How Fast Are You?

Dear Cult Members,

Adobe has announced that the Flash player will be available for devices from Google, Microsoft, Palm, and Nokia by the end of the year. We’re talking about a full-featured, in-browser Flash player, comparable in functionality to the desktop version of Flash 10, optimized for the ARM 6 processor¹ and the ARM 7².

But Flash for the iPhone still looks very unlikely. Quoth Macworld:

Adobe said that it was still not close to delivering Flash players that would work with Apple’s iPhone or Research in Motion’s BlackBerry .

And analysts are divided on whether that will ever happen.

Adobe has been working on a Flash player tailored for the iPhone for almost a year, after Apple CEO Steve Jobs complained about Flash’s performance on the iPhone.

“We’ve made a lot of progress, but there is still a lot of engineering work to be done,” said Anup Murarka, director of partner development and technology strategy for Adobe’s platform business unit.

Jack Gold, an independent analyst with J. Gold Associates, cites a couple of reasons why we will not see a Flash player on the iPhone in the foreseeable future:

One is technical. “Adobe wants Flash to run really well. To get high performance, you need to run in the lower layers of the OS or phone,” Gold said. Windows Mobile, Nokia’s Symbian and Googles Android are relatively open to that, but OSes such as those on the BlackBerry and iPhone are not, he said.

The other reason, at least with Apple, is business. “Apple wants to push its own technology, in this case, QuickTime,” Gold said. “It has its own interests at heart. Look at how long it took to get Flash onto Macs. I honestly don’t think you will see Flash on the iPhone anytime soon.”

To paraphrase: Apple prevents applications like Flash from accessing the iPhone’s processor, and they Apple doesn’t want Adobe competing with their own technologies.

So you see, my Cult Member friends, Apple does not have your best interests at heart. It’s like buying a car that Ford prohibits you from driving more than 100 miles per day. That’s fine if you’re only ever going use the car to commute to work, but if you wanted to get away for the weekend, tough luck.

That’s why the BadKitty and I are looking into getting Android phones. When the Flash player comes out, I’ll let you touch my phone. My vastly superior phone. With a QWERTY keyboard. That I can write my own applications for without having to go through the manufacturer. So there.

Via Boing Boing Gadgets.

It’s still early days, and some of this is abstraction based on reporting from a number of sources, but here’s what we know (or think we know) about the Palm Pre so far:

• The new OS, called WebOS, is based on Linux (bbg)
• UI and web browser are WebKit based (bbg)
• Comes with real GPS (bbg)
• Threaded SMS (bbg)
• Copy and paste is universally available (bbg)
• Universal search, kind of like Helio Ocean; just start typing, and it’ll search your contacts, calendar, files and the web (bbg)
• Optional tight Facebook integration, including contacts and avatars, IM, status updates (bbg)
• All applications, including the built-in ones, are created with web technologies (HTML, CSS and JavaScript) (ars)
• JSON-based access to device services, like contacts, calendar, location, accelerometer, GPS, etc. (bbg, ars)
• Sqlite database available to apps (one assumes through the JSON bus) (bbg)
• Palm seems to be OK with applications that send SMS, unlike Apple (ars)
• Palm hasn’t released the SDK or Mojo to the public yet, but a private group of developers has been working with it (ars)
• Applications can built using Palm’s Mojo development framework — which is “extremely nice, well thought out, and significantly improves the speed and efficiency of developing mobile applications on the prė” — or you can start from scratch (ars)
• Palm will provide a mechanism to download new apps over the air (bbg)

Everyone on teh weebs seems pretty impressed with the Pre. Pending further review, it’s sounding like my next phone might be a Palm, which is something I never thought I’d say again.

Break free for free!

That Bald Guy calls me a cult member, and he’s right: I have the Apple Kool-Aid running down my face after glugging down gallons of it. But I have taken a positive step.

After spending years paying $99 for a suite of services I never really used that much, I was glad to be getting push synching for my hard-earned dollars. But it wasn’t worth $99.

$12.99 a year, maybe, but not a Franklin. I mean, I can just sync at night.

Thankfully, a new web site has created a way to use Google as a *free* MobileMe alternative with push contacts & calendar on your iPod touch or iPhone, thanks to NuevaSync and Google. In order for this phase of your MobileMe recovery, you will need the iPhone 2.0 OS. To upgrade, connect your iPhone to your computer and click “Check for Updates” in iTunes.

NuevaSync links Google Calendar and Contacts with their Exchange server, which enables you to sync your Google info with devices that support Microsoft Exchange. You can sign up here.

Read more here. And welcome back to reality.

That message alert on your phone is not the late-night call you were waiting for, but it might be just as good (riiiight). Cellfire has launched its nationwide phone service for Cingular customers, and more carriers are on the way. Only a few businesses In Cali have bought in, but the concept is great. Sign up, download the mobile app, get coupons on your phone and redeem them by either showing it to the cashier or have them scan the bar code on your mobile screen.

It just makes sense that people can make more use of one device in even more practical ways than carrying envelopes full of dead-tree discount delivery devices. Maybe you can even beam your number to that cute checker. (“Is this the checkout line? Well, I’m checking you out. Giggity-giggity. Aw-right.”)

The nice people over at The Consumerist post that das T-Mobile forbids you to record your call to customer service, even though they reserve the right to record the call themselves. While it’s not illegal for T-Mobile to set such a policy, I have to wonder if anyone over there actually thought it through. Doesn’t such a policy amount to telling their paying customers “Sooner or later we’re going to screw you, and when we do, we don’t want any pesky recordings running around to prove your side of the story?”

Do companies like T-Mobile not understand that the relationship between customer and vendor is kept alive only through trust? Doesn’t this kind of policy just tell the consumer that T-Mobile wants to screw them and doesn’t want to get caught doing it?

Further, the relationship between, say, an individual consumer and a cellular company is a contract. A contract is an agreement between two parties to exchange something of value. In this case, the individual agrees to give money to the cellular company in exchange for cellular service. While the perceived value of the service is comprised of several factors, it especially includes the ability to call customer service if there’s a problem (and, of course, for customer service to be willing and able to fix the problem.) Therefore, if customer service quality is perceived to be poor, the perceived value of the cellular service is reduced, and the individual may (and probably should) take their business elsewhere.

Note the use of the word “perceived”. I’m sure someone over at T-Mobile understands that customer retention is wholly reliant on the perceived value of their service, but that person and the jerk who set the aforementioned policy don’t appear to talk much.

Unintelligble rants aside, remember that it’s totally legal to record your phone calls, and you don’t even have to tell the other party unless they’re in the same state you are, and that state happens to have such a law. From a follow-up post on The Consumerist:

It’s totally legal to record conversations across state lines and you don’t have to tell the company at all.

This right is granted specifically by Federal statute 18 U.S.C. Sec. 2511(2)(d).

Now, if the call center is in your state, you will have to notify them, but only if you’re in one of these states: California, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Massachusetts, Maryland, Michigan, Montana, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Washington.

Mostly, calls to companies are interstate. You can secretly record to your heart’s delight.

Via The Consumerist, from whom I also shamelessly swiped the Mr. T Mobile image, ’cause it’s super sweet.

Please note that neither this post, nor any content on this blog constitutes a legal opinion or legal advice. I’m not an attorney, just someone who takes the hard work of others, shakes well with self-centered raving and a dash of vitriol, then pours it on an unsuspecting blogosphere.