a unicorn-sized hole in the security of its desktop software, Adobe has been talking about its future in the mobile space. According to its rose-tinted forecasts, Flash Player will be featured in a quarter billion handsets by the end of 2012, including 53 percent of all smarphones shipped that year. Those are pretty strident words for a company that has yet to ship Flash Player 10.1 in even one new handset, but we're reminded that Android 2.2's leading position on the issue will be swiftly followed by BlackBerry OS, Symbian, webOS, and Windows Phone 7 supporting the full fat Flash experience. Whether all that momentum will be enough to produce an install base of 250 million, we don't know. What we do know, however, is that people want the blasted thing and Adobe had better start doing a bit more work on its mobile player and a little less talking about it -- that's what we're here for.

Adobe expects Flash on 250 million smartphones by end of 2012 originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 11 Jun 2010 16:20:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Verizon’s HTC Droid Eris getting Android 2.1 any time now

Chris Ziegler — Tue, 11 May 2010 20:08:00 +0000

We'd been hearing rumors lately that HTC's Droid Eris -- a phone that has never quite made it out from under the Droid's shadow -- is in the midst of being discontinued by Verizon, but the imminent launch of an Android 2.1 update might just buy it a new lease on life. In fact, the update makes this phone just about the first Hero variant anywhere in the world to be graced with an upgrade to Google's latest and greatest stuff, beating Sprint's version thanks to a string of delays that have pushed it out to some unidentified period in the second quarter. We've yet to see any reports of folks actually receiving the update notification on their devices, but Verizon's official support Twitter account is tweeting about the upgrade -- which should fix numerous bugs on top of the hotly-anticipated Eclair boost -- so we'd expect it to start hitting the wild shortly. Keep us on top of your experiences in comments, won't you?

[Thanks, Richard]

Update: Verizon has now posted the PDF changelog for your perusal while you wait. Thanks, Michael V.!

Verizon's HTC Droid Eris getting Android 2.1 any time now originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 11 May 2010 15:08:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Editorial: What happened to the US-spec Motorola MOTOROI?

Chris Ziegler — Fri, 07 May 2010 05:48:00 +0000

Motorola, in case you haven't noticed, hasn't done much in the way of high-spec gear since the announcement of the original Droid way back in October of last year -- and, well, that's a problem for a company that's in the midst of trying to kick-start a recovery to get its corporate split off on the right foot. The so-called Sholes Tablet -- alternatively known as the XT720 or the MOTOROI -- had seemed destined to become Moto's next volley thanks to comments by SK Telecom and Motorola execs at the phone's Korean launch, even going so far as to call out a March launch window, but March has come and gone and the phone is nowhere to be found. Heck, we even found FCC evidence that the phone would be hitching up with T-Mobile, but that was way back in January and we're on the cusp of Summer now.

We understand that delays happen in this business -- in fact, delays always happen -- but these protracted, phased roll-outs around the globe are never good for a product's image since the last markets to get the product have been exposed to it (thanks in part to yours truly) for months. This would be a killer high-end device for T-Mobile USA, but it's got to launch immediately; the Nexus One's been out there since January, and we can pretty much guarantee that Google doesn't intend to back down with the superphone assault. We suppose it's possible that the Sholes Tablet will actually reemerge as the "Nexus Two" -- Sanjay Jha wants to offer a Nexus-branded phone, after all -- but however it comes out, it's got to happen right now. Trust us, Motorola -- you've got a golden opportunity to learn from Sony Ericsson's mistakes on this one.

Editorial: What happened to the US-spec Motorola MOTOROI? originally appeared on Engadget Mobile on Fri, 07 May 2010 00:48:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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WikiReader update boasts better scrolling, keyboard, and navigation

Doug Aamoth — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 16:00:40 +0000

The WikiReader (portable Wikipedia reader -- see previous coverage here) is in the midst of its “Spring 2010” update, which includes new and updated Wikipedia entries, animated key presses a la the iPhone, more fluid scrolling, and “a highly requested back feature for a quick way to return to previously searched articles.”

Behind The Scenes at Cirque du Soleil

Daniel Brusilovsky — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 03:00:44 +0000

I’ve always been a fan of Cirque du Soleil and I make sure to go to a show when they are in town either in San Francisco or in Las Vegas. I got a backstage tour of their latest extravaganza, OVO, in San Francisco when they were in town. I caught up with Gerard Edwards-Webb, [...]

Analyst noise: Apple tablet in March for $1k, publishers on-board, Verizon iPhone coming too

Joshua Topolsky — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 21:25:00 +0000

If you've been following mainstream news today, then it's likely you've seen the story doing the rounds on new Apple tablet rumors, spurred by a note sent to clients from Oppenheimer analyst Yair Reiner. Never heard of him? That's not surprising, since he has no real connection to Apple, and his job mainly consists of telling people how to move their money around -- a Master of the Universe gear-cranker, you might say. Anyhow, Yair is sure that Apple will be releasing its 10.1-inch, multitouch tablet around March or April, with a ramp-up on production sometime in February. He also notes that the device will sell for $1,000 (so far we've heard rumored price points from $699 all the way up to $2,000), but ultimately Reiner seems most concerned with how it will impact Amazon, the Kindle, and book and media publishers.

According to the note, Apple has been in talks with publishers concerning a "very attractive proposal" in which the company will split revenue with publishing houses 70 / 30, as they do with iTunes and App Store sales (just as we speculated in our post on the Time Inc. digimag). What's most disconcerting about the report is that it seems more interested in disrupting or dismissing what Amazon is doing (particularly noteworthy as the company is in the midst of its biggest season for Kindle sales ever). When financial analysts start squawking in this manner, we like to approach with caution. As of right now, we have zero solid evidence that Apple is even producing a tablet, let alone ready to drop one for a G come March. We have heard plenty of other rumors that corroborate much of this, but if the above is the plan, you can expect a big reveal from Cupertino around the time of Macworld or CES, so you won't have to wait long to know the truth. For now, keep your BS detectors set to "stun."

P.S.: See what we mean? Now a Piper Jaffray analyst is 70 percent certain (70 percent!) that Apple will introduce an iPhone for Verizon in 2010. Hold onto your hats folks, we've only just begun.

Analyst noise: Apple tablet in March for $1k, publishers on-board, Verizon iPhone coming too originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 09 Dec 2009 16:25:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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TerreStar Genus satphone gets beamed into an FCC lab

Chris Ziegler — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 05:58:00 +0000

That projected Q1 2010 availability window for AT&T's first dual-mode satphone (and first satphone, period, for that matter) is looking pretty dang obtainable now that Elektrobit -- the device's manufacturer -- has secured FCC approval. As you can tell from the laboratory mugshot here, TerreStar's Genus is a pretty unassuming-looking Windows Mobile smartphone, which is pretty amazing when you consider that it'll more or less guarantee you coverage anywhere in the most ridiculously remote regions of North America and surrounding waters. Test documentation confirms that it'll be ready with US HSPA out of the gate, so if you can hold out for a month or two and stomach some likely hardcore plans and per-minute / per-megabyte charges, get ready to impress your co-pilot in the midst of that next offshore race.

TerreStar Genus satphone gets beamed into an FCC lab originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 02 Dec 2009 00:58:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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iPhone App Roundup: America, F&$% yeah! edition

Gagan Biyani — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 20:10:31 +0000

Ahh, 4th of July. A welcome day off work in the midst of summer. Seems like everyone’s on vacation these days and that means grueling airplane rides and long road trips with the family. If you aren’t lucky enough to be on JetBlue or Virgin, you’re probably stuck without in-flight entertainment, meaning you’ve got nothing [...]