Earlier this month Zong — China Mobile’s first overseas brand operating in Pakistan — introduced Huawei and Google co-production IDEOS U8150, the cheapest Android 2.2 Froyo handset available in the market, for PKR 15,999 ($185) with six months internet and pay as you go connection.

While at first I wasn’t very surprised as Chinese low-priced products are traditionally a not very good alternative to big brands. However, after few days many of my friends started asking me about this “Smart Phone for All”. Therefore, I conducted some research and decided to feature a review here.

Based on the Froyo 2.2 iteration of the Google Android OS, the Huawei Ideos is aimed at the budget end of the smartphone market and represents Huawei’s big push for mass adoption outside its native Eastern markets. Huawei is best known to most consumers as a maker of 3G dongles and MiFi-style 3G hubs.

PC Advisor’s Verdict

If you’re keen to get into smartphones and have a limited budget, the Google co-developed Huawei Ideos is a great start. Running the latest Android 2.2 OS and with customisable coloured backplates, it offers the appeal of the customisable Android platform without the drag of an expensive and lengthy contract. Recommended.

CNET’s Verdict

Specifications

Quad-band smartphone

Google Android 2.2 Froyo OS

2.8in (240 x 320) capacitive touchscreen, 256k colours

Qualcomm MSM 7225 528MHz processor

256MB RAM

512MB flash storage

802.11b/g/n

Bluetooth 2.1 with A2DP

microSD card slot, up to 16GB cards

GPS

3.15Mp camera

104 x 55 x 14mm

Full specs here.

Detailed Review

Good

Bad

Unlike most smartphones, the Huawei Ideos has a brightly coloured backplate (where others come in unremitting black, though we’re pleased to see Sony Ericsson has recently begun offering a white version of its 8.1Mp Sony Ericsson Xperia X10 Android cameraphone).

It’s notable that the backplate of the Huawei Ideos is much easier than most to remove – good news if you need to swap the SIM card or should you want to customise its look with a different coloured plate. Our review handset rocked a shiny cyan blue that gave it an illusory glow when placed on a light coloured surface. There’s no disguising that this is a fairly cheap-feeling handset, but we’ve certainly enjoyed using others far less.

As is standard for most smartphones now, the display accounts for two thirds of the total frontage of the Huawei Ideos. The screen is a modest 3in across with a resolution of 320×240 pixels. Anyone accustomed to the pinsharp display of the iPhone or other high-end smartphones will find the screen pedestrian, but given the price tag of just £130 or so, sans lengthy contract, it’s a small compromise.

The other aspect to note about the Huawei Ideos’s screen is that it doesn’t support multi-touch. Finger-based navigation is fast and responsive. A Google search bar sits prominently on the front page – unlike other screen elements, holding down a finger and dragging it elsewhere doesn’t let you relocate it. At the opposite end of the searchbar is a microphone button that allows you to speak a search term.

It recognised the phrase ‘PC Advisor’ well enough, but its first result was for the web hosts of the mobile version of this website, while result G pinpointed our offices from three years ago. Google Maps needs to update its listings for this aspect of the Huawei Ideos to work well, it seems.

Like all 2010 Android devices we’ve tried, the Huawei Ideos’s display is bright and colourful. You can flick its five screens from side to side in what is now a signature feature of Android devices. You don’t get fancy visual extras à la HTC or Samsung, but this allows the Ideos to be an excellent ambassador for unadulterated Android 2.2.

A sweep to the left brings up local weather information and tabbed news headlines delivered as RSS-style nuggets. Top stories, UK, Sport and Entertain tabs quickly bring you up-to-date about what’s happening. This at-a-glance listing is much easier than having to fire up a full web page, but we noticed that the content wasn’t necessarily refreshed as much as you might expect. Several hours after Wayne Rooney agreed new contract terms with Manchester United, for example, the Huawei Ideos’s Sports link was still seemingly unaware.

Getting online with the Huawei Ideos is a fast and painless experience. Now that 3G connectivity enjoys widespread coverage in UK cities at least it has become more reliable. Logging on to our home and office Wi-Fi networks was also straightforward.

Hardware buttons below the Huawei Ideos’s screen are used to initiate and end calls, while a large wobbly central button wakes up the screen from its unlit state and is used for moving up and down menu lists. Other navigation functions are covered by touch-sensitive buttons at the very bottom of the display and onscreen.

The Settings menu lets you view the Huawei Ideos’s on-device storage space, manage, mount and format SD cards, as well as allow you to change connection and accessibility options. The Accessibility option prompts you to download a free screen reader from the Android Market, for which you’ll need to provide Gmail login details.

Text to speech and voice recognition options on the Huawei Ideos include a parochial/sensible (depending on your viewpoint) ability to block offensive word recognition so your little darlings don’t use speech search to navigate to a website they shouldn’t.

One of the new features being punted in Android 2.2 is support for Flash video. This battery-draining feature is not offered in lower specification Android handsets such as the Huawei Ideos, but our initial tests of this feature on the more expensive Motorola Milestone 2 suggest there are flaws in its provision anyway.

General web surfing is fine considering the cramped screen and need to manually zoom in and out of pages. The accelerometer inside the Huawei Ideos is quick to respond to changes of orientation so you can read web pages in landscape mode.

As with most Android phones, you need an SD card to store pictures from the onboard camera. The 5Mp camera here is now just about average. It certainly can’t hold a candle to the likes of the Motorola Droid X or Xperia 10.

Check out the video demo below.

Video

[Via PC Advisor & CNET UK]

android, Cheapest Android Phone, Gadgets, Google, Huawei, Mobile Phones, Smartphone, Smartphones

Jailbreaking is freedom for iOS users, giving them a way to break free from Apple’s restrictive App Store ecosystem, install whatever software they want, and use their phones however they please. Technically, each jailbreak is a hack; an exploitation of some flaw in the devices’ operating systems, used to install unauthorized software. This software generally includes some kind of alternative App Store, called either Cydia or Rock.

Jailbreaking is openly discouraged by Apple, who updates various jailbreak exploits out of existence as fast as hackers can find them, but even after three years of pressure from Jobs and Co., the jailbreak scene is still as lively as ever.

Why Jailbreaking is worth trying?

Because the jailbreak app stores are packed full of previously forbidden goodness. This ranges from replacement text message apps and device skins to Wi-Fi tethering apps and access to hidden device settings. The best case to be made for jailbreaking is a showcase of the apps it lets you download.

Jailbreaking is easy to install on any iOS device

There are a few different options for jailbreaking iOS devices, some more involved than others, but at this point, and for current software versions LimeRa1n is the best choice. It works the same way on both Windows and Mac, works for nearly all iDevices (though some 2G iPhone owners have problems), and gets the job done quickly.

Things YOU’LL NEED:

• An iOS device running version 3.2.2 (iPad) or 4.1 (iPhone and iPod Touch)
• A computer with which your iDevice has been paired via sync
• LimeRa1n software from here (an .EXE for Windows users, and a .APP file for Mac users, which must be extracted from a .ZIP)
• A recent iTunes backup of your device, since it will need to be restored after jailbreaking
• About 10 minutes, max

Instructions

1. Connect your iDevice to your computer, and wait until it is recognized by the operating system or iTunes
2. Open the LimeRa1n app
3. Click “make it ra1n”

4. Your device will enter recovery mode. One it’s done, you will be prompted to manually put the device in DFU mode by pressing and holding your home and power buttons.
5. After about 10 or 15 seconds you’ll need to release the power button, but continue holding the home button. You will be prompted by the installer to perform this step, so keep a close eye on it.
6. The device will enter DFU mode, at which point you can let go of the home button. The installer takes care of the rest.

When the phone reboots you will see a new startup screen, and find a limera1n app on your homescreen. Run it to install Cydia—then from there, whatever the hell you want.

[Via Gizmodo]

Apple, apps, hack, iOS, iPad, iPhone, ipod, Jailbreak

Facebook advertising holds tremendous promise for marketers looking to reach targeted audiences online. Nowhere else do people willingly share such specific information about themselves – enabling marketers to target ads and evaluate performance based on details about consumers such as their age, interests, employers, location and even friends and relationships.

Facebook advertising, however, is still relatively new, and advertisers are only beginning to experiment with Facebook ads. Even digital marketing experts, familiar with advanced targeting techniques in paid search and display advertising, are just now figuring out how to effectively run advertising programs on Facebook.

To get your ads noticed by Facebook users, you’ll need to tailor your ads to work within the Facebook experience. Facebook users spend an inordinate amount of time –- more than any other website — on the social network. They interact with friends, share information and connect with their favorite causes; however, despite all their actions, people aren’t searching for products or services. That’s why carefully selecting images, modifying calls-to-action and subtly changing messaging to reach Facebook users is important for success in this channel.

Here are a few insider tricks you can use to take your Facebook targeting and ad performance to the next level.

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1. Remember the User Experience

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Many marketers dive right into Facebook ads expecting to drive traffic from Facebook directly to their site, just as in paid search. While this may work for some, tailoring the experience to Facebook users typically delivers better results. Using Custom Pages or Applications on Facebook to capture traffic allows you to keep users within Facebook for a consistent browsing experience, resulting in lower bounce rates. Custom Pages, as part of your Facebook Page, make it easy for consumers to “Like” your product or brand. For every user who Likes your page, you can remarket to them over time with status updates about deals or upcoming events.

Facebook Apps, on the other hand, provide the marketer with more control over the user experience, as well as the ability to gather detailed demographic data from user profiles. If converting traffic outside of Facebook is a requirement for you, consider tailoring your landing pages to social users. This could include writing different ad copy, the inclusion of Like and sharing buttons on your site and presenting user-generated content such as videos or reviews, as opposed to product information, for Facebook users arriving at your landing page.

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2. Use Root Analysis to Expand Targeting

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Facebook users can list any terms they want to define their likes and interests, so in order to target a full audience of potential customers, you may have to do some investigating for those terms and phrases that go beyond your general keyword search. For example, using the targeting parameter “camping,” your ad will not reach users who have listed “camping in the mountains” or “tent camping” on their profile.

Root analysis is a useful way to discover people’s likes and interests on Facebook to expand your audience and drive more conversions. Simply start with a root word and expand your targeting to include related interests. You can do this by typing the root word into Facebook’s “Likes & Interests” targeting settings and then typing a single letter to find related terms. Using the camping example, entering “camping i” results in a list that includes “camping in California” and “I love camping.” Adding these unique terms to your targeting criteria expands your audience, helping to discover additional valuable consumers and improve ROI.

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3. Segment Your Ads

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With 500 million users on Facebook, there are probably plenty of consumers that you want to reach with your ads. However, not all Facebook users are created equal. Breaking out your audiences to understand the value of each segment, and then adjusting your bids accordingly, will help you optimize your Facebook budget.

Dividing audiences by age, location, and gender should help you find the segments most likely to convert, making each segment more valuable to you. As you measure the performance variance between your segmented advertisements, you can adjust your bids to improve the overall ROI for your Facebook ad campaigns.

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4. Prevent Ad Blindness

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People use Facebook to interact with friends, share their photos and play games, not to look for products and services. Your ads need to grab their attention. Facebook users are inundated with content and typically scan images and text quickly, but there are tricks to modify creative to minimize ad blindness and increase click-through rates. The most successful ads include colorful, engaging images — and of course, a compelling and relevant offer. Adding borders to your photos in colors like orange or yellow, which contrast with the blue and white Facebook interface, is a simple way to pull the user’s eyes in your ad’s direction.

Make sure to test early and often here, as the results will surprise you. The most-clicked ads are not necessarily the most aesthetically pleasing; they are often the ones that stand out on the page. Also, because ads can be served to the same users multiple times, it doesn’t take long for users to completely tune out repeat ads, so you have to keep your approach creative and fresh. Rotating images and headline copy as performance drops over time can help boost click-through rates.

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Conclusion

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By using the tips above to target and optimize your advertisements, you should have a head start in Facebook marketing. More importantly, by building competencies in this new channel, you can build sustainable advantage over the competition through superior targeting and optimization.

Taking a wait-and-see approach may be the safe route, but now is the time to begin. The Facebook advertiser base is still relatively small in comparison to the Facebook audience. As a result, costs-per-click rates remain lower than paid search and other channels. As advertisers continue to shift dollars to Facebook, costs will rise, and advertisers that have managed to build a fan base early will be better positioned to reap dividends from their investment.

What tips can you offer? What has worked with your own advertising experience on Facebook? Do you also zone out uninspired ads? Let us know in the comments below.

[Via Mashable]

Ad, Advertising, Business, Facebook, List, Lists, Marketing, ROI, small business, social media marketing, Tips

A 22-year-old mother from Jacksonville, Florida, has pleaded guilty to second-degree murder for shaking her 3-month-old son to death after his crying interrupted her FarmVille game.

The mother, Alexandra V. Tobias, was arrested in January and declared her plea on Wednesday before Circuit Judge Adrian G. Soud, The Florida Times-Union reports.

She told investigators that she shook the baby, smoked a cigarette “to compose herself,” and proceeded to shake him again. The baby may have hit his head during one of the two shakings, she said.

FarmVille, named one of the “worst inventions” in recent decades by Time magazine, has more than 60 million members, most of whom access the game through Facebook. Some players have found it so addicting that they’ve lost their jobs and racked up debts north of $1,000.

Needless to say, it is Ms. Tobias — and not the game itself — that is responsible for the death of her 3-month-old son. This is not the first time that a virtual game has led to murder; in 2009, 28-year-old Joseph Johnson of Chicago was charged with first-degree murder after allegedly shooting his companion in the head while playing an Xbox game.

[Via Mashable]

Facebook, farmville, Gaming, murder, social games, Technology, Technology news, Zynga

“Ugh!” I put my hands on my head and looked away from my computer at the ceiling. “I can’t do this! It’s just not coming out right!”

My wife, Eleanor, looked over sympathetically from the desk next to mine; she knew how hard I had been working. I was preparing for a TEDx talk I was scheduled to give in Flint, Michigan and although I was somewhere around version 25 of my speech, I was still dissatisfied.

I love the idea behind TED: you have 18 minutes to talk about an idea worth sharing. Lots of well-known people have given fascinating talks and I felt honored to be invited to offer mine. I also felt tremendous pressure to make it a great speech.

I had been asked to focus on “learning:” a good thing because I have lots to say, but a bad thing because I have lots to say. If I had eight hours to speak I could have done it off the cuff. But 18 minutes? Which one of my ideas is important enough, interesting enough, and matters to me enough to choose? And once I chose one, how should I present it so it’s engaging, funny, clever, clear and creative? All in 18 minutes?

On top of that, every TED speaker is video taped, with three cameras, and the talks are posted on the web. Which is wonderful if my talk goes well. But if it doesn’t? If it’s a disaster? There will be no escape.

I wanted it to be perfect. So I had cordoned off a significant amount of time over several weeks to write and practice my talk.

I should know better.

When I try to make something perfect, it’s almost a guarantee that I’ll over-think it. Which means I’ll spend too much time spinning with too little progress. Hence version 25.

On some level, over-thinking is part of the process of taking on bigger challenges. I remember my first paper as an undergraduate at Princeton. It was a small, ungraded, one-page reaction paper to a reading assignment in a religion class. I pulled an all-nighter.

But over-thinking is rarely helpful, increases stress, takes a tremendous amount of time, and never produces a better product.

I cleared my schedule for two weeks — not even writing my usual blog posts — so I could focus completely on the speech. A big mistake.

While it takes a lot of time to work on something creative, it can’t be accomplished all at once. Creativity needs to percolate over time. After a few focused hours in a day, my productivity declined rapidly.

So what happened to all those hours I had cordoned off to focus on the speech? I couldn’t possibly spend them all working on the speech. But, it turns out, I could spend a surprising amount of them stressing about the speech.

Why didn’t I spend my time on other important tasks? This doesn’t make rational sense, but I think, somehow, that would have been an acknowledgment that I wasn’t spending my time where I thought I should have been: working on the speech. So, instead of doing valuable work, I took long breaks, distracting myself with the internet and food. Crazy, but there you have it.

Others tried to support me by telling me not to worry. I’m a natural at it and I’ll be great. I give speeches all the time and I should just do what I always do: be myself.

But those thoughts just increased the pressure because they reminded me of the expectation that the speech be really, really great.

So what should we do when we’re under pressure to deliver on a big challenge?

For me, two things were most helpful.

1. I ran out of time. I had two weeks. Then one week. Then three days. That’s when my productivity kicked up. There’s a saying: if you want something done, ask a busy person to do it. Another way to think about it: If you want to get something done, become a busy person. Don’t empty your schedule, fill it. The busier you are, the less time you have to get in your own way. I should have cordoned off a few hours each day and filled everything else with work I considered important.
2. I changed my expectations. One morning, a few days before the speech, I found a note on my computer, left by Eleanor. She told me the speech might not end up being that great. But in the big picture, it wouldn’t make a huge difference. Surely it would be good. And if not that, then at least OK. Which, ultimately, would be just fine. Once I read that, something shifted in me. I stopped trying so hard. I stopped trying to be funny, smart, clever, or creative. I stopped trying to talk about the three most important things. I stopped trying to make this my best talk ever. Instead, I set a goal I knew I could achieve: talk about one thing — not necessarily the thing, just something that was meaningful to me — and talk about it simply and passionately.

Life is a process and while one stellar moment — be it a success or a failure — can make a difference, it’s far more likely that the steady production of many adequate moments over a significant period of time will make a much bigger difference.

In my next blog post, I’m going to discuss my process for getting to the final version of my speech. The video is not posted on the web yet, but once it is, I’ll include a link so you can decide for yourself what you think.

It may not be great. But, hopefully, you’ll find it good enough.

About the Author

Peter Bregman speaks, writes, and consults on leadership. He is the CEO of Bregman Partners, Inc., a global management consulting firm, and the author of Point B: A Short Guide To Leading a Big Change.

(Via HBR)

Business, Career advice, Communication, Leadership development, Managing yourself, Personal effectiveness, Personal Management, Presentations

Seven out of 10 people store sensitive information such as medical and bank details on their mobile phone without any security, new research has found.

At the same time, four out of five respondents cite security as a top priority when buying or using a smartphone.

The research was conducted by security firm Juniper Networks.

“We are all living the mobile dream and the next killer app is peace of mind,” Mark Bauhaus, executive vice president for Juniper said. “Mobile phones represent the fastest adopted technology in the history of mankind – faster than video camcorders or the TV. I think the issue of security it hitting us quite quickly. As we grow the number of devices, so the bad guys increase and the sophistication of attacks also grow,” added Mr Bauhaus.

Mobile spyware

Juniper said that in the last year there had been a 250% jump in the number of threats in the mobile space from malware to viruses.

Research has shown that beyond a certain prevalence of one kind of operating system, mobiles would be subject to massive virus attacks.

In anticipation of a security market for phones that will in time run parallel to that for desktop computers, all the major security software vendors now offer a smartphone software package.

In its research covering 6,000 participants spread over 16 countries, Juniper found that 61% of all reported smartphone infections were spyware, capable of monitoring communication from the device.

A further 17% were text message Trojans that charge fees to a device’s account holder.

Compromise agents

One of the big areas of concern in the security world is the workplace.

Juniper reported that 59% of employees who use their phone for business do so without permission, representing a compromise of enterprise security.

“Smartphones have changed the very dynamic around how organisations and individuals are thinking about security as smartphones increasingly replace the laptop and the PC as the normal way for employees to do their job,” said Mark Patterson general manager of mobile data services for BT.

“But there is also an awareness that these smart devices, which have been thought of as pretty innocent, can become agents of compromise.”

As to the workplace threat, Juniper said that one Fortune 15 company discovered that 5% – or 25,000 – of its mobile devices were infected with malware.

Lost or stolen

BT’s Mr Patterson said he was not surprised and thought this represented the tip of the iceberg.

“As soon as you bring the ability to do financial transactions, make real business decisions and move information that is ‘corporate sensitive’, that creates an opportunity and a threat.

“The sophistication of the hacker threats grows because it represents too great an opportunity,” added Mr Patterson.

Industry watchers agreed mobile security is a critical problem and will only increase as more and more people rely on their mobile phone.

Gartner research has estimated that the number of mobile devices will grow to around ten billion by 2013.

“A lot of software and hardware vendors are trying to solve this issue of mobile security and the proliferation of smartphones and tablets are creating a new wrinkle in that problem,” said J. Bonasia, staff writer for Investor’s Business Daily.

“In the not too distant future, we will hear more personal hardship stories about people telling their friends about their phones getting lost, stolen or corrupted. This word-of-mouth will create a real tipping point about the issue among the public.”

Juniper revealed that in the last year in the US, two million people had either lost or had their mobile phone stolen.

[Via BBC]

Gadgets, Mobile Phones, Mobile Security, security, Smartphone, Smartphones, Technology

Wi-Fi Direct officially became a concrete technology yesterday with several new laptop components certified by the Wi-Fi Alliance. That threshold was reached even before most people even understand what Wi-Fi Direct is.

Wi-Fi Direct is a new technology designed to allow peer-to-peer Wi-Fi connections between devices like smartphones and cameras without a traditional Wi-Fi network or the need for Wi-Fi access points.

Communication between Wi-Fi devices isn’t specifically new. The Nintendo DS, for instance, has had device-to-device Wi-Fi interaction for some time, but the technology is proprietary.

The Wi-Fi Alliance differentiates Wi-Fi Direct by certifying the standard, ensuring interoperability. Devices stamped with the Wi-Fi Direct certification don’t need wireless networks, as they essentially become micro-hotspots.

This technology will conceivably allow devices like an Eye-Fi memory card to directly beam an image to a wireless printer. Since Wi-Fi Direct is largely software based, many recent devices should be upgradeable.

Speeds for Wi-Fi Direct are based on 802.11b/g/n channels, so we’re looking at intra-device throughput at rates upward of 300Mbps. Range will also be a major selling point, and it’s reasonable to expect that future Wi-Fi Direct devices will eventually achieve distances similar to our home wireless networks.

Bluetooth will undoubtedly be the first technology to suffer as a result of Wi-Fi Direct. Although Bluetooth is aimed, almost universally, at close connections like headsets, it will be hard to trump the speed of Wi-Fi direct. Additionally, Wi-Fi Direct would use the same transponders as other Wi-Fi functions, so device manufacturers will likely be quick to cut redundant technologies.

Here’s a quick animation that illustrates the functionality of Wi-Fi Direct:

The Wi-Fi Alliance has posted an FAQ about the technology on its Web site.

Eye-Fi, Gadgets, Technology, Wi-Fi, Wi-Fi Alliance, Wireless