Walled Garden Archive

  • Starbucks announces free WiFi at all locations

    Starbucks announces free WiFi at all locations

    Posted on June 14, 2010 | No Comments
    Starbucks just tweeted that, starting July 1, there will be free, one-click WiFi at all Starbucks locations.
    We're very excited to announce that coming July 1st: Free. 1 click. No registration WIFI at all US locations! :-)
    This came from the official @starbucks Twitter account so either someone hacked them or this is the dog's honest truth.

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  • Adobe decries Apple’s ‘walled garden,’ yet pledges ‘best tools’ for HTML5

    Adobe decries Apple’s ‘walled garden,’ yet pledges ‘best tools’ for HTML5

    Posted on May 5, 2010 | No Comments
    Adobe CTO Kevin Lynch says Flash works just fine on the Apple iPhone, thank you very much -- and he thinks that's exactly why Apple keeps on denying it access. Speaking at the Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco, he explained his belief that by eliminating Flash, Cupertino is forcing developers to build apps natively for iPhone OS rather than one of Adobe's cross-platform solutions, and thus creating a "walled garden" of applications that users must flock to an iDevice to be able to use. Lynch compared Apple's control over development formats to 19th century railroad lines that competed for customers by using differently sized rails, and pledged that Adobe would not be part of such a competition. "It's not HTML vs. Flash -- they've been co-existing for over a decade," he said, adding, "We're going to try and make the best tools in the world for HTML5." So, what do you think about that, Steve?

    Adobe decries Apple's 'walled garden,' yet pledges 'best tools' for HTML5 originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 05 May 2010 19:27:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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  • Et tu, Nokia?

    Et tu, Nokia?

    Posted on February 17, 2010 | No Comments
    In the US we have a somewhat myopic view of cell phones. We have iPhones and Blackberrys and now Androids and Nexuses for smartphones, and a whole bunch of feature phones from manufacturers like LG and Motorola and Samsung. Notably absent from most wireless stores in the U.S. are Nokia, which is odd since Nokia owns more of the global cell phone market than its next three competitors combined. Part of this discrepancy is no doubt due to the market differences between U.S. carriers and wireless carriers in the rest of the world. But a large part of this can be explained by Nokia's sheer arrogance.

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  • Sony Ericsson starts taking submissions for Android version of PlayNow

    Sony Ericsson starts taking submissions for Android version of PlayNow

    Posted on December 24, 2009 | No Comments
    Manufacturers and carriers are showing commendable restraint in avoiding totally bastardized, walled-garden versions of Android on their handsets (for the most part), but they're not avoiding it altogether -- take Sony Ericsson here, for instance. The company has announced that it's expanding the reach of its PlayNow app store to cover Android in concert with its launch of the X10, which presumably means that users will be juggling a minimum of two sources for third-party wares on this thing. Long-term, this kind of needless fragmentation seems like one of the greatest threats to Android's ability to become and remain a heavyweight player in the smartphone ring -- but then again, what do we know? It's not like these guys haven't already figured out how to dominate before with UIQ... ah, wait. Anyhoo, yeah, back to the topic at hand: devs are now invited to submit their Android apps for inclusion in the PlayNow store, so hey, you may as well -- the phone's looking to be a hottie, so it can't hurt to have your stuff featured on there, we figure.

    [Thanks, wimbet]

    Sony Ericsson starts taking submissions for Android version of PlayNow originally appeared on Engadget Mobile on Thu, 24 Dec 2009 14:32:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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  • Verizon Launches Direct Attack Against The iPhone With Ads For The Motorola Droid

    Verizon Launches Direct Attack Against The iPhone With Ads For The Motorola Droid

    Posted on October 18, 2009 | No Comments
    Over the last few weeks there has been an increasing amount of buzz about an unannounced Motorola smartphone due to come out some time between late October and early December. Rumored specs include a powerful OMAP3430 processor, 5 megapixel camera, slideout QWERTY keyboard and touch screen, all housed in a super-compact package and running Android 2.0. A handful of potential names have swirled around, included the Sholes and the Tao, but tonight Verizon has made it perfectly clear what the upcoming phone will be called: Droid. And Verizon is positioning it to be a direct threat to the iPhone in a new advertising campaign it launched at the site DroidDoes.com. Verizon isn't holding any punches: it calls out basically every major weakness on the iPhone, from its inability to run background applications to the App Store's walled garden. The site kicks off with a stream of things that the iPhone can't do, mimicking the black text-on-white background commonly seen in Apple ads but replacing it with statements like iDon't run simultaneous apps.

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  • Funambol: open source mobile cloud sync (with contest!)

    Funambol: open source mobile cloud sync (with contest!)

    Posted on September 29, 2009 | No Comments
    funambolSmartphones are great. Ubiquitous data access is great. Mobile computing is great. Unfortunately, each smartphone represents its own little walled garden of convenience. Apple's iPhone is tied tightly with iTunes and various other Apple services. Android is tied tightly with Google services. Each manufacturer makes a modicum of effort to allow their smartphone to sync with someone else's services, but as is too often the case, such integration is usually lacking some important functionality. After all, there's little business incentive to allow your users to use someone else's services, right? Enter Funambol, and their open source mobile cloud sync.

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  • Sprint drops the price of the Palm Pre, explains the $100 credit offer yesterday

    Sprint drops the price of the Palm Pre, explains the $100 credit offer yesterday

    Posted on September 9, 2009 | No Comments
    Yesterday the Internet was abuzz with an offer from Sprint that involved a $100 service credit if you port-in a number and buy a Palm Pre. It was a fair deal but Sprint quickly pulled the offer and now explained what happened.

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  • Microsoft is entering the streaming music market. Hooray.

    Microsoft is entering the streaming music market. Hooray.

    Posted on July 13, 2009 | No Comments
    zuneThe Telegraph has word that Microsoft will be entering the streaming music market. The plan is to offer free streaming, and the option to purchase music for download. Just what the world needs, another streaming solution. Another boutique music store. Another walled garden from which digital content can be rationed out to the masses, while fatcat music execs wallow in piles of cash.

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