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Tag: facebook

  • Facebook introduces Free Video Calling in Messenger

    Facebook introduces Free Video Calling in Messenger

    facebook-messenger-video-call

    Facebook just recently introduced video calling in Messenger. With the update, you can now have face-to-face conversations with your fellow “Facebookers” via Messenger.

    You can quickly turn a chat into a video call by tapping the video icon available at the top right corner of the screen and you can do this from within an existing Messenger conversation.

    Facebook Messenger already has the voice calls function and the introduction of the video calling function will more than likely expand Messenger’s user base. It is interesting to see how the 600 million plus Messenger users receive the service.

    The video calling function is available across platforms regardless of one’s OS and it is the latest feature to be added to Messenger, which is great news to users who are already using Messenger to send money to friends.

    The video calling feature is already available to Android and iOS users living in Greece, Norway, Oman, Poland, Ireland, Laos, Portugal, the UK, the US,  Lithuania, Nigeria, Belgium, Canada, Croatia, Denmark, Mexico, France, and Uruguay.

    The service will be rolled out on an ongoing basis to other locales and regions in the coming months.

    Also read: WhatsApp now with Free Calling Service, new Sharing Extensions, and More…

  • "Facebook phone": HTC First to arrive with Facebook Home

    Facebook made another big announcement, this time about Facebook Home, an Android launcher that will be pre-loaded on HTC First. Although Facebook did not create its own phone, it managed to grab our attention with something between an operating system and an application that manages to turn an Android phone into a Facebook phone.

    According to Mark Zuckerberg,

    “We’re not building a phone; and we’re not building an operating system, but we are building something that’s a whole lot deeper than an app.”

    HTC First will be the first Android phone that will have Facebook Home pre-installed and it is expected on April 12th by AT&T, at the price of $99.99. It is described by Peter Chou of HTC as the "ultimate social phone" and if you are a Facebook fan you won't be disappointed. It will feature LTE connectivity, it will have a ualcomm dual-core Snapdragon 400 processor, a 4.3-inch display and it will run on Android Jelly Bean 4.1. What's more, it will be available in 4 colors, in black, white, red and light blue.

    Facebook Home will be a completely new experience, allowing you to connect with your friends faster than ever. If you also love Instagram, except for Facebook, you need to know that HTC First will be the first phone that will have Instagram pre-loaded at the device.

    As it seems, Facebook is targetinh a young mobile audience, trying to increase its audience, but also its revenue from the mobile market. HTC and At&T will also benefir from such a big collaboration with Facebook, while Android must be happy leaving iOS behind on such a social innovation.

    Whether you'd be interested in buying such a phone or not, HTC First was indeed the first Facebook phone and it cannot be ignored. At least for the time being. 

  • Facebook phone: Ovum comments ahead of Facebook's announcement

    Ahead of Facebook’s announcement today, Adam Leach, principal device analyst at Ovum provides his perspective on how Facebook should move forward.

    Adam Leach, principal device analyst, Ovum:

    “Today Facebook will announce its ‘new home on Android’. There has been much speculation about what this will be, ranging from introducing a more deeply integrated Facebook app for Android all the way to launching its own “Facebook” phone.

    “But why is Facebook doing anything at all? The company wants to increase its engagement with its users and in particular its users accessing the service over mobile. To achieve this Facebook needs a mechanism to deliver its own services to a portfolio of devices. If this can be achieved with an Android Facebook skin or a co-branded phone then this will be better for Facebook as it avoids upsetting its current phone and platform partners and removes the immediate need to launch its own branded devices.

    “Whether Facebook needs to launches its own-branded devices depends on how ambitious Facebook is in moving into new consumer services which it currently does not provide. Facebook currently relies on the good will of its partners to carry the Facebook service. If it intends to move further into delivering digital services and go head to head with its consumer tech rivals such as Google, Microsoft and Amazon. This will bring Facebook into conflict with its current partners and will require the company to have more control over the platform and the devices it delivers the experience to.”

    Image: Michal Bonikowski

  • HTC partners with Facebook for HTC Myst

    HTC has decided to collaborate once again with Facebook and AT&T, in order to create another smartphone that focuses on the use of Facebook. It will be known as HTC Myst and its rumored specs are already online.

    It's not the first time that HTC collaborates with Facebook and AT&T, since they had already cooperated two years ago, for the release of HTC status, the smartphone with its own button for quick Facebook access. This was just the beginning, since HTC Myst plans to gain an even bigger part of the smartphone market. According to UnwiredView, HTC Myst is expected during the spring with its rumored specs already being online. Thus, if we want to have a first look at HTC Myst, it will have a 4.3-inch screen, a 1.5GHz dual core MSM8960 processor, a RAM of 1GB, a 16GB storage (without microSD),a rear camera of 5MP and a front one of 1.6MP. What's more, it will have all the latest apps by Facebook already preloaded, such as the typical Facebook app, the Facebook Messenger, Instagram and others, while it will run on Android Jelly Bean 4.1.2.

    Although Facebook seems reluctant for the time being to create their own unique phone, this collaboration might be attractive for the customers that want to stay connected as much as possible. Facebook as a brand name is powerful enough to target some significant attention for HTC Myst, not to mention the power of AT&T and the decent smartphones by HTC. Hence, even though Mark Zuckerberg doesn't think it is necessary to have a Facebook smartphone, he still thinks that he can keep an eye at the smartphone market for future reconsideration. HTC Myst will not be the only phone that connects you on Facebook, but we still want to see its performance on the smartphone market. We are waiting for more details about its release, then.

  • Facebook, Google and Amazon reportedly outsourcing new storage product orders to Taiwan-based ODMs

    Inexpensive data storage boxes from Taiwan are being picked up in lieu of storage arrays from Dell, EMC, HP and NetApp by Facebook and other vast data-centre operators such as Google and Amazon.

    Supply chain insiders say that the juggernaut that is Facebook is about to buy bargain storage kits from original design manufacturers, or ODMs, based in Taiwan. Original design manufacturers work with customer specifications to design and produce hardware. Both Quanta Computer and Wistron will be likely bidders for Facebook's supply contracts.

    Facebook looks to save a small fortune by using arrays defined by its Open Compute Project standard and running its own software. It's quite possible this may not even occur, as reports from Far East supply chain sources tend to be a little questionable, but the information is interesting nonetheless.

    Using ODMs for storage gear doesn't come as a big surprise; Facebook is merely following a trend. According to Digitimes, Google buys all its servers from ODMs and Amazon follows suit about 30 per cent of the time.

    Sales of standardised hardware via distribution channel partners to the West and beyond could start happening anytime. Amazon, Baidu and other cloud giants are likely to expand their services into the cloud; businesses are purchasing fewer storage arrays because of the cloud, so it's no surprise that Amazon, Baidu and others are making forays into this area.

    DEY Storage, a startup company, claims it can follow the trend started by Amazon, Facebook and Google. The company claims they can unbundle "storage management from the physical layer to provide customers with a storage system which is massively scalable and designed to align and integrate with their services-based infrastructures".

    The current crop of servers, storage and network switch vendors may have to look to Taiwan for a new model if they want to continue to be successful.

  • Facebook smartphone denied by Zuckerberg

    There were many rumors the last months about a possible release of a Facebook smartphone in the near future. We even heard of its specifications. However, they do not seem to be realistic anymore.

    According to Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Facebook, "it wouldn't really make much sense" for such a move and the possibility of creating their own smartphone. This means that all the rumors all these months about a Facebook smartphone, its possible design and its specifications were nothing more than rumors, with no credibility at all. There was even a rumor about Facebook collaborating with HTC and employing engineers to build hardware, but Mark Zuckerberg was quite clear.

    Was he? Some Facebook "experts" believe that he might be hiding his plans, in order to surprise them all at a future announcement. Not many CEOs like to provide details about their plans and this might be another case of it. Even though they might not expect to release a Facebook smartphone right now, how can we be sure that they won't do it in the future?

    It is obvious that Facebook focuses a lot on mobile market lately, especially after the acquisition of Instagram for 1$ billion. This meant that they try to be part of the profitable mobile industry and the possibility of having their own smartphone to combat the others, and not just an application, might not be a bad idea. Of course the competition would be high and they already risked a lot with their IPO, but do such companies act with cautiousness?

  • Photos and check-ins more popular than ever on trips

    Mobile phones are part of our daily routine, since we are using it wherever we go. Travelling could not be an exception.

    Nowadays, checking in on Foursquare for the new places we visit and uploading photos on Facebook is considered part of the trip for many of us. Technology has changed our lifestyle and it is not surprising that 39% of the total check-ins  are done while travelling. According to Tripl's recent inforgraphic, 79,971 photos were taken in total during trips, with the 28% of the trips having at least one photo uploaded. What's more, there were 20,401 check-ins in hotels, and the most popular destinations were New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco.

    Tripl is an application that notifies you about your friends' trips, according to their check-ins trough Facebook and Foursquare. It is a way to be updated on their trips and also check whether they are visiting your town to give them a call. Tripl's stats were gathered by their customers, with 137,151 trips in total, and their check-ins through Facebook Places and Foursquare. 

    However, we don't need any stats to realise that checking-in with pictures is a trend, since a look at our Facebook wall is enough. How many friends do you have on Facebook that have uploaded pictures from their vacation? It's mid-summer, so the stats must be rising day by day. Gone are the days when going on vacation meant losing contact with the others. Now going on vacation means letting others know what it's like chilling in the sun and enjoying cocktails. Invasion of technology has also brought to the surface our narcissistic self and this is not expected to change in the following year.

    For the time being, let's compete with others about our recent trips and find out who has taken the best picture.

  • Skype Working Out Instant Messaging Bug

    Skype has long set the standard for both video conferencing and VoIP communications, as their products were one of the first to cross operating systems, and is now the VoIP option integrated with social networking giant Facebook. But many consumers have run into issues in recent weeks, as instant messages sent over Skype have been accidentally sent to the incorrect contact, creating a host of awkward situations. Luckily, Skype is moving quickly to address the problem, so their millions of customers can rest easy that things should soon go back to normal.

    Skype first became aware of the glitch on a user forum. The misdirected IM’s became an issue any time Skype crashed in the midst of an instant message session. The last IM sent would accidentally go to a different contact once the user logged back into his account. Although Skype was incredibly apologetic about the bug, they announced they didn’t feel it has affected a large number of users, and shouldn’t dissuade anyone from trusting their VoIP needs to the service.

    VoIP-List.com: extensive catalog of voip providers, available software and hardware resources.

    Not only is the situation rather unique, but it also only impacted particular iterations of Skype. The versions in question seem to be Skype 5.8 for Mac, Skype 4.0 for Linux, Skype 5.10 for Windows, and Skype 1.2 running on Windows mobile devices. Customers were asked to upgrade to the latest version, which should solve the issue. Skype also took the opportunity to fix the File Sending option on their desktop software, so that users with a FAT32 hard drive can now save files consistently.

    Skype has risen swiftly in the VoIP world, further buffered by their purchase by Microsoft last year. Skype will come built-in on Microsoft’s newest Windows release, Windows 8, and will integrate seamlessly with Microsoft Office 2013 when it heads to market next year.

  • Ford and Mercedes Looking to Succeed In Mobile Applications

    In a world dominated by technology and internet, it seems that not even the auto fairs are deprived of promotion and marketing campaigns for the new applications for smartphones.

    In the attempt of promoting the idea of SmartCar, each carmaker is struggling to demonstrate its efforts through a useful, fast and of high performance application.

    Ford's SYNC system will allow the driver to make voice commands to the phone, to hear a voice that reads the text messages received or to listen to the favorite music through the car speakers. In case of an accident, the same system will call 911 and will send the coordinates of the event over to the phone operator. This technology will be implemented starting with Ford’s new range of family cars.

    Although all manufacturers seemed interested in this trend – currently in a continuous process of popularization –, there were people in charge, probably because of the great efforts required. In terms of location information security there were also several uproars, fortunately most programmers trying as much as possible to give users the option to take into consideration the preferences of the most reluctant people to this technology as well.

    To define a trend related to smartphone applications, Pitt Moos, Product Manager at Electric Cars Division of Smart, explained that currently the priority is an interface to allow users to see the current level of battery for example and only after to check the Facebook page.

  • The 2012 Global Mobile Awards Nominations

    The GSMA announced nominees for the 17th annual Global Mobile Awards. The winners will be presented on Tuesday, 28th February at the GSMA Mobile World Congress. In total, 158 nominees have been shortlisted.

    For 2012, the GSMA introduced 18 new awards, with notable developments in categories such as ‘Apps of the Year’, ‘Mobile Innovation’, ‘Mobile Marketing and Advertising’, and ‘Social and Economic Development’. In addition, the ‘Best New Mobile Handset, Device or Tablet at the Mobile World Congress’ will be selected from those on show at the annual mobile event.

    Here are the nominees:

    Best smartphone
    Apple iPhone 4S
    HTC Desire S
    Nokia Lumia 800
    Samsung Galaxy Nexus
    Samsung Galaxy S II

    Best Feature or Entry Level Phone
    Nokia C2-03
    Nokia C3-00
    Nokia C3-01
    Samsung Ch@t 335 (Samsung S3350)

    Best Mobile Tablet
    Acer Iconia Tab A500/501
    Amazon Kindle Fire
    Apple iPad 2
    Asus Eee Pad Transformer
    Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1

    Best Consumer Application
    Facebook Messenger
    Talking Tom Cat 2
    Angry Birds Rio
    Blast Monkeys
    Hanging With Friends

    Best Enterprise Application
    Cisco AnyConnect
    GoToMeeting
    Citrix Receiver
    Share Plus: SharePoint Mobile Client
    Forsquare

    Best Application – jury selection
    Evernote
    FlipBoard
    Google Maps
    LinkedIn
    WhatsApp

    Most Innovative Application
    biNu
    Divide
    Google Wallet
    Thrutu (TM)
    Shazam App
    SwiftKey X

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