So, for a week now, I’ve been using a new phone. It has a white side, a black side, and some pretty glassy-touchy-feely thing. It’s also from Apple Inc. and I didn’t bought it (obrigado Catarina!). iTunes is not compatible with my OS, so no sync with anything.

Impressions so far:

• good for playing games
• good for email
• shit for watching videos (unless you convert them to some strange format only a few people use)
• good enough for watching videos if you convert them to some strange format only a few people use
• it has copy/paste!
• Wifi is nice!
• as phone, it’s just “OK”.

Let’s see if I can get used to this…

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Let’s say, for whatever reason, you’re the first human ever to make alien contact…

Some months ago, I predicted an application that would merge all contact forms in one place. I was expecting Android to be the first one with something like this, but it was Nokia. I did not see that coming!

Ever since I got my first SonyEricsson mobile, I never gave Nokia a second look. The phones were ugly, with shity and slow software. SonyEricsson’s had (and still have) a great design, with a much more user friendly and intuitive software. Unfortunately, people where too hooked on Nokia (Microsoft style) to notice it, and never got to try it out.

Now… this is the first time I’m expecting something good out of Nokia, a mobile that actually fits all my demands (in no specific order):

• WLAN
• 5 Megapixel (the minimum to reach the old 35mm role’s quality) camera with video recording capability
• Bluetooth
• An OS that is a bit more open than most
• and of course, the killer contact list!

I’m sure that last feature will be copied and, hopefully, improved by others. Finally!

I don’t know the final price, but “they” are saying around $750. It is expensive but, after that, it can only come down…

Damn… I think I’m going to miss it by a few weeks: Maker Faire Africa. Quoting Afrigadjet:

The aim of a Maker Faire-like event is to create a space on the continent where Afrigadget-type innovations, inventions and initiatives can be sought, identified, brought to life, supported, amplified, propagated, etc. Maker Faire Africa asks the question, “What happens when you put the drivers of ingenious concepts from Mali with those from Ghana and Kenya, and add resources to the mix?”

Next time I’m in Kenya, I should definitely meet some of this people. Would it be interesting to make a podcast out of this possible encounter?

This must be one of the coolest DIY things I’ve seen recently. Basically, Dharma Initiative labels that you can print and put on your own things.

Enjoy!

P.S.: I’ve a bottle of  water made by the DI now.

Next Monday, Last.fm will start charging users for the privilege of listening to music from their service. I, like many, am not willing to pay for this. Nevertheless, I think I’ve found a way to keep, at least, part of the free online radio. It’s very simple.

Only play royalty free music.

I’m sure many artists only want the exposure and are willing to let Last.fm play their music for free. Jamendo and Magnatune, for example would probably be interested in this. Last.fm would only have to implement a system where the artist selects, or not, this option. All the other things that make the service good will keep existing, but for the free users, instead of playing every available artist, it would select only those from the royalty free list. I could live with this, could you?

With Android getting into cruise speed, it’s probably time to talk about an integration, or application, that does something I’ve been waiting for a long time. It’s actually very simple: full contact list integration.

So, what do I mean by this?

Day by day, our world is getting even more connected in each and every way, but our personal availability to connect is still limited. More, the “mobile internet” is already here: iPhone, netbooks, cheap mobile data plans, etc. Of course, not everyone wants to be available 24/7, but remember there’s always the off switch.

To put it short, I want, and predict, that the next generation of contact lists, most probably the mobile phone books, will also be instant messengers, with redundant contacts to the same person/object. It isn’t anything new, just the merging of two concepts. Pidgin is a very good example, where a single client program connects to a variety of services, providing an almost seamless instant messaging experience to the user. Now just imagine that it works in your own mobile, and integrates with it’s phone book. Bingo! You are now able to talk (or communicate) with any person in your contacts list, either they have a mobile phone or not! Another example is Jaiku‘s S60 application, that integrates with Nokia‘s mobile phone books.

Again, I know there are lots of programs that to a part of this, but I’m still waiting to see the full integration. No messy apps, just one contact list, with everything you need to communicate with another person.

And Android could well be the best candidate platform to do this…

It was freaking time someone explained this!

I’m a big fan of Symbian and UIQ3, so I was very happy when I found Bergamot.

In their words:

The Bergamot Project produces high quality free and open source software for the Symbian mobile phone platform used by Nokia, Sony Ericsson, Motorola, and Samsung.

Unfortunately:

As the Symbian environment is presently undergoing significant changes, we are shifting the project’s focus from the UIQ user interface towards S60, which will be the basis for the coming Symbian OS.

Still, I’ve been using Escarpod (a podcatcher) under UIQ3, and it works really well.