The Mobile Location-Based Informant

Mobile blogging Grand Tour 2008

2008-08-01T00:35:00.001-04:00

Starting this Saturday, me and my wife will be on vacation for a week and taking part in one of the biggest organized bike tours in Canada: Le Grand Tour 2008. This event is organized by Velo-Quebec and gets an average of 2000 cyclists every year.

I've been part of this event 10 times (only missing 4). As a matter of fact, I met my wife at this event 10 years ago in 1998. So this year we are celebrating our 10th anniversary at this event.

The best thing about Grand Tour is the friendly atmosphere that you find day in and day out with fellow cyclists even after riding 110 kms.

Also seeing about 800 tents all pitched up in a football field is a pretty interesting sight.

So this year, I'll try to mobile blog the experience using posterous. You can follow me on Grand Tour 2008 from August 2th until August 8th on my posterous account.

And feel free to post comments and questions. I'll do my best to answer them.

L8er - Martin

Garmin announces delays for the Nuvifone

2008-07-30T21:43:00.001-04:00

Uploaded with plasq's Skitch!

MobileCrunch reports today that Garmin has provided details in its second quarter earnings call that the Nuvifone has been delayed until the first quarter of 2009.

From the analysis calls today:

The nüvifone will not be available in fourth quarter as previously announced. While we had hoped to have carrier launches in the fourth quarter, we have found that meeting some of the carrier specific requirements will take longer than anticipated. We remain pleased with carrier interest in the device and are working toward making necessary design changes to meet their requirements. We anticipate launching the product during the first half of 2009

In short: The Apple iPhone 3G is beating a lot of players in this space and I suspect that the availability of the Nuvifone right now would be a real flop.

I'm still unsure about the viability of this product as it was announced to counter the iPhone 3G announcement at the WWDC in June.

My best guess is that this product will be pulled before it actually hits the road. It's too late now for Garmin to get any traction over the iPhone 3G which already has an embbeded GPS chip. Carriers knows this and that's why they are reluctant in supporting this phone.

Happy location reporting - Martin

The Word Cloud

2008-07-08T14:41:00.001-04:00

While browsing FriendFeed comments, I stumbled on this nicely done Word Cloud generating application.

Here's the cloud for this site :

Uploaded with plasq's Skitch!

Thanks Fred !!

Happy location reporting - Martin

Nokia buys location-based German startup Plazes.com

2008-06-23T09:18:00.001-04:00

Reuters report this morning that Plazes, one of the earliest location-based startup, has been bought by cell phone giant Nokia for an undisclosed amount.

I've been following Plazes for a long time (in Internet speak: so close to 3 years now), and they where one of the first company with a location-based service. They originally put out Plazer for the Nokia S60 which used cell-tower id to try to pinpoint your location and show shops and stores nearby. However, from the feedback I got, this was too complex. So they relaunch to try simplify the functionality and added, at the same time, Twitter-like status updates. You could then send your position and your status at the same time. However it seems they were never getting enough traction.

Even the newcomer BrightKite, is being showed ahead of Plazes.

I think Plazes reached a saturation point on their brand and people were more eager in trying newer services in search of better functionality then staying with them. This echoes my comments in a BBC interview I did a while back:

Social networking is a very volatile environment. People are going to one place and if they don't like the feature set, they are ready to jump to the next one...

What will happen now to Plazes? Folded into the Nokia giant, it will surely be rebranded as part of Nokia's push into new Internet services. Perhaps that's another pioneer of location-based services which we won't see anymore as an independent service.

Hopefully they won't end up like Dodgeball or Jaiku and Nokia will be able to extract the best of it.

Happy location reporting - Martin

The Location-based revolution is coming according to GigaOm

2008-06-18T23:08:00.001-04:00

Om Malik, founder and senior writer of GigaOm, has a nice perspective on why the commoditization of GPS and the associated emergence of Location-Based services is poised to change the market. Here's the interesting excerpt:

But lately I’ve been feeling like I may have been too conservative with my outlook for the location-based services revolution.
The main reason is the ubiquitousness of mobile phones; the sheer number of them that get shipped each year guarantees LBS a huge audience. Of course, in order for LBS to be on mobile phones, we need applications, which is where I believe the iPhone plays a vital role. Its large screen and built-in GPS (and now its 3G speeds) enable and encourage truly interesting LBS applications.

I think the introduction of an embedded GPS chip within the iPhone is what the LBS industry needs to move itself forward. Sure, we had a number of different cell phones in the past with embedded GPS chips. And this is the core of the problem: they were different cell phones with very different characteristics. So why is the iPhone different? It relies mostly with developers and their ability to create truly rich mobile applications. No more of those crappy Java-based apps. With that richness, comes very immersive applications.

If you add into the mix location-based services, then you got the perfect recipe for the best location-based device. And this was echoed by the Loopt CEO at the WWDC keynote: "This is the best version of Loopt we've ever made, and by far the best device we've had the opportunity to work with. We've developed for every mobile platform out there, this one is the best and the most powerful" [WWDC Keynote @ 0:28:32]

Although this comment was made in the context of the WWDC, so you should remove some adjectives, I'm convinced that this platform will push forward LBS services further than anything that has been attempted so far.

Happy location reporting - Martin

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The 3G iPhone - My predictions for the WWDC keynote

2008-06-05T12:30:00.001-04:00

The Apple World Wide Developer Conference (WWDC) will be held next week starting with the keynote address by Steve Jobs on Monday June 9th @ 10:00 am PDT.

It is widely expected that Steve will announce a new 3G iPhone that will support the HSDPA standard for higher data exchange throughput.

There has been a huge number of predictions within the industry about what this phone will do and not do. So I decided to jump in the game and provide a list of my own :

Form Factor

The iPhone form factor will be reduced, current rumors is that it will be 22% thinner. Apple always strive for minimizing the form factor of new devices (new MacBook Pro, MacBook Air). I'm not sure if it will be 22% thinner but it will be thinner for sure. So this one is strong on the list.

Probability: 9/10

GPS

With recent updates to the Google Maps application and the strong push by Apple for location-based services, it is almost certain this new iPhone will have an embedded GPS chip. This will further acknowledge the recent market push for Location-based services (Loopt, BrightKite, FireEagle) and will help propagate them to higher levels of acceptance.

This one is really a no-brainer. If it is not included, the market will not be happy.

Probability: 10/10

On a side note: Expect a huge announcement storm of iPhone-specific LBS at the WWDC conference.

Camera

The current iPhone camera is good. According to sources, the new phone will be powered by the Broadcom chip which can easily handle a 5 Megapixel camera. I expect Apple will go all out on this and provide a 5Mpx camera to be on par with the Nokia N95.

Probability: 7/10

Since the 3G iPhone can handle higher data throughputs, video conference calls are now possible. To properly support this, a front side camera is needed (like in the Nokia N95). Will Apple follow this trend, I'm really not sure here because it really changes the design of the phone.

Probability: 4/10

Memory Size

We have seen the introduction of the 32Gb iPod Touch recently. So I expect Apple to announce the availability of a 32Gb 3G iPhone along with the current 16Gb version we also have today.

Probability: 8/10

Versions

From my understanding, and the reading I've been doing, it looks like Apple will be providing a white colored iPhone. However I still think the more upscale Black version will still be provided. In the same line as the MacBook line (where black is the upscale line), the white version will be used in subsidized markets and will basically be a 3G iPhone but with less memory and not front-side camera.

The Black version will be a fully featured 3G version with the front side camera.
Apple really needs to offer more than one version to reduce supply chain issues it has been experimenting over the past few months.

Probability: 6/10

In the end

Consumers are again going to rush to get this new device. I will, for sure, update mine as well. With the iPhone officially coming to Canada, thanks to the Rogers partnership, and other new countries, Apple is really disrupting the mobile market.

I really applaud them for their efforts.

We will see how I score on Monday. Feel free to provide your own predictions or comment on mine in the comments.

Happy location reporting - Martin

The $100M iFund putting first egg into the location-based services basket

2008-05-27T13:42:00.003-04:00

BusinessWeek is announcing today the first investment from the Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers (KPCB) $100M iFund. The first company out of the gate is: Pelago with an application called Whrrl.

According to the press release, this is what Whrrl is about:
(side note, they should change the name because it is too similar to Twhirl - the Twitter Native Client).

Say you're lost in Las Vegas and need a restaurant recommendation. With iPhone in hand, you can scan the locations of nearby restaurants, just Italian restaurants, or just those recommended by foodie friends. Or you could search for the highest-rated bars or kid-friendly activities recommended by friends from your social network. There's going to be a "what's going on around me right now" button, says Kleiner Perkins partner Matt Murphy. "You're always one button away from that immediate context."

The BusinessWeek article also mentions that KPCB received no less than 1700 proposals from companies seeking funding under this new fund. I'm pretty sure that a good percentage of these proposals were associated with location-based services in some way.

With the upcoming release of the 3G version of the iPhone (on June 9th at the WWDC keynote), it looks like the iPhone will be well positioned, for the sheer number of developers, to be the major player in the mobile location-based social networking space.

I'm currently looking, in depth at the iPhone SDK API, and I'm pretty sure that Apple created the ultimate mobile social networking device.

The only thing missing is for some entrepreneurs to unlock the right combination of features and functionality to make it a reality.

And there is a lot of people trying to accomplish that right now. When the AppStore floodgate opens in June, we will experienced a slew of those applications. Some brilliant, some ok, some atrocious. So don't jump the gun. The network will tell us which one needs to capture the flag.

Happy location reporting - Martin

Are Location-based services too early ?

2008-05-21T06:44:00.002-04:00

Today while reading blog news with Google Reader, I hit the report from TechCrunch about the shutdown of another location-based service: Meetro.

Here's the functional description of Meetro for the post in TechCrunch:

To those of you not familiar with Meetro, we were one of the first location-based social networks. We figured out where you were physically and then we would tell you else was around you in real-time. You would then be able to instant message with them, check out their profiles, and hopefully meet up. Other functionality included telling you about restaurants close by, media created nearby, and various local information that pertained to your location. We also supported all your various instant messaging protocols (AIM, MSN, Yahoo) and a slew of other social features.

And the telling quote is: "Even with a robust product we simply couldn’t capture enough market share". This echoes by own words in the interview I gave Austin Hill on his blog.

Seems the physical location problem is an interesting problem but very difficult to get right. And I think it has to do with the dilution of the network. When you launch a location-based service (LBS) on the internet, it is accessible world-wide. You have users (aka internet friends) from every part of the globe.

However a LBS real value is proximity of your network, so the service can detect and properly tell you who's nearby. When you user base is widely located, these functions, although very interesting on paper, do not work. Thus the value of your service is widely diminished and so is it's stickiness.

Dodgeball tried it and they failed, Kakiloc (us) tried it and we failed and now Meetro is joining the bench.

Brightkite is having a go a it right now. However looking at my friends statuses, only a few of them are actively using it. The others (early adopters) came, look and went away. I argue that most of the false-traction that Brightkite is having now is from those early adopters but the stickiness is not there yet. They have real nice interfaces to the service and a very cool iPhone web application as well. Still I'm not convinced on the success until they implement the key elements.

If you are building another location-based service, you should learn from these post-mortem experiences and you should really leverage other services that can help you move forward. The FireEagle service is one of them.

As for me, I'm currently parked on the Falkland Islands within BrightKite until they send me a message in a bottle that they fully support FireEagle.

Happy location reporting - Martin

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Apple World Wide Developer Conference (WWDC) is sold out.

2008-05-15T09:24:00.003-04:00

For the first time in it's history, the WWDC is sold out. I think this is a clear indication of the popularity of the iPhone and the associated SDK.

The opening of the Apple AppStore (in June ?) will surely be very interesting as eager indie developers rush out to be first to market with new and cheap (99 cents) application for the iPhone.

I was also toying with the idea of attending WWDC to get insight on the iPhone SDK.

This is surely a hot space to watch given the number of new mobile providers that have signed on to distribute the iPhone (Canada - Rogers being one of them).

Happy location reporting - Martin

Apple releases the fifth version of the iPhone SDK

2008-05-06T20:43:00.001-04:00

Well Apple is very quick to turn out new revisions of it's iPhone SDK. They just released the 5th version of the SDK available for download here.

Apple is clearly sending a signal that it wants this to be very successful and keeps stabilizing and updating the SDK in a very agile manner.

Happy location reporting - Martin

Location is everywhere

2008-05-06T12:21:00.004-04:00

A very nice post by Chris Messina about the increase in awareness and popularity of location and location-based services applied to web and iPhone applications.

Here's an excerpt:

... I think we’re on the brink of seeing the kind of the ubiquity (in the consumer space) that we need in order to start taking the availability of location information for granted, and, that, like standards-compliant browsers, it could (or should) really inform the way that we build out the social fabric of web applications from thence forward.

I think this is a very good article but Chris forgot to mention FireEagle which is starting to provide some of the layers we need to truly built innovative location-based applications.

Happy location reporting - Martin

Reportage - Checkpoint

2008-05-04T11:53:00.002-04:00

The development of the native iPhone application "Reportage" is progressing slowly. The transition from Ruby to Objective-C takes a little time to get used to.

But I really like the development environment provided by Apple (XCode / Interface Builder) and especially the stability of the 4th release of the SDK.

Here's a screenshot of the Reportage icon on the iPhone Home page. I'll continue posting progress on the development of "Reportage". Stay tuned.

Happy location reporting - Martin

Zero-gravity architecture aka Architecture Astronauts

2008-05-01T09:52:00.002-04:00

Joel Spolsky just published this new piece about Architecture Astronauts and the new Microsoft Live Mesh product offering.

Personally I would prefer to call it "Zero-gravity architecture" because it floats and never produces anything concrete. The piece is really good and I fully agree with Joel.

Here's a nice excerpt:

But Windows Live Mesh is not just a way to synchronize files. That's just the sample app. It's a whole goddamned architecture, with an API and developer tools and in insane diagram showing all the nifty layers of acronyms, and it seems like the chief astronauts at Microsoft literally expect this to be their gigantic platform in the sky which will take over when Windows becomes irrelevant on the desktop

But please go read it online, it is quite eye opening.

Happy location reporting - Martin

Reportage - The Splash Screen

2008-04-18T11:11:00.001-04:00

Here's the splash screen for Reportage.

But according to the iPhone User Interface Guidelines, application should not have a splash screen, so this is going into the credits section then.

Coming soon for your iPhone
Happy location reporting - Martin

Reportage en cours...

2008-04-12T08:51:00.001-04:00

Coming soon for the iPhone...

Happy location reporting - Martin

iPhone SDK works on PowerMac Architecture

2008-03-18T21:21:00.001-04:00

The iPhone SDK has been released by Apple a week ago and already there is has been over 100 000 downloads of the kit. As you can imagine, I was the first inline to get it. However upon installation on my Dual G5, I was surprised to see that there was no iPhone project templates available in XCode. After some researching, it found this note posted on Apple Site about support for Intel-based architecture Mac only.

So I was contemplating the purchase of a dedicated Mac Mini box as a development machine until I hit this site that explains how to use the SDK on a PowerMac architecture.

After following every steps, voila !!!

Now I will delve into the CoreLocation API and report back here soon.

Update: If you are using the iPhone SDK Beta 2, please follow the directions here instead.

Happy location reporting - Martin

Apple iPhone SDK program is flooded with requests!

2008-03-18T15:14:00.002-04:00

I just received this interesting email from Apple about the iPhone SDK Developer program registration.

Thank you again for applying to the iPhone Developer Program. We’re thrilled with the tremendous response we've received. We have many more requests than we can serve during this initial beta period, so we must limit the Program at this time. We plan to expand it during the beta period, and we will contact you regarding your enrollment status at the appropriate time. We appreciate your patience.

Seems Apple is listening to all the complaints on the net about people being rejected from the program.

Happy location reporting - Martin

Yahoo's FireEagle new service is now live (in Beta)

2008-03-05T12:06:00.006-05:00

I've just received an invitation for the new Yahoo FireEagle service which is now in Beta.

What is FireEagle, here's a description from their site:

Fire Eagle makes it safe and easy to build and use location-aware applications and services. It's a place for users to store information about their current location that trusted apps and sites can update or access.

I will be looking at the API closely and the capabilities of this first release. Make sure to come back here as I will do a full report on this location-brokering service.

Happy location reporting - Martin

Update: Here's the keynote speech from Tom Coates of Yahoo about the launch of FireEagle today at ETech.

iPhone SDK and developer's roadmap to be announced on March 6th

2008-02-29T09:33:00.004-05:00

Apple sent a number of press invitations to attend the unveiling of the iPhone SDK / roadmap on March 6th at the Apple Cupertino Campus.

I'm really eager to learn what Apple is planning for developers and especially the deployment model of iPhone third-party applications. As I eluded in a previous post, I'm afraid that all applications will have to be channelled through the ITunes application and that they will exercise some kind of policing of applications.

I just remember when FaceBook application directory was flooded with pending applications and developers had to provide backdoor links to provide Facebook users access to it.

More info and move coverage to be done after the unveiling.

Happy location reporting - Martin

Update: It seems my fear of Apple being the watchdog of iPhone third-party applications has been officialized by AppleInsider.

Mobile Location-Based services: The Ins and Outs of the latest crop

2008-02-11T11:58:00.001-05:00

I've noticed that there is a lot of activity around Mobile Location-based services lately. My Google reader starred items is showing a higher number of articles on that subject that I need to research.

Let's review some of the early announcements and provide some insights starting with the new Apple iPhone Firmware 1.1.3 announced at MacWorld in early January.

Apple iPhone/iPod Touch firmware 1.1.3

This announcement has been covered in numerous blogs and brings the "MyLocation" feature of Google Maps to the iPhone which I have covered earlier. However Apple has added the Wifi-sensing technology from SkyHook Wireless to the mix. This is very interesting as this technology is also available in the latest firmware upgrade for the iPod Touch as well. SkyHook Wireless is really the leading provider of Wifi-sensing positioning technology today. The inclusion of this technology within the new firmware is also a huge setback for it's competitor: Navizon. I've been following both companies for a long time now and I'm now surprised to see SkyHook being selected as the chosen winner by Apple.

SkyHook was financed early on by Intel Capital and is based on derivative work from the PlaceLab projet originated at Intel Labs. Given Apple very close relationship with Intel, it was natural fit that they would be selected. Navizon is surely not gaining any strengths with this announcement and will likely go underwater unless they can strike a deal with a competing company. Which one ? I'm still searching.

I've tried to use the Navizon software on my iPhone and the experience was really painful. The web site would not register me correctly and the software failed every time.

SkyHook: in, Navizon: out

Loopt partnership with CBS Mobile

On February 6th, GigaOM and a number of bloggers announced that Loopt has signed a partnership with CBS Mobile to help them push location-based ads to their customers. CBS will be using Loopt GPS technology to enable location-specific ads to be overlaid of top of web sites browsed by CBS mobile customers. I'm not really sure what is the added value of Loopt in this equation. Loopt, which was covered earlier as well, started out as a mobile personal-locator service and is financed by Sequoia Capital. However, there has been some shakeup within Loopt as the executive vice president of corporate development and marketing left the company to become the EIR at Charles River Ventures. Was that a sign of the new orientation for the company? Also given all the VC money going into Mobile Ads company (AdMob is a prime example), it seems that Loopt is moving sideways from it's early direction.

Also, compared to SkyHook or Navizon, Loopt does not have a lot of investments into locating technologies. It mainly relies on the embedded GPS chips within the cellphone or uses the AutoDesk positioning framework to pinpoint the location of the user. And currently, it's offering can only be used by Sprint / Boost Mobile customers. I think this is a too narrow market to actually be successful and something I still argue needs to be addressed. We will see where this is going but I doubt very much that Loopt will be successful in the Location-Based Advertisements (LBA) market.

Loopt: fading

Happy location reporting - Martin

Garmin moves into the cellphone world with the nuvifone

2008-01-31T10:32:00.001-05:00

Garmin made a step into iPhone territory today with the announcement of the Nuvifone.

Garmin gets official with its nuvifone

This is a very interesting move and will surely raise awareness if they decide to sell it unlocked.
Story to be followed for sure...

Happy location reporting - Martin

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Twitter is growing, Users are suffering.

2008-01-31T09:34:00.000-05:00

Twitter, the micro-blogging framework is becoming more and more popular and extremely useful for reporting live news for demonstration and conference events.

However it's popularity is also it's biggest enemy: scalability.

Lately, Twitter has had a lot of problems staying online and responding to users sending "less than 141 characters" status updates.

On the second day of the Demo 2008 conference, it was down during most of the sessions which prevented people attending from properly providing insights into the demonstrations.

Marshall KirkPatrick of Read/Write Web posted this status this morning which is very telling.

In response, Ev Williams and the Twitter team updated the community about the progress of the service and how they will address the scalability issue.

I've been addicted to Twitter more and more since I decided to cancel by Facebook account. For a service, so popular, I wish they would bring out more features and ensure they invest more in scalability.

However, I'm still unclear on the business model that will be associated to that micro-blogging platform. Because has they sink more money into the infrastructure, revenues will have to start flowing in pretty soon or else this will be another doomed service.

Happy location reporting - Martin

Air: The Only Thing Left In Your Wallet After You Buy Apple’s New Laptop

2008-01-16T10:51:00.001-05:00

Very interesting quote from Duncan Riley of TechCrunch

Air: The Only Thing Left In Your Wallet After You Buy Apple’s New Laptop

Also, I'm in the process of updating my iPhone to firmware release 1.1.3 and I will report on the new
pseudo-GPS functionality (via cell tower trilateration and wifi beacon sensing) in an upcoming post.

Happy location reporting - Martin

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The iPhone untold story revealed

2008-01-10T10:18:00.001-05:00

A very very interesting article by Wired about the untold story of the iPhone:

The Untold Story: How the iPhone Blew Up the Wireless Industry

Happy location reporting - Martin

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Google / Jaiku responding to criticisms

2008-01-09T19:29:00.001-05:00

Seems the Jaiku/Google team did not like the post by Ars Technica about the subpart service level.
They have responded with a new post which is the first one since their acquisition. Here's an interesting excerpt:

First, we know the Jaiku site is currently not as responsive as it should be. (...)
We should have everything sorted out soon; in the meantime, thanks for your patience.

Second, I know you’re all excited to hear what’s next for Jaiku and what we’ve been working on since
joining Google. To be honest, a lot of our time in the early going was spent on getting to know Google.
And, of course, a little R&R during the holidays

Can I sense some culture / product direction clash here... However it is interesting how the blogosphere can force you to realign your online presence.
But the overall lesson here is:

"In the online world, communication with your clients / users is paramount, never close that channel even if you have nothing to say"

Stay tuned.
Happy location reporting - Martin

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