Recommendation of a Smartphone

[SunWuKong]

Originally Posted by MarshalStealth

SWK,

What are your top 5 favorite iPhone apps?

facebook, twitterfon, flixster, read it later, and google earth. they're all free. but twitterfon has a paid version that some people really love. i haven't tried it yet. all my apps are free.

[MarshalStealth]

Originally Posted by SunWuKong

facebook, twitterfon, flixster, read it later, and google earth. they're all free. but twitterfon has a paid version that some people really love. i haven't tried it yet. all my apps are free.

Thanks for the information. I appreciate it. ... I have to see what is available on BB soon. ... I have seen Evernote on the iPhone It is quite nice. ...

On my list of 5, I am only looking for one good weiqi (go) program that I can run simulated games on the BB. ... I will take your suggestion for google earth

[SunWuKong]

Originally Posted by MarshalStealth

Thanks for the information. I appreciate it. ... I have to see what is available on BB soon. ... I have seen Evernote on the iPhone It is quite nice. ...

On my list of 5, I am only looking for one good weiqi (go) program that I can run simulated games on the BB. ... I will take your suggestion for google earth

well, Google Earth has basically no functional value for me. i just think it's fun.

[MarshalStealth]

Originally Posted by SunWuKong

well, Google Earth has basically no functional value for me. i just think it's fun.

Fun is always good. Thanks.

[MarshalStealth]

After a vigor search, I discovered that a BB version of weiqi (Go) is not currently available. I've determined that the clear option for me is to return to playing my games on various Go servers.

#Info. for the BB newbies:
http://appworld.blackberry.com/webstore/
http://www.blackberryfreeware.com/20...rry-games.html

[MarshalStealth]

Minor correction: http://www.blackberryfreeware.com/

[MarshalStealth]

An "iPhone using" associate sent me this item. Obama's Blackberry is a very nice piece of hardware.

Obama's new BlackBerry: The NSA's secure PDA?
by Declan McCullagh

Bill Clinton sent only two e-mail messages as president and has yet to pick up the habit. George W. Bush ceased using e-mail in January 2001 but has said he's looking forward to e-mailing "my buddies" after leaving Washington, D.C.

Barack Obama, though, is a serious e-mail addict. "I'm still clinging to my BlackBerry," he said in a recent interview with CNBC. "They're going to pry it out of my hands."

One reason to curb presidential BlackBerrying is the possibility of eavesdropping by hackers and other digital snoops. While Research In Motion offers encryption, the U.S. government has stricter requirements for communications security.

"Without more details I would have to say that putting sensitive or classified information on a BlackBerry is a risky proposition," said Greg Shipley, chief technology officer at Neohapsis, a governance, risk, and compliance consultancy.

Fortunately for an enthusiastic e-mailer-in-chief, some handheld devices have been officially blessed as secure enough to handle even classified documents, e-mail, and Web browsing.

One is General Dynamics' Sectera Edge, a combination phone-PDA that's been certified by the National Security Agency as being acceptable for Top Secret voice communications and Secret e-mail and Web sites. Through three separate interchangeable modules, it works with Wi-Fi, GSM, or CDMA networks, and is dust-proof, waterproof, and rugged enough to survive repeated 4-foot drops onto concrete. Physically, it's a chunkier second cousin to the Palm Treo 750, though with an additional LCD display below the keyboard.

The price is $3,350 with a two-year warranty, a princely sum that's reflected in the Pentagon-worthy price tags for accessories: a simple adapter for a lighter plug costs $100. (Never again should you complain about how much your civilian analogue costs.)

The Sectera runs a mobile version of Microsoft Windows, including versions of Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and Windows Media Player. The NSA claims that the installed versions of Internet Explorer, WordPad, and Windows Messenger are good enough for data that's classified at a level of Secret. Presumably the federal spooks have found a way to protect IE from the numerous security flaws that continue to plague the Internet's most popular browser.

The NSA declined to comment on Monday.

L-3 Communications' Guardian, still in development, is similar, but sports a chunkier antenna and a slightly less conventional keyboard shaped like a V. It, too, runs Windows, boasts a stylus and QWERTY keyboard, supports desktop synchronization, and can be used on secure data plans with AT&T, Sprint, T-Mobile, and, internationally, Worldcell. Files stored locally are encrypted.

Both PDA-phones owe their existence to a Defense Department project called SME-PED, meaning Secure Mobile Environment Portable Electronic Device. Because the SME-PED was explicitly designed to act as a classified-information-friendly replacement for a BlackBerry, it should be an easy switch for a President Obama.

That's assuming he still feels like e-mailing after Inauguration Day. Even though President Bush enjoys the same access to NSA-certified handhelds, he has never resumed his daily e-mail habit from the days when he went by the humble moniker of G94B@aol.com. (On January 17, 2001, Bush sent out this sad farewell: "Since I do not want my private conversations looked at by those out to embarrass, the only course of action is not to correspond in cyberspace. This saddens me. I have enjoyed conversing with each of you.")

At the time, Karen Hughes, one of Bush's closest aides, said that the president chose to abandon e-mail because of public records laws. That includes the Freedom of Information Act, or FOIA, and the Presidential Records Act of 1978.

Obama may find the convenience of wireless e-mail a pleasure difficult to give up. News reports during the presidential campaign described how he relied on his BlackBerry to bypass aides, which was even satirized by the Onion.

He checked e-mail during his daughter's football games, e-chatted with actress Scarlett Johansson, and before the New Hampshire primary told CNET News that the BlackBerry was his favorite gadget. On the other hand, Republican VP candidate Sarah Palin's e-mail breach is still within recent memory, as are the Bush White House's legal troubles stemming from the use of Republican National Committee e-mail systems.

"It's not just the flow of information," Obama said in the recent interview. "I mean, I can get somebody to print out clips for me, and I can read newspapers. What it has to do with is having mechanisms where you are interacting with people who are outside of the White House in a meaningful way. And I've got to look for every opportunity to do that--ways that aren't scripted, ways that aren't controlled, ways where, you know, people aren't just complimenting you or standing up when you enter into a room, ways of staying grounded."

Federal law does explicitly exempt from disclosure any "personal records" that do not relate to the president's official function. Those include electronic records that are "of a purely private or non-public character" and don't relate to official duties; the law lists diaries, journals, notes, and presidential campaign materials as examples. Similarly, FOIA prevents files from being released if the disclosure would significantly jeopardize "personal privacy."

In other words, Obama could choose to keep e-mailing judiciously, and trust his lawyers and the law to fend off overly nosy journalists and historians.

Wireless devices: What price convenience?
One thing that security experts can agree on is that despite RIM's efforts, a BlackBerry probably isn't up to the security standards for a leader of the free (or even unfree) world.

BlackBerrys can become infected with viruses that install spyware or turn the microphone on and record conversations, malware can be inadvertently downloaded, e-mail and text messages can be intercepted, and, of course, they can be lost or stolen, said Dan Hoffman, chief technology officer of SMobile Systems, which sells antivirus software for the devices.

The National Vulnerability Database, which is sponsored by the Department of Homeland Security's National Cyber Security Division, lists 14 vulnerabilities for BlackBerrys. Those include ways that a malicious attacker can install malware, and perhaps crash the device through a so-called denial of service attack.

It's not like snoopy computer utilities are difficult to find. Flexispy.com sells spyware that can be installed by someone with physical possession of a phone for 15 minutes. The creators boast that their software, once installed, can "bug a room or person" and "catch cheating husbands."

The U.S. government uses special ciphers for secret information and they use different data networks from the public data networks, said Phil Dunkelberger, chief executive of encryption provider PGP Corp. "Unless you're using point-to-point encryption technology...or the mail itself is encrypted, you would have exposure to people administering the network." And, on a related note, we know that Obama's cell phone records through Verizon were improperly accessed last year.

There's also the risk of someone tracking the coordinates of a BlackBerry through the device's built-in GPS or the carrier's ability to triangulate on the signal--something that police, for instance, claim they should be able to do without a search warrant or evidence of criminal activity. Bush White House aides say that security concerns prompted them to disable the GPS feature on their BlackBerrys.

James Atkinson, president of Granite Island Group, an engineering firm that helps the government protect classified networks and equipment, pointed this out as a possible security vulnerability. "You can identify where a person is without gaining access to the cell phone network just by the timing of the signals, Atkinson said. "You can identify who is sitting in which seat in a conference room from a couple thousand feet away."

Then again, it's not like the president of the United States and his entourage travel incognito that often.

If nothing else works, Obama can always turn to Bush for some tips. Not his immediate predecessor, but former President George H.W. Bush, a late-in-life convert to the joys of e-mail. Bush the Elder has been quoted as saying: "I'm what you might call a black belt wireless e-mailer."

CNET News' Elinor Mills contributed to this report.
Declan McCullagh, CNET News' chief political correspondent, chronicles the intersection of politics and technology. He has covered politics, technology, and Washington, D.C., for more than a decade, which has turned him into an iconoclast and a skeptic of anyone who says, "We oughta have a new federal law against this." E-mail Declan.

http://news.cnet.com/obamas-new-blackberry-the-nsas-secure-pda/
Some more interesting info
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/Pre...6712260&page=1
http://www.networkworld.com/community/node/37482

[SunWuKong]

that's our prez. he represents us tech addicts.

[MarshalStealth]

Originally Posted by SunWuKong

that's our prez. he represents us tech addicts.

In terms of technology, I have always presumed that President Obama is more of a power user of some degree.

[MarshalStealth]

Tetherberry is a cool tool for the BB user who loves to be connected. Read, review and ponder.

A review on Tetherberry:
http://www.boygeniusreport.com/2009/...f-tetherberry/

[drydem]

Originally Posted by MarshalStealth

In terms of technology, I have always presumed that President Obama is more of a power user of some degree.

Obama understands and appreciates the social
and marketing impact technology can have.
Furthermore, Obama understood how to use
technology in his political campaign - McCain
did not. At one point during the presidential
election, some were comparing Obama to a
hi speed bullet train and McCain to a 1840's
Steam engine train.

[MarshalStealth]

Originally Posted by drydem

Obama understands and appreciates the social and marketing impact technology can have. Furthermore, Obama understood how to use technology in his political campaign - McCain did not. At one point during the presidential election, some were comparing Obama to a hi speed bullet train and McCain to a 1840's Steam engine train.

The outcome of the election was based on Obama and his team effectively broadcasted a better message.

[MarshalStealth]

BB is still a better emailing device. I prefer the iPhone for web surfing. ...

BlackBerry still targeting businesses
On the smartphone's 10th anniversary, RIM officials discussed its signature handheld's enterprise strengths over competitors like the iPhone and the Google Android platform

While competitors like the Apple iPhone and the budding Google Android platform have garnered a lot of attention lately, Research in Motion (RIM), maker of the ubiquitous BlackBerry smartphone, sees itself as the right choice for businesses, a company official stressed Friday.

RIM officials held a press session in San Francisco Monday to tout the tenth anniversary of the BlackBerry as well as promote the company's wireless communications solutions for enterprises of varying sizes. Asked how BlackBerry stacks up against iPhone, Alan Panezic, vice president of the RIM platform product management group, emphasized business benefits for a corporate audience, where security, usability and connecting to corporate assets are paramount.

"From our perspective, we really see [BlackBerry] as head and shoulders above anything that's out there in the marketplace," said Panezic, who later noted BlackBerry also can be used as a consumer-oriented device. The BlackBerry Storm model could be regarded as the functional equivalent of the iPhone, although it was not designed with that intention, said David Heit, director of software product management at RIM.

As far as Android, Panezic said, "To be quite to be quite honest, it's a wait-and-see attitude. It's an open device-centric platform." He also emphasized BlackBerry as offering a platform with behind-the-firewall capabilities and push technology.

The BlackBerry has expanded beyond its roots as a wireless tool to read e-mail, now offering such capabilities as business collaboration like social networking and the sharing of data and documents, Panezic said. "That's an example of things that 10 years ago were quite frankly a dream," he said.

While smartphones like the BlackBerry are only a relatively small portion of the overall cell phone population, the volume is growing, Heit stressed. The smartphone has been a disruptive technology to devices like the laptop computer and desktop phone as it adds more capabilities, such as reading and editing of documents, he said.

"I'm starting to eliminate the use cases why I carry a laptop," Heit said. Eventually, the BlackBerry could be expanded to such diverse uses as remotely controlling the temperature in a home swimming pool or as a TV remote, he said.

The company plans to open in March an application store for third-party and RIM applications for BlackBerry. Applications for the BlackBerry were noted, such as the Pyxis Mobile application for mortgage-banking and the Salesforce.com CRM system.

RIM officials also detailed company technologies including BlackBerry Enterprise Server 5.0, for pushing e-mail and data to the BlackBerry. Previously referred to as "Argon," version 5.0 is due in the second quarter of this year, featuring enhancements in scalability and application deployment as well as high availability.

BlackBerry Professional Software provides smaller scale version of Enterprise Server, for small and mid-sized businesses. BlackBerry Mobile Voice System, meanwhile, allows calls to an office desktop phone to be channeled to a BlackBerry.

Paul Krill is an editor at large at InfoWorld.
http://www.infoworld.com/t/networkin...businesses-721

[MarshalStealth]

fyi

Google Voice app comes to BlackBerry, Android App allows users to make calls, send SMS via Google Voice directly from their smartphone
By Matt Hamblen , Computerworld , 07/15/2009

Google Voice is now available via BlackBerry and Android smartphones, Google announced today.

Google began sending invitations to join Google Voice last month, and today said an application for the two smartphone platforms is available.

Before today, BlackBerry and Android device users had to dial a Google Voice number from their phone, or online, to place a call.

The new apps allow users to make calls and send SMS with a Google Voice number directly from their Android or BlackBerry smartphone. The call can be made directly from the phone's address book because the app is integrated with the phone, Google said.

The application means a user can access voicemail, read SMS messages sent to Google Voice and access call history. Users can also place calls and send SMS messages. A video at Google's blog explains some of the functions.

The app is available to Android phone users at the Android Market, but BlackBerry users must download it from m.google.com/voice. Google Voice is by invitation only still, but Google said it is sending out invitations daily to those who have registered.

Google didn't indicate when Google Voice might be available for othr platforms such as the iPhone, Windows Mobile devices or Palm's WebOS. Some reports have indicated that Google is working on an iPhone version.

The news is significant, said analysts, because Google Voice is now available on at least one major mobile platform.

Anslyst Jeffrey Kagan, said the features of Google Voice are powerful, but he questioned how widely they will be used, since there are now so many choices for making calls and sending text messages.

With so many choices the marketplace is "both excited and confused," he said, noting that users can work with traditional carriers, but also third parties for VoIP calls from a wireless device.

The appearance of Google Voice on smartphones has led at least one prominent blogger, Om Malik, to suggest that Google could become a person's phone company.

More traditional vendors of unified communications gear, including Cisco Systems Inc., have taken note of Google's role in communications as well.
--- eof
http://www.networkworld.com/news/2009/071509-google-voice-app-comes-to.html

[MarshalStealth]

BB prevails because of the emailing and security.

In the case of the iPhone, their advantage is the 85 thousand types of s/w app programs.

October 14, 2009
BlackBerry Aims to Suit Every User
By SAUL HANSELL and IAN AUSTEN
The Storm was supposed to be the smartphone that would keep Verizon Wireless customers from deserting to Apple’s iPhone, which runs on AT&T’s network.

Research In Motion, the company that created the BlackBerry phones that business users find so addictive, gave Verizon exclusive rights to sell its first touch-screen phone in order to reach the vast consumer market.

But the Storm failed to live up to its name. About a million devices were sold, so it was not a flop. But many customers and some reviewers found it buggy and hard to use.

Meanwhile, the iPhone’s allure grew with new versions and a rapidly growing catalog of applications.

This week, Verizon and R.I.M. are trying again with a Storm do-over, the Storm 2. Among its many improvements, the new phone gives the user the sensation of pushing a physical button when pressing a number on the glass touch screen.

Lowell C. McAdam, the chief executive of Verizon Wireless, has been carrying the revamped device for a few weeks, looking for any evidence that this time it will catch on. Mr. McAdam said that while he was recently visiting the Verizon store in New York’s SoHo district, he started talking to a couple of students from New York University who were shopping for cellphones.

“I let them play with the second-generation Storm device,” he said. “They came back and said ‘Oh, my gosh.’ They were very excited. This is what they hoped the original Storm should be.”

If enough people share that opinion, R.I.M. could finally have the hit with consumers it has long sought. The Canadian company remains the top seller of smartphones in North America (and second to Nokia worldwide). But Apple is catching up quickly, and a huge crop of new smartphones is heading to stores based on new operating systems from Microsoft and Google. Even Verizon is hedging its smartphone bets with a major deal to develop handsets based on Google’s Android operating system.

R.I.M. has been slow to develop touch-screen technology, and its BlackBerrys are sluggish at browsing the Internet, industry analysts say. And developers have written only about 2,000 applications to run on BlackBerrys, compared with 85,000 for the iPhone and 10,000 for Android phones.

Investors are increasingly worried that R.I.M. cannot keep up with the pace of innovation. R.I.M.’s shares plunged 17 percent in one day last month after the company reported slightly less revenue than analysts expected for the quarter that ended in August.

Analysts were also alarmed because the company said the average price it expected to get from phones sold to wireless carriers would fall to $320, from $350.

“Times are getting tougher for R.I.M. as they move more into the consumer space,” said Carolina Milanesi, an analyst for the Gartner Group. “There is a lot more competition, and consumers don’t care much about the security and other things they sell to enterprises.”

Jim Balsillie, R.I.M.’s co-chief executive, said in a recent interview that investors were misreading the most recent financial results. Prices are falling largely because the company is moving out its inventory of old models in preparation for the new versions of the Storm and the Bold, its top-of-the line, keyboard-based phone.

Moreover, since R.I.M.’s component costs are falling, profit margins are holding steady. “I have never felt more enthusiastic about our business,” he said.

Despite its consumer push, much of R.I.M.’s effort is still tilted to pleasing business customers. Mr. Balsillie said the company planned to shake up the market in November when it will open its private communication network, which will allow BlackBerry users to receive their e-mail and a constant flow of social network updates and entertainment content from other sources.

“The way people love the BlackBerry, e-mail is the way they will love doing a lot more with it,” Mr. Balsillie said.

R.I.M. has been written off many times before. Skeptics said that its first gadgets, which were little more than glorified pagers with keyboards, could not survive in a world of cellphones. Instead of failing, R.I.M. was the fastest-growing company in the world from 2006 through 2008, according to calculations by Fortune magazine.

R.I.M. was not hard hit by the recession, which has forced some of the big companies that have been the heart of its market to lay off workers. And R.I.M. was helped because BlackBerrys have started to become a family phone, too.

The company has also cut the manufacturing cost of BlackBerrys by using variations on its existing designs that have allowed retailers to sell the devices at prices matching much simpler phones. For example, the BlackBerry Curve, R.I.M.’s most popular phone, is offered at Wal-Mart for about $50 with a contract. About 80 percent of R.I.M.’s sales this year have been to consumers, not to employers.

Mike Lazaridis, R.I.M’s other co-chief executive, says that the low cost of BlackBerrys allows cellular carriers to make more profit from the BlackBerrys than from other touch-screen handsets.

“We help carriers be profitable,” he said. “We gave them a way to get into the data business. Now we are giving them a way to manage their costs when they are worried that all they have to sell is highly subsidized smartphones.”

Mr. Lazaridis said that R.I.M. was about to release version 5.0 of its BlackBerry software, which promises to be easier to use, with a better Internet browser and longer battery life.

Applications remain a weak point. Developers say it is harder to write programs for the BlackBerry, especially ones with spiffy graphics and multimedia features. “When you create an application for R.I.M., you have to put in 30 to 40 percent more effort to make it look like what it would look like on the Android or the iPhone,” said Walter Doyle, the chief executive of uLocate Communications, which makes applications to locate businesses on maps.

“Yes, it is a little more difficult to develop on R.I.M.,” Mr. Lazaridis said. The company is working on new tools that will speed the work of applications programmers. But to serve the needs of its big corporate clients, he said, applications will still have to comply with sometimes cumbersome security procedures.

“It’s not a free-for-all,” he said.

That security is a crucial selling point for many customers, including President Obama, probably the best-known BlackBerry user. Mr. Lazaridis says R.I.M.’s precautions protect everyone.

“You’re starting to do banking on your handset,” he said. “Which would you rather use: something that can be hacked in five minutes or something the F.B.I. uses?”

Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/14/te...ies/14rimm.htm