Shonzilla, a pattern-seeking animal

Street Hero - Amazing bus jump

An attempt at launching a viral campaign for the latest HTC smartphone running Google Android - HTC Hero. This video is supposedly created by a parkour group Street Heroes whose MySpace page is a couple of days old.

To get the full point of this viral ad, make sure to watch the related video where you can see the entire commercial from point-of-view recorded with headcam, i.e. HTC Hero strapped to guys head. :-)

[via thestreetheroes and digital buyologie]

Taiwanese Elan Microelectronics claims to have patented multi-touch technology under the name “eFinger Transparent Touchpad” before Apple filed for that patent. They already had some issues with Synaptics, the company that has been supplying Apple, no more no less, with their own touch technology (e.g. touchpad for iPods).

Now, Elan Microelectronics is suing Apple over multi-touch (or was it multi-finger?) patents. In this video you can see their eFinger Transparent Touchpad technology being used in a device that runs Android OS. That also proves the flexibility and potential of open-source Android platform.

On a side note, it is evident that Elan’s technology is more powerful then the original T-Mobile G1’s capacitive screen has and as demonstrated by an Android deveoper, Rye Brye, several months ago.

Sprint the Now Network

I like commercials like this - fun, fast-pased and informative.

This one has been made by Goodby, Silverstein & Partners and the client is US mobile carrier Sprint, obviously.

And here’s that talking dog to justify the informative part above. ;-)

Rhodes framework

Here’s another open-source cross-platform mobile application framework I’ve discovered. It’s called Rhodes framework. This one is both very interesting and special because it does not use web browser as run-time environment but it rather creates native applications.

Cross-platform mobile applications are written in Ruby programming language using MVC architectural. This is definitely good news for all Rails developers out there and perhaps an additional push for everyone else considering finally learning the Ruby language and Rails framework as well.

The version 1.0 release a week ago, on March 24th, supports mobile platforms such as iPhone, Windows Mobile, Symbian, BlueBerry, and last but not least, Android.

Rhodes framework includes the first Ruby implementation for all the mentioned platforms except Symbian which already had one. Cross-platform mobile Ruby code gets translated into natively optimized mobile apps. One of the main components is client-side component called RhoSync which allows integration with web services and, consequently, integration with almost any back-end system or application. Some integrations already available with Rhodes framework are SugarCRM integration and Ligthouse integration.

How does it work? Nice people from Rhomobile explain it themselves:
“In general, developer productivity is much higher in Rhodes than writing to diverse native device operating systems and APIs since most of your UI customization can be done in HTML templates (ERB files). Rhodes also provides access to native device capabilities such as GPS and PIM data via an extended set of tags (e.g. <geolocation/>).”

Has Rhodes framework intrigued you? If so, have a look at Rhodes tutorial.

iFart economy

Q: What is iFart economy?
A: It’s the impact that a simple product, regardless how bizarre, can provoke in your immediate environment. Thanks to viral effects of humor everyone understands this effect expands to a wider audience and, consequently, creates its own market niche.

Watch the the commercial for the application for the iPhone and iPod Touch. One has to admit it’s fun as hell regardless of your educational background, ethicity, zodiac sign or your favorite brand of mobile phone. The reason why I’m writing about it is that it is sold through iTunes Store for $1. Joel Comm, the iFart developer, has revealed that it is downloaded over 10.000 times a day. Yes, that’s over ten thousand times every day, give or take. During last Christmas it was particularly popular and was sold nearly 40.000 times. Knowing 30% is sliced off by Apple – do the math and draw your own conclusions…

Perhaps more people should be making mobile applications, developing for the popular mobile platforms like the upcoming iPhone 3.0, Android, Symbian, WebOS (on still anticipated Palm Pre)…? Maybe developers should less enterprise applications and more fun ones that can be used and enjoyed by anyone?

You can tell that this cheap mobile app is viral with a potential to inspire some priceless moments. You don’t believe me? Watch what happens when a kid uses iFart during City Council meeting.

Do you want to work for Google? No problem!

You can work for Google, alas, for free by helping them improve the voice transcription algorithms used in Google Voice’s voicemail. Google Voice is a revamped GrandCentral, which Google bought 21 months ago and finally re-released as a new service offering several interesting features you can read and watch other videos here.

Google Voice is supposed to be the new and better Skype and is likely to further endanger Microsoft’s dominance in the space occupied by Outlook in small and medium companies. Indeed, it sounds tempting to have all of your information like emails, contacts, reminders, (shared) appointments, documents etc. converged under the same umbrella in the (Google) cloud. One thing is sure - Google’s dominance in the information space is becoming bigger and consequently scarier.

Are you eager to try Google Voice? I know I am.
If you can’t wait to try it out, you need an existing GrandCentral account. Don’t have one? Buy one at eBay - prices go up to $650!

I’m thinking what may be the next evolutionary step for Google Voice. Maybe, if everything goes well according to plans for world domination, Google may start offering free international calls after you hear a short audio ad that is personalized to you, i.e. your email+SMS+conversation stream.

What do you think?

Another fun commercial for a mobile operator advertising a new 3G rodent. This one is for the Argentinian Claro, starring two kids and two guinea pigs, produced by El Cielo agency. Nice!

[via lin7s]