11 November 2002

O2 Presents Non-Voice Products DUBLIN, Ireland -- Before she left for the O2 breakfast, Karlin told Santa that she wants a cameraphone for Christmas. Note the reaction when she asked Danuta Gray, CEO of O2 Ireland. Seriously, both women were accompanied by 16 other people at breakfast in The Mansion House, getting a whirlwind tour of O2's MMS, Java games, location-based SMS text alerts, and parking paid by mobile phones. All this non-voice capability may be fully functioning technology, but did consumers really buy their phones for those purposes? Non-data usage would help both O2 and Vodafone pump up their average revenue per user (ARPU) figures. O2's ARPU was €542 last year, €10 more than Vodafone. I am watching third level students at Tipperary Institute in Java classes, writing small programs that can run on the new phones. Java games require only a couple of programmers and a lot of caffeine. In Tipp, many of the students will code up an arcade game in exchange for a new phone. But one of the problems is the way Java has been installed on the phones. The programmers cannot access any of the interesting bits of the phone. That means they cannot get to the camera, or to the SMS function or to the address book. These limitations make it difficult to quickly write the really interesting location-based games using low-end Java coders. One non-data capability that went unmentioned in the O2 session was the possibility of wireless internet networks being used instead of wireless phone networks. This is already happening in the USA, where you can have your telephone routed to your handheld device. It would pay O2 to look into emerging 802.11 usage patterns because they are a competitive threat. "Non-Voice Products" by Karlin Lillington, 11 Nov 02. "These are fun. I want one." Original mail-to-blog story on Kirbycom, 11 Nov 02. Picture snapped by Nokia 9210i Concord EyeQ IrTranP camera and emailed to blog files.   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Where Mobiles Are More Important than Trainers GUARDIAN co uk -- The Guardian has a special report on how mobile phones have intruded into life. James Meek looks at How the mobile phone has changed our world. "It used to be that you had to make an effort to overhear other people's conversations. Now you have to make an effort not to." Laura Barton eavesdropped shamelessly round London to find out what we are saying. Jess Cartner-Morley talks about how your phone became more important than your trainers.   [Comment on Shoptalk]

WebTrends Developer Kit MACROMEDIA -- Barry Parshall describes the WebTrends Developer Kit.   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Macromedia to Sell Light-Duty Web Tool CNET -- After years of targeting professional developers, Macromedia's light-duty Web tool targets the mass market.   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Geek Girl Thong DUBBERLEY com -- Emily wants Geek Girl pants. "Totally cool. Wear your code on your crotch. Or something." I would prefer RFID in the waistband. That way, you could nonchalantly grab whatever information you wanted, even from across the room. [Geek Girl Thong]   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Columbia TriStar Shipping Without Macrovision New Scientist -- Columbia Tristar now ships high-res "Superbit" DVDs in Europe without Macrovision protection. An Irish-American company makes the technology used to keep home users from making VHS recordings from their own DVDs. Macrovision charges the film companies big bucks for licenses to their technology, which is trivial to circumvent and makes home-theater setups unnecessarily complex. So Columbia-Tristar is forgoing paying for Macrovision licenses for its new Superbit titles and releasing without the copy-prevention technology. [New Scientist, Boing Boing and The Aardvark Speaks]   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Keep WiFi Unlicensed SEISS ie -- The Irish Communications Regulator views wireless spectrum as a finite resource, but in the case of WiFi, that perspective may be flawed.   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Irish Civil Servants Main Cause of Dublin Gridlock DUBLIN -- Almost two-thirds of all city centre parking in Dublin is owned by the public sector, which means that over 7,000 civil servants take their cars instead of public transport into the city every day. They use car parking spaces worth up to €50,000 each on the open market. However, this perk is not taxed as a benefit in kind.   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Easy Irish Tax Breaks for Working from Home TELEWORK ie -- Advances in Irish tax law make it easier to work from home. In relation to income tax, an e-worker's employer may provide computers and ancillary equipment to enable them to work outside of the office. No benefit in kind charge will be imposed. Regarding home expenses, such as electricity, it is accepted that the w-worker will incur extra expenditure while working from home. Revenue allows an employer to makde payments up to €3.20 per day to employees without deducting PAYE and PRSI. The tax treatment of motor expenses and subsistence payments is set out in separate pamphlets. Several friends avail of capital gains tax exemptions for their home office space. These concepts are explained well by Telework Ireland.   [Comment on Shoptalk]

U2: Best Of, 1990-2000 U2 -- I remember thumbing through a flatmate's newly minted CD collection in 1992. He was in the process of converting vinyl to CD and he had a fresh copy of The Joshua Tree. I decided to play the CD. Up until that point, I did not equate the album with U2 anthems. I craved the hip-shaking funky fuzz guitar, the taut, dance-style drums, the riffs with attitude. The best thing is I got to see them perform in Slane last year. The next best thing is that I have the best of their work from the past decade.   [Comment on Shoptalk]

Minimum Equipment List for a Wireless Office KILKENNY, Ireland -- Talking about the bare minimum equipment for a wireless office, friends preparing for the Telework Ireland Conference tick off the same kind of things. ISDN or DSL line router wireless access point wireless card Zone Alarm or firewall   [Comment on Shoptalk]