Chinese mobile operators? war of words escalates [TNW Asia]

The battle between China?s two largest mobile providers, China Mobile and China Unicom is hotting up as each tries to win over the lucrative iPhone market.

China Unicom, is still the only carrier licenced to sell the iPhone in China. Recent statistics, based on the alternative contact number required when signing up, show that about 73% of China Unicom?s iPhone customers have come to them from China Mobile.

The Chinese mobile market is still immature when compared to the west and users are unable to transfer their mobile number to a new provider.  While that situation is changing with new services rolling out in a couple of cities, most people purchasing iPhones from China Unicom have opted to keep their existing accounts and numbers with China Mobile as well.

China mobile have been quick to spot this opportunity in the market and have been offering services to users to cut down their existing China Mobile SIM cards to fit the new iPhone 4.  They have also set up a hotline to assist subscribers in getting an iPhone working on China Mobile?s network.

New reports today suggest that China Unicom are countering China Mobile?s moves by threatening to freeze the accounts of users who separate their iPhone and SIM card.  This will not have a significant effect on the users who have switched to China Mobile in terms of the use of their iPhone but it does mean that they stand to lose their deposit of 5,880RMB. (about US$885).  Of course, with grey imports of iPhone 4?s selling for about 6,000 RMB (about US$900), this move may just serve to drive more potential customers to the grey market instead.

If China Telecom, the third largest mobile operator in the country get the iPhone, as we speculated here, then things could get a whole lot more interesting.

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Source: http://thenextweb.com/asia/2010/11/23/chinese-mobile-operators-war-of-words-escalates/

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How Mobile Phones Jump-Start Developing Economies

As one of the fastest-spreading technologies in history, the mobile phone has been transformative for the billions of people in the developing world who never had a landline or an Internet connection. One of the most unexpected benefits is its ability to deliver banking services.

Veronica Suarez, like some 2.5 billion other adults on the planet, has no bank account of her own. Suarez and her husband run a small grocery store in Quito, Ecuador, a city of about 1.4 million people on a plateau ringed with dormant volcanoes. In the past, she would often spend half a day traveling to pay bills in cash. But since June, she has been testing a mobile banking service called Mony, which is run by the Panama-based startup YellowPepper Holding. Now she can simply type out text messages that zap payments to the phones of the delivery men who bring cases of Coca-Cola and boxes of vegetable oil to her shop. That could enable her to save travel time, reduce the risk of getting robbed, and run her business more efficiently.

"It works pretty well," says Suarez, whose store is one of 52 mom-and-pop shops in Ecuador taking part in the tests. "But sometimes I am $50 short to pay the delivery man. It would be better if they loaned money, too."

Soon, they might. Worldwide, dozens of companies are introducing mobile wallets that store money in cell phones instead of bank accounts. Such schemes help the vast ranks of the "unbanked"?those huddled masses who yearn to easily send funds to distant family members, pay bills, or even take out small loans, but don't have access to financial services. "The mobile wallet can be transformational," says YellowPepper's founder and president, Serge Elkiner, who was in Ecuador in November demonstrating his system to officials from neighboring Colombia. "We have the chance to bring hundreds of millions into the banking system."

Entrepreneurs say mobile wallets are feasible thanks to the rapid expansion of cell-phone use in poorer regions of the world. In the past five years, operators have added more than two billion mobile accounts in developing and poor nations, according to data from the International Telecommunication Union. That compares to 435 million new accounts in wealthy nations (see chart).

As a result, even in poor regions without clean water or electricity, most adults are now connected. "In pretty much any developing country, in any rural area, you can get the four Cs: Coca-Cola, cigarettes, condoms, and cell phones," says Robert Katz, an associate with the Acumen Fund, a nonprofit that invests in companies trying to address poverty. "The cell-phone companies have been successful in creating ubiquity, so the challenge for the next generation of startup companies and entrepreneurs is leveraging that installed base to deliver real economic and social value to the poor."

There's no shortage of ideas for how to do that. One company in India is offering basic medical diagnoses over the phone to people who live far from a doctor; patients can pay with phone credits. Others are trying to deliver market information to farmers or fishermen, so they can take their goods to the places where they are in demand.

In Ecuador, the Mony service is filling a real need, says Elkiner. According to the consulting firm Bankable Frontier Associates, more than 75 percent of Ecuadorians have a cell phone but only 35 percent have a bank account, about average for poor and developing nations. To open a conventional bank account in Ecuador, you need several hundred dollars and proof of address?two things many Ecuadorians don't have. To sign up for a YellowPepper mobile account, all that's needed is an ID, a $5 deposit, and a cell phone. The service is slated for launch in 2011 in partnership with mobile-phone company Porta and a local bank.

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Source: http://feeds.technologyreview.com/click.phdo?i=bd4f34066ab83fd9231c9daa98b2513c

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Video How to: Using iOS 4.2 on the iPad Part 1: Multitasking [TNW Lifehacks]

While iPhone owners have been spoiled with iOS 4 features like multitasking and app folders for months now (seems like an eternity to me), finally today iPad owners get the same coolness.

Instead of just writing out how to use multitasking on your iPad, we thought we?d show you how it works. But first a little tip I picked up recently, using microfibre cleaning cloths to polish your iPad or iPhone (or iPod Touch) screen:

No, I?m not going to be selling these on infomercials, I just thought you?d like to see this. My wife found them with other cleaning products and cloths.
Regardless, multitasking in iOS 4.2.1 (on the iPad) here?s the video:

Summary:

  • Remember double-clicking the home button doesn?t bring up iPod controls anymore, it brings up the multitasking pane
  • Press and hold (like deleting or moving apps) to close
  • Slide to the right to get to rotation lock and iPod controls

Not all apps have been updated for multitasking as yet, so I?d keep checking for app updates over the next few days (week?) for updates as they roll in.

Next up?App folders!

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Source: http://thenextweb.com/lifehacks/2010/11/23/video-how-to-using-ios-4-2-on-the-ipad-part-1-multitasking/

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Video How to: Using iOS 4.2 on the iPad Part 1: Multitasking [TNW Lifehacks]

While iPhone owners have been spoiled with iOS 4 features like multitasking and app folders for months now (seems like an eternity to me), finally today iPad owners get the same coolness.

Instead of just writing out how to use multitasking on your iPad, we thought we?d show you how it works. But first a little tip I picked up recently, using microfibre cleaning cloths to polish your iPad or iPhone (or iPod Touch) screen:

No, I?m not going to be selling these on infomercials, I just thought you?d like to see this. My wife found them with other cleaning products and cloths.
Regardless, multitasking in iOS 4.2.1 (on the iPad) here?s the video:

Summary:

  • Remember double-clicking the home button doesn?t bring up iPod controls anymore, it brings up the multitasking pane
  • Press and hold (like deleting or moving apps) to close
  • Slide to the right to get to rotation lock and iPod controls

Not all apps have been updated for multitasking as yet, so I?d keep checking for app updates over the next few days (week?) for updates as they roll in.

Next up?App folders!

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Source: http://thenextweb.com/lifehacks/2010/11/23/video-how-to-using-ios-4-2-on-the-ipad-part-1-multitasking/

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Try This: WidgetBlock. Speed up Chrome page loads by killing the social widgets [TNW Apps]

While we here at TNW are big fans of the social aspect of pages, we understand that there are some of you who aren?t. Not mincing words, social widgets often slow down pages to a crawl when the sites that they reference are having problems.

WidgetBlock is an extension for Google Chrome that simply does what it says ? it blocks widgets. So, if Twitter is courting the failwhale you won?t be staring at a half-completed page. Rather, you?ll be browsing the content of your choice but you?ll have to share it the old way.

I did some testing with WidgetBlock and there are some obvious down sides to the process. While pages do indeed load faster, the extension can lead to a page having a ?broken? look to it. Here on TNW, for instance, the missing Tweet buttons simply get replaced by a text saying ?Tweet?. As you can see in the screenshot, it also leaves a pretty barren area around our RSS button where the Facebook and Twitter widgets should sit:

So the tradeoff is your call to make. It?s worth a look, regardless. While I did experience some faster load times, your mileage may vary.

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Source: http://thenextweb.com/apps/2010/11/23/try-this-widgetblock-speed-up-chrome-page-loads-by-killing-the-social-widgets/

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Silverlight is hardly over, Microsoft is bringing it to the Xbox 360 [TNW Microsoft]

There has been so much talk about the future of Silverlight in the last few weeks that nearly no one has a clear idea as to if the platform has a future or not. Heck, even we?re not exactly sure what Microsoft has in mind, and we?ve read everything on the topic.

Mixed messages however do swing both ways, and while we have seen some negative signs for the platform, a new job posting from Microsoft today should put a smile on the face of every Silverlight fan.

Microsoft, it seems, is bringing Silverlight to one of its most successful product lines: the Xbox 360. Yes, ?looking to hire motivated developers with a passion for creating ground breaking multiscreen platform experiences,? Microsoft is going to bring the power of Silverlight to its living-room behemoth.

What does that mean? This revelation combined with the prominence of Silverlight in the development process for WP7 gives the impression that Microsoft has not given up on the product at all.

There is a less enthusiastic interpretation of the hiring however. Microsoft could be merely looking to improve cross-platform compatibility between WP7 and Xbox 360 in the short-term, giving the hires no real long-term strategic importance if the Redmond giant plans on replacing Silverlight on Windows Phone 7 in the future. Time will tell, but tonight the legions of Silverlight developers can sleep a little easier.

This is the job posting:

Silverlight is a fast paced, fun and winning team that ships yearly and is making serious inroads in the marketplace. It is a cross-browser, cross-platform, developer platform that is based on XAML and already running on Windows, Mac, set-top-boxes and Windows Phones. Numerous industry partners are already using Silverlight to deliver high end and cutting edge internet and mobile experiences to millions of users, including Netflix, NBC Olympics, Seesmic, Facebook, Foursquare and Twitter. Microsoft teams such as Sql reporting services, Office Communicator are already using Silverlight and many more will be in the future.

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Source: http://thenextweb.com/microsoft/2010/11/23/silverlight-is-hardly-over-microsoft-is-bringing-it-to-the-xbox-360/

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Silverlight is hardly over, Microsoft is bringing it to the Xbox 360 [TNW Microsoft]

There has been so much talk about the future of Silverlight in the last few weeks that nearly no one has a clear idea as to if the platform has a future or not. Heck, even we?re not exactly sure what Microsoft has in mind, and we?ve read everything on the topic.

Mixed messages however do swing both ways, and while we have seen some negative signs for the platform, a new job posting from Microsoft today should put a smile on the face of every Silverlight fan.

Microsoft, it seems, is bringing Silverlight to one of its most successful product lines: the Xbox 360. Yes, ?looking to hire motivated developers with a passion for creating ground breaking multiscreen platform experiences,? Microsoft is going to bring the power of Silverlight to its living-room behemoth.

What does that mean? This revelation combined with the prominence of Silverlight in the development process for WP7 gives the impression that Microsoft has not given up on the product at all.

There is a less enthusiastic interpretation of the hiring however. Microsoft could be merely looking to improve cross-platform compatibility between WP7 and Xbox 360 in the short-term, giving the hires no real long-term strategic importance if the Redmond giant plans on replacing Silverlight on Windows Phone 7 in the future. Time will tell, but tonight the legions of Silverlight developers can sleep a little easier.

This is the job posting:

Silverlight is a fast paced, fun and winning team that ships yearly and is making serious inroads in the marketplace. It is a cross-browser, cross-platform, developer platform that is based on XAML and already running on Windows, Mac, set-top-boxes and Windows Phones. Numerous industry partners are already using Silverlight to deliver high end and cutting edge internet and mobile experiences to millions of users, including Netflix, NBC Olympics, Seesmic, Facebook, Foursquare and Twitter. Microsoft teams such as Sql reporting services, Office Communicator are already using Silverlight and many more will be in the future.

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Source: http://thenextweb.com/microsoft/2010/11/23/silverlight-is-hardly-over-microsoft-is-bringing-it-to-the-xbox-360/

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Blog - Why Life Is Physics, Not Chemistry

In the history of science, there are many examples of simple changes in perspective that lead to profound insights into the nature of the cosmos. The invention of the telescope is perhaps one example. Another is the realisation that chemical energy, thermodynamic energy, kinetic energy and the like are all manifestations of the same stuff. You can surely supply your own favourite instances here.

One of the more important examples in 20th centruy science is that biology is the result of evolution, not the other way round. By that way if thinking, evolution is a process, an algorithm even; albeit one with unimaginable power. Exploit evolution and there is little you cannot achieve.

In recent years, computer scientists have begun to exploit evolution's amazing power. One thing they have experienced time and time again is evolution's blind progress. Put a genetic algorithm to work and it will explore the evolutionary landscape, looking for local minima. When it finds one, there is no knowing whether it is the best possible solution of whether it sits within touching distance of an evolutionary abyss that represents a solution of an entirely different order of magnitude.

That hints at the possibility that life as it has evolved on Earth is but a local minima in a vast landscape of evolutionary possibilities. If that's the case, biologists are studying a pitifully small fraction of something bigger. Much bigger.

Today, we get an important insight into this state of affairs thanks to a fascinating paper by Nigel Goldenfeld and Carl Woese at the University of Illinois. Goldenfeld is a physicist by training while Woese, also a physicist, is one of the great revolutionary figures in biology. In the 1970s, he defined a new kingdom of life, the Archae, and developed a theory of the origin of life called the RNA world hypothesis, which has gained much fame or notoriety depending on your viewpoint.

Together they suggest that biologists need to think about their field in a radical new way: as a branch of condensed matter physics. Their basic conjecture is that life is an emergent phenomena that occurs in systems that are far out of equilibrium. If you accept this premise, then two questions immediately arise: what laws describe such systems and how are we to get at them.

Goldenfeld and Woese say that biologists' closed way of thinking on this topic is embodied by the phrase: all life is chemistry. Nothing could be further from the truth, they say.

They have an interesting analogy to help press their case: the example of superconductivity. It would be easy to look at superconductivity and imagine that it can be fully explained by the properties of electrons as they transfer in and out of the outer atomic orbitals. You might go further and say that superconductivity is all atoms and chemistry.

And yet the real explanation is much more interesting and profound. It turns out that many of the problems of superconductivity are explained by a theory which describes the relationship between electromagnetic fields and long range order. When the symmetry in this relationship breaks down, the result is superconductivity.

And it doesn't just happen in materials on Earth. This kind of symmetry breaking emerges in other exotic places such as the cores of quark stars. Superconductivity is an emergent phenomenon and has little to do with the behaviour of atoms. A chemist would be flabbergasted.

According to Goldenfeld and Woese, life is like superconductivity. It is an emergent phenomenon and we need to understand the fundamental laws of physics that govern its behaviour. Consequently, only a discipline akin to physics can reveal such laws and biology as it is practised today does not fall into this category.

That's a brave and provocative idea that may not come as a complete surprise to the latest generation of biophysicists. For the others, it should be a call to arms.

We'll be watching the results with interest.

Ref: arxiv.org/abs/1011.4125: Life Is Physics: Evolution As A Collective Phenomenon Far From Equilibrium


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