Finally, affordable BOTH voice and data on Docomo

[Taro Toporific]

B-Mobile (which uses the best quality network, Docomo) is now offering "talkingSIM", a voice and data SIM for under 4000 yen per month!

Refer to:
[INDENT][SIZE="3"]B-Mobile talkingSIM: BOTH voice and data for under 4000 yen per month[/SIZE]
Softbank Sucks: July 23, 2010


[/INDENT]

[FG Lurker]

Unlimited data, but no streaming (so no Skype). They also charge 21yen/30secs for voice which is pretty pricey if you make regular calls. Finally, SMS is 5yen each to send...!

I'm really looking forward to Docomo allowing foreign phones (ie unlocked iPhones from outside Japan) onto their network later this year. They are apparently preparing their IMEI registration system currently.

The telecom industry in Japan hasn't had a big shakeup like this since cheap ADSL became available in the late '90s. Good times indeed.

[Taro Toporific]

[FG Lurker]

[AlbertSiegel]

I'm a bit torn when it comes to smart phones. I have a Windows smart phone in the States that I really only use for calls and texting most of the time. I love the keyboard and being able to look up a web page from time to time, but I miss the TV features and form design of a Japanese phone.

On the other hand, I have a Softbank Panasonic 930P in Japan that I love for everything except texting. My old keitai was a Sharp that was excellent for texting, but my current Panasonic has some odd interface that is great for kanji I'm told but stinks for anything non-Japanese. It's not fun texting on it at all but I can get it done.

Between the two, I like the clamshell design of the 930P better. I love the ability to watch TV on it. The web function is a bit basic but works well enough. Still though, I really like smart phone abilities. I actually still use a PDA along with my phone though I guess all the outlook features can really be tied into the 930P. I'm looking into this as I'm about to make the switch back to Macintosh on Monday when my new Mac arrives.

I really want to like smart phones, but I don't care for the size. If there were a clamshell smart phone that had a real keyboard (even if tiny) and a TV tuner with an OS that I could customize, I would be set. I would also like to be able to use a stylus with the screen.

As for the OS... the funny thing is I'm actually one of the few people out there that actually likes Windows Mobile. I don't care for the iPhone OS. Android OS is indeed very interesting to me. I have yet to see what the WebOS is about and doubt I will now that HP owns PALM.

[GomiGirl]

but with Google hiring away the guy who designed Palm's WebOS I think we will see great things from Android 3.0.

OK - you had me until this statement!! Palm WebOS!!! Are you shitting me?

Have you ever tried to develop for Palm (aka steaming pile of turds)? It is a dumb dumb dumb platform. Perhaps I was spoilt by the early days of Newton and EPOC (pre Symbian) but Palm, for all their US market share, was a developers nightmare. Kinda like anything based on CE... *shudder*

[FG Lurker]

OK - you had me until this statement!! Palm WebOS!!! Are you shitting me?

I should have been clearer. Google hired Matias Duarte, a highly regarded mobile UI designer who was responsible for WebOS' UI. Android's UI is...lacking (to be kind) and very inconsistent in how it works. The combination of Android's openness with a much better mobile UI would be very interesting indeed... Better than iOS? Could be. Being open counts for a lot, something Apple doesn't seem to have learned from the days of the PC crushing the Mac.

[cujojpn]

OK - you had me until this statement!! Palm WebOS!!! Are you shitting me?

Have you ever tried to develop for Palm (aka steaming pile of turds)? It is a dumb dumb dumb platform. Perhaps I was spoilt by the early days of Newton and EPOC (pre Symbian) but Palm, for all their US market share, was a developers nightmare. Kinda like anything based on CE... *shudder*

I tried developing for Palm, what a giant pile of shit that platform is. It was no more open then iOS, they had a complete lack of documentation and even today the docs are in horrid condition, they say if you know how to develop web-sites you can make an app but they don't take into consideration their own proprietary javascript framework.

The entire thing was a mess, and I am happy I left that job, no more Palm application development for me.

[xenomorph42]

[BigInJapan]

The entire thing was a mess, and I am happy I left that job, no more Palm application development for me.

Never say never...

[SIZE="4"]HP not making Windows Phone 7 devices, focusing on webOS instead[/SIZE]
No big surprise here, but HP Personal Systems Group VP Todd Bradley just flat-out confirmed to CNBC that HP will not be making any Windows Phone 7 devices, preferring instead to focus on the newly-acquired webOS for its line of smartphones. Continued...

I washed my hands of Palm devices several years, but it looks like HP thinks the fat lady hasn't sung yet...

[FG Lurker]

Never say never...

I washed my hands of Palm devices several years, but it looks like HP thinks the fat lady hasn't sung yet...

The problem is small devices are migrating into two main form factors: phones and tablets. If HP is going to ignore half that market the future of WebOS looks pretty dim to me.

I also remember how HP handed Alpha to Intel after the Compaq acquisition and wonder if they will handle the Palm technology any better.

[Samurai_Jerk]

I really want to like smart phones, but I don't care for the size.

Exactly. The main reason I don't have any interest in smart phones is the size. 10 years ago the goal was to make smaller and smaller phones and then somewhere in the early to mid 2000s they started getting bigger again to accomodate all the features. Unless I work for a company that requires me to have a smart phone I doubt I'll be buying one anytime soon.

[FG Lurker]

If the only desire is to have a device for voice calls and the occasional text message then the smaller the better. That used to be what I wanted as well and my last dumbphone was one of those tiny Samsung clam shell phones. (Looked like a Motorola Razor.)

Now though I use my phone for a helluva lot more than just voice and mail. I do online banking with it. I can remotely boot/access/reboot computers in my office when needed. I use Skype for international calls when I'm out and about -- both over Wifi and over 3G. I use Google Reader via an app to keep up with websites I follow. I monitor exchange rates. I use it for tidal information when I'm down in Okayama. I use the web browser to look up all sorts of crap, one example being looking up online/overseas prices when I'm out shopping, or checking specs of something I'm interested in. I monitor weather and traffic when I'm away on weekends. I use it for music. I use it at the gym to track my workouts via DailyBurn.com. I use GPS with RunKeeper to keep track of bike workouts on the streets of Osaka. I use the notepad function to jot short notes to myself so I can keep track of all the shit I need to do. I'm sure I've missed a lot of other things I use it for occasionally, and I'm sure I'll find new uses for it as time goes on.

I never saw the need for anything more than just a phone until I got a phone that could do a lot more. I could live without it but I wouldn't give it up voluntarily...

[Coligny]

Since i don't haz friends my phone is mainly used to call mominlaw for help when i get lost or for me bitch to call me to pick her up at work (out of question for her to waste any muney on a second car and she's too ashamed of the dozens of sticker i put to drive the one we haz)... so for me a bulky smartphone with a douchebag(tm) bluetooth headset would be gud... But honestly... Being locked (family contract) with AU-kddi i really wouldn't know what to take... Lucky i'm more of a housecat...

[SBS]

B-mobile's talkingSIM will be perfect for people who 1) don't want a contract, 2) don't make many phone calls, 3) don't send many SMSs, 4) don't have family in Japan, and 5) don't use skype over 3G.

Receiving calls and SMSs will obviously incur no extra charge.

If you don't fit all of those criteria, then it is not for you.

The price for making calls is 21yen/half minute, which AFAIK is the same rate as the other carriers without any discounts applied and when you are subscribed to the cheapest rate plan. SBs white plan is a bit different depending on time of day and if your calling another SB phone, though.

The biggest thing for me would be no family plans - now my entire extended family is on a docomo family plan, so we all get free calls between each other.

No streaming is understandable, since b-mobile must buy bandwidth from Docomo. They either can offer a pay-as-you do data plan or an "unlimited" plan with throttles in place. They did the latter, though I think there could be a market for the former, assuming the payment arrangement with Docomo is not ridiculously complicated (which I bet it is).

but with Google hiring away the guy who designed Palm's WebOS I think we will see great things from Android 3.0

Google has said they've got the core bits and pieces in place and the next iteration (2.3 or 3.0?) will focus primarily on the UI, so I agree. I have a feeling they are going to release something that includes functionality very similar to the best parts of the proprietary UIs. This would also help alleviate fragmentation if handset makers saw no reason to tinker with an already excellent UI. (of course they will still tinker with it).

But as is, with both 2.1 and 2.2, the UI has improved tremendously. In the pic, the the left is the unlock screen with swipe to unlock and mute.

Middle is the way I tend to look at my home screen. Rather than stare at all the apps installed on my phone, I see just what I want to see - weather info for my current location, CPU over/underclock settings with battery temp, various toggle settings, short cuts to stuff I use a lot like jorudan and maps (on the bottom on either side of the application drawer button). And of course a button for quickly contacting the ball and chain.

Right is showing the status bar (top) and quick launch bar (bottom), each viewed by a user-configurable swiping gesture, and a contextual menu that pops up when I click the pic of the ball and chain with shortcuts for (left to right) call, view contact, send SMS, send gmail, view address on map.

Granted, this is quite complicated for the average joe idiot user to set up, so the appeal of the iOS interface, which has minimal configurability, is understandable.

But for me, this set up is much preferable since I can immediately access what I use the most.

I really want to like smart phones, but I don't care for the size. If there were a clamshell smart phone that had a real keyboard (even if tiny) and a TV tuner with an OS that I could customize, I would be set. I would also like to be able to use a stylus with the screen.

As for the OS... the funny thing is I'm actually one of the few people out there that actually likes Windows Mobile. I don't care for the iPhone OS. Android OS is indeed very interesting to me. I have yet to see what the WebOS is about and doubt I will now that HP owns PALM.

Exactly. The main reason I don't have any interest in smart phones is the size. 10 years ago the goal was to make smaller and smaller phones and then somewhere in the early to mid 2000s they started getting bigger again to accomodate all the features. Unless I work for a company that requires me to have a smart phone I doubt I'll be buying one anytime soon.

Feature phones have been affected by the same - think back 10 years ago when not every. single. phone. was a clamshell. They were slim and extremely light. Then came higher res screens, cameras, TV tuners, pedometers, IC cards for payment, etc. etc. and every one of them now is a relatively thick clamshell.

As far as the size of the smartphones in Japan right now, the HTC Sapphire/Magic, sold by Docomo as the ht-03a is probably the smallest. It is significantly smaller than an iPhone. Whenever I see someone with an iPhone, I think "damn that thing is huge."

Now that it is old tech, Docomo is practically giving them away. With Cyanogen Mod, it can run the latest Android OS (2.2 Froyo) which is leaps and bounds ahead of its stock 1.6 Donut. (above pics from froyo on ht-03a)

The downside to this phone is the aging hardware, obviously. It will likely never do flash, even though a full flash app is available for 2.2, because it has in ARM 6 processor and Adobe has only compiled flash for ARM 7 (aka snapdragon) architecture.

Of course, IMHO not having flash is a good thing.

There is no reason for abode to compile for ARM 6 since phones with that processor aren't supposed to be powerful enough/have enough memory to run 2.2 . (Shhh, don't tell that to cyanogen.) Even if they did compile it, based on reports of how flash runs on phones with 1 GHz processors, my guess is that it would run like a 3-legged dog on valium - slooooow.

The other issue is that Docomo has no intention of unlocking phones bought before next fiscal year, though an IMEI generated code will work and only cost 10 euros or something like that.