Posts Tagged ‘apple’

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Deposit Checks With Your Cell Phone

May 11, 2010

I have to hand it to the folks at USAA. They are ahead of the game in every respect. They have released a mobile application that allows you to deposit a check using your cell phone! For over a year, they have had an application that allows customers to deposit checks using a computer and a scanner. This has been incredibly helpful as they do not have local branches.

This is relatively straight forward technology has been made possible because of the switch in the banking industry to “check truncation.” In the old days, seven years ago, the physical check was sent from the recipient’s bank back to the check writer’s bank. This was a laborious task that took a lot of resources to manage all of those paper checks. Under the check truncation process, an electronic image of the check is deemed just as good, so once a bank has an image of the check, they can destroy the original.

However, under their new application (currently only available for iPhone and Android devices), a customer simply takes a picture of the check and it is deposited into their account.  I have yet to use this technology, but it would certainly help around my house as checks often sit attached to our refrigerator waiting to go upstairs to the scanner for deposit. You can watch a YouTube video of this process here.

I have yet to use this application myself being a Blackberry owner, but USAA’s website promises a Blackberry version soon. If you have used the application to deposit a check, please drop me a line. I’m anxious to know how it worked for you.

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You Will Get a Charge Out Of This

July 2, 2009

What seems like such a logical product feature is finally coming to pass thanks to, gulp, the Europeans… If you have owned more than one mobile phone, chances are you have more than one mobile phone charger. There is even a good chance that those phone chargers are not interchangeable leading to a huge black hole of old cell phone chargers in landfills. One estimate I read was that 1.2 billion cell phones are sold each year, each with its own charger. This seems a bit high, but maybe not that far off the mark.

The major cell phone companies have all voluntarily agreed to standardize on the micro USB port for cell phone charging. This includes the Apple iPhone which might also translate into standardization of the microUSB for iPods in the near future. Forget the cable to synchronize your PDA while on the road, no worries, just ask one of your collegues who has a PDA – even if it is a different brand.

I got fed up with all of the different chargers that I purchased one of those universal power adapters that will power my laptop, iPod and phones by purchasing separate “tips”. This was fantastic when I was routinely carrying four or five different phones for demonstrations. Even phones made by the same manufacturer used different power tips. I have five different power tips for Motorola phones alone! Every time I would upgrade my phone, I would receive a new charger – even on the off chance that the phone I was upgrading used the same charger as one of my old phone.

One estimate is that this agreement could reduce by half the number of chargers produced each year and save nearly 50,000 tons of charger trash from reaching our landfills. (I wonder what the half-life of a phone charger is anyway…) Having one power adapter for multiple devices will not only reduce the waste, but also reduce the clutter in my briefcase or bags when I travel. Not having to spend an additional $25 each time I upgrade my phone for a new car charger is also a bonus. (OK, I never paid that much, but that is what the carriers sell them for in the store.)

Who stands to gain from this switch? In short, just about everyone. Less junk in landfills and no unneeded production costs. Even the folks that make these chargers will likley continue to make them for the cell phone manufacturers. Carriers will likely sell more replacment chargers than they currently do. Since replacement chargers are not subject to subsidies, they actually stand to make MORE money from this switch. I doubt if the handset manufactuers will lower their prices so this will help them as they can charge the same amount without the cost of buying, packaging and shipping the chargers. The biggest winner of all, however, will be Mother Earth who no longer has to ingest old cell phone chargers.

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A New Mac vs. PC Commercial

June 2, 2009

I can see it now, the new Mac vs. PC commercial need a makeover. The new commercials will be the iPhone vs. the Berry. I’m not sure who will replace John Hodgman as the PC, but I think dipping into the Daily Show well again and selecting Aasif Mandvi would be a great choice.

The commercials would be largely scripted the same. The capable, but frumpy Blackberry would talk about the features it wished it had and the iPhone will be surprised that these features are not standard on all phones. Casts of other characters could play popular applications available for the iPhone and not available on the Berry. That could even be the name of the Blackberry character, “Berry.” Of course just like the PC commercials, the Berry would crash periodically and need to be rebooted by yanking the battery. 

These commercials, of course, are largely consumer focused, but isn’t that the point? Apple will get adoption at the grass roots level and then corporations will have to figure out how to support these phones with limited security and application management solutions. But at the end of the day, what CIO is going to tell the CEO that he can’t use the coolest phone on the block? Even the Secret Service had to bow to the wishes of President Obama to allow him to carry a PDA. (Of course, he is using a specially modified Blackberry with enhanced security software installed.)

While Blackberry still rules with about double the market share over the iPhone, their dominance is on shaky ground. A few extra features and and additional carriers and Apple can make a serious run at the dominant slot for corporate communications. Security, centralized management and true multi-tasking are key for corporations to adopt the iPhone. But these are things that can be added within a year. Now that Apple has mind-share, and the consumer market waiting for each iteration, RIM had better watch out.

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Pre Pre Announcements

May 29, 2009

Woe is Sprint. They haven’t even launched the long awaited Palm Pre smart phone and already Verizon Wireless and AT&T are sucking all of the wind out of their sails. Verizon Wireless CEO Lowell McAdam announced in an investor web-cast that his carrier will begin selling the Palm Pre at the end of the year giving Sprint a woeful six months of exclusivity to try to woo Palm die-hards to its subscriber roles. 

Will the Pre be worth it? Hopefully Palm has spent as much effort designing and building the product as they have hyping it. Signs say that they have really thought about how the modern consumer and business person operates to have some very useful features. Highlights include:

  • Multiple calendars – This is something that I really need to learn how to use for my Blackberry Storm. With two different Google Calendars (one personal and one that a client uses) plus trying to synchronize with my desktop and notebook Outlook calendars, this is a great feature. It also automatically manages contacts in different places to synchronize and keep those contacts consistent. (Nothing worse than having two different mobile numbers for the same person…)
  • Background applications – Apple, are you listening? The ability to have multiple applications open and switch between them without having to shut down is a major feature that mimics how people actually work. (I apologize to any of you who are organized enough to completely put away one task on your desk before starting the next…)
  • Direct access to iTunes – This is a recent rumor that may or may not last but apparently the Pre will be able to purchase non-copy protected content directly from iTunes. This opens a whole host of music and podcast options.

The Pre also includes a slide-out keyboard instead of a touch screen. Personally, I think you either need to go keyboard or touch screen. I have never really felt comfortable with the slide-out keyboards. Perhaps this is because the keyboard is below the screen surface and it makes it slightly uncomfortable to hold. I will reserve judgement on this feature to actually try typing on a production model.

Will the Pre compete with the iPhone or Blackberry? My personal take is “Yes, in some circles.” If you are a die-hard Palm fan, this will likely be a great upgrade to your old Treo. If you are a die-hard Sprint customer, then this could be the smart phone for you. If you currently are an AT&T or a Verizon Wireless customer and are not a Palm user, you should likely skip this phone in favor of the iPhone or a Blackberry model… 

The bigger question is will this have a significant impact on Sprint? In six months I think we are all going to look at the number and say that defections to Sprint are negligible and that at best, it has saved them a number of subscribers from defecting away…

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Too Many App Stores?

May 27, 2009

I’ve been excited about all of the announcements of mobile application stores that will make it easier for application developers to publish their work and for consumers to download and take advantage of innovative (and sometimes stupid) software. Recently a number of articles have been published that dismisses the viability of all of the application stores announced.

To be sure, many of the application stores that have been announced will never be launched. Of those that are launched, some will even die as their corporate sponsors loose interest without significant revenue rolling in. But I do not believe that we will see a disastrous withering of the application store space and here is why.

First, for many of the corporate sponsors such as Motorola and Microsoft, application stores are really a marketing expense for their handset platforms. They recognize that in order to sell handsets, there must be innovative and useful applications available.  This is what captures the fancy of the public and will drive handset sales. These stores are here to stay. They will, however, get competitive to get unique content on their shelves. Look for one of them to undertake an aggressive pricing and revenue share strategy with developers to encourage exclusive content.

Some of the smaller handset manufacturers who can not attract large user bases, however, may find that the marketing expense is not worth the cost. They will not be able to pay to have exclusive content nor underwrite the cost of running an application store at aggressive revenue share prices.

Secondly, big box stores come to the phone. It is possible that we will see stores such as Best Buy and potentially even a player such as Wal Mart come to the small screen. These stores are starting to realize that all software sales are going to head the way of the application store, even desktop software. The barriers to the consumer to visit the store to see a package are shrinking. Already “subscription” services prevalent in the anti-virus space and is really defacto in the personal finance arena as well. (Is Quicken 2009 really that much different than 2008?) Of course, Apple is already the first all digital big-box store…

Lastly, niche stores can make a play. Just as offline retailers have recognized the way to compete with big box stores is to provide deep expertise in a specific area. Look for niche focused application stores to come to the market. I can see some based around games, exercise, location-based services (LBS) as some of the first niche stores. These stores will provide expert advice and support that the larger stores can not offer. At least until the larger stores purchase their brands…

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What is Steve Up To?

May 20, 2009

Steve Jobs is on medical leave. Can anyone honestly picture this guy taking a break? My guess is that on day two of his medical leave he was puttering around the mansion wishing he had a better thing-a-ma-bob. What is that thing-a-ma-bob? Many people think the money is on a device that is between an iPhone and a netbook and I like that bet.

Think about it, when do you need such a device? When you are stuck at home or in a hospital and don’t want to crack out the notebook. Rumors have it that the device will not have a keyboard but will have a larger screen than the iPhone so that it will be suitable for reading newspapers and magazines.

Not that my idea was original, but it this does sound like my Star Trek data pad. But here is where I think that Steve will do me one (or a few hundred) better. My concept was to have the data pad attached to a smaller, more traditional mobile phone. Steve will likely realize that he can drive any deal with any carrier and the big reason to have a limitation like this is because of a crazy price plan driven by a carrier. Instead of requiring the device to have a traditional phone line plus a huge per month data charge, he will force the carriers to accept a much lower data charge on the order of $30 a month or unlimited usage. This will be even lower if you have an existing contract with the carrier. There is precedent for this as carriers are looking to sell other devices from Internet Phone Hubs (huh) to switches that make your cell phone work on your home phones. Carriers are also rushing headlong into the netbook space such as Verizon Wireless launching the HP Mini 1151 this month. (Although the price point is still too high at $40 for 250 MB a month.)

Apple could really clean up in this space as they have all the components necessary to make this a smash:

  • Experience with touch screen, WiFi and a cellular modems – solved with iPhone 
  • Good email client – solved this with the iPhone or leverage one on the Apple
  • Good web browser – solved with the MacBook
  • Good developer program for custom applications
  • Positive consumer oriented brand – few people beat Apple
  • Retail presence

I also think that this is not necessarily a replacement for a netbook. Perhaps the netbook is first but I hope to see my data pad not too far behind. Once the device is on the market, look for better remote control over other home gadgets such as TV’s, iTunes, lights, dishwashers, etc…

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Can Wireless Save The Newspaper

April 29, 2009

I can’t help but think of the REM song “It’s the End of the World as We Know It” while writing this post. It won’t be the last posting or article that touts the beginning of the end for the print media industry. Trees everywhere are rejoicing in the fact that their brethren will soon be safe from the newsroom presses.

The recession has hastened this demise as advertisers pull back from all sorts of traditional printed advertisements in favor of digital formats. It is as if media buyers had a Gilligan’s Island moment when a coconut fell on their head and they suddenly realized the lack of effectiveness of print media. Junk mail volume is down (yeah) but so are advertisements in newspapers and magazines.

Now I am not bashing online business models, I think they are valuable. I am also not bashing the move to digital media, this is an important evolutionary step that will make the media industry better in the long haul. What I am pointing out, however, is that there is a missing link for the convenient consumption of the written word that makes it convenient to receive and read.

I pointed out to the editors of PC Magazine that I typically read their magazine cover-to-cover while in bed at the end of the day. I tried the Zino reader on my notebook in January when they switched to all digital delivery and made it half-way through. I haven’t read a word of any issues since.

The missing link is a decent wireless device and interface that makes it easier to consume the written word. This may be the long awaited “ebook” but even this category has a lot of groundwork to cover in order to be the replacement of the printed newspaper or magazine. Amazon.com has certainly injected excitement into this category with its Kindle product. It is a nice ebook reader that is bundled with wireless networking provided by Sprint. It allows subscribers to purchase books on-line and have them automatically downloaded to their device, many times within seconds.

The downside is that it has a steep startup cost ($360) that puts the device out of range for most readers. (Hey Jeff B – if you are reading, I’d love to review one…) Reviews also indicate that the interface is also not there for magazine reading. (For one thing, no color.)

Magazines and newspapers also need to rethink the way that they deliver content. Zinio does a great job of recreating the page turn of a magazine on the PC, but if you don’t have a page to turn, do you really need that experience? I don’t think the typical web experience is what we need either. There is a certain comfort with well organized sections that are visually navigable. (Hmmm, maybe the iPhone interface can help out here?)

Wireless push delivery is also a great idea here. Not having to wait for content to download allows the e-Media reader to be read offline. This is helpful when you have poor coverage or on a plane where you have no coverage.
Industry players are starting to circle around this space and I expect to see a lot of advancement. Amazon just purchased Lexcyle, an iPhone e-book reader application in addition to developing on their own Kindle for iPhone application. I had a great conversation with Zinio who was in the Qualcomm booth at CTIA. Apple is rumored to be working on a Media Pad (product design team, please read my post on Star Trek getting it right!) which could be a Kindle killer.

I guess that REM song was the right one for this post. “It’s the end of the world as we know it… but I feel fine.”

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Mobile Application Stores For All

April 7, 2009

I’m back from CTIA and had a great time. The show was much smaller this year than in the past but to some extent, that made it easier to network. (As one of my friends used to say “all the tourists have gone home.”) There was a lot of buzz around the shift to 4G – the next generation of wireless networks that promises higher speeds and capacity.

The real story of the show, however, was the abundance of mobile application stores. As with just about any change in the wireless industry over the last two years, Apple started the ball rolling with the addition of mobile applications to the iTunes store. This made it ridiculously easy for mobile application developers to reach consumers and even easier for consumers to download mobile applications to their phone. Gone are the two years of networking and cajoling of carriers to make your application one of a few dozen that appear on their “deck” of approved applications. iTunes literally has thousands of applications.

Device manufacturers realize that they were losing market share to Apple (who has gained 26% of the smart-phone market in less than two years!). It was no longer up to the carrier or the handset manufacturer to add functionality to their phones, they can focus on what they should do best, create a great platform, and allow developers to add functionality.

At CTIA Research In Motion (RIM) launched AppWorld for the Blackberry. (Download it by pointing your mobile phone browser to http://www.blackberry.com/appworld.) In fact, most of their booth was devoted to featured application developers. While some phones were about, there was little fanfare around the Bold or the Storm, their flagship smartphones.

Additionally, Samsung, Microsoft and Motorola announced their own application stores to join Symbian and Nokia’s application stores. To be sure, there will be a great deal of overlap between these stores and it will open a quandary and potentially a great opportunity for application developers.

Ironically, while Apple has broken down the Chinese Wall that has blocked application developers from getting their applications to consumers, it has also taken some heat for blocking some applications (http://news.cnet.com/8301-13846_3-10041187-62.html).  With several stores having the ability to sell the same products (e.g., Samsung, Motorola and Microsoft will all sell Windows Mobile applications) will there be alternative channels for applications blocked from one store. I asked the folks at Samsung if they would sell applications to non-Samsung phones and they didn’t appear to have thought about this scenario. The marketing manager I spoke with  indicated that there wouldn’t be anything blocking such sales.

Will there be a market for specialty stores (only applications for outdoors (REI Mobile), mobile photography (Ritz Mobile), etc. ? How many application stores can we handle? Interestingly, the mobile application stores can be quickly set up and be more of a marketing expense then a true money making operation. A simple payment mechanism, some advertising, a database, and automated customer service and shazam you are in the mobile application store business.

The net-net good news for all – it will be easier for developers to create and deploy applications for mobile phones. Additionally, the abundance of stores will lead to price competition to get higher revenue shares for developers. Some stores are already promising 70% of the application revenue for developers. This is a huge shift from developers getting 30% in some cases with applications sold through carrier stores. Consumers and businesses alike will appreciate the abundance of mobile applications for just about any need.

The net-net bad news – developers will have to deploy their applications across multiple stores to reach the market to have maximum exposure to their audience. They will also have to work to differentiate their applications for the consumers as thousands of applications flood the market. For consumers there is a double downside – tons of applications with most of them junk will make it hard to separate the wheat from the chaff.

The second downside for consumers – the months of testing that carriers used to put applications through before launch to ensure a positive interaction are gone. You will be lucky of most of these application stores load an application to see if it starts much less have extensive testing. Additionally having multiple applications loaded on your phone will lead to many unintended interactions in the near term. This will go away as mobile phone operating systems get more powerful, but be ready to reboot your phone ever day or two in the short term.

All-in-all a great show and I will be talking about some of the cool applications that I saw while there over the next few blog posts.

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Under the Radar for iPhone OSv3 – Accessories

March 31, 2009

It has been over two weeks since the announcement of the new iPhone OS and developers have had the opportunity to kick the tires of the beta version of the OS. There is a lot to like about the new OS including many features that I have blogged about such as:

  • MMS support – finally, true picture messaging.
  • Push start support – the ability for content publishers to send messages to applications
  • Landscape support for all apps – One of the positive features of the Storm allows for easier access to many applications

Additionally, Apple reports over 1,000 new API’s available for developers that allow new functionality such as access to the iTunes Library, peer-to-peer connectivity, in application purchases, etc.

Apple also introduced a new class of functionality that allows greater control over accessories. While this sounds rather plebeian, this could lead to another sea-change in the mobile phone market forcing other manufacturers to play catch-up to Apple once again. With the new functionality, developers can easily control other devices either connected through the iPhone dock or wirelessly via Bluetooth. Examples given by Apple during their press conference include FM transmitters controlled by the iPhone to find the perfect frequency to broadcast to your car stereo or a blood pressure cuff that will keep track of your blood pressure history and if necessary, send the results to your doctor. This ease of connecting external devices to a wireless device combined with the promised ease of Bluetooth connections, will lead to an explosion of new applications and a further penetration of the iPhone into business.

To be fair, Apple did not think of this concept all on their own, they just made it easier to deploy. For example, a few weeks ago I had my car windshield replaced at my house. The technician had me sign for the service using a Bluetooth pen that was connected to his Blackberry. The application was highly specialized and required a lot of custom programming on the part of the auto glass company to deploy. I’m sure there is also a significant support cost to maintain this custom application.

With the new support for Accessories to help developers produce and deploy applications that utilize external devices should help reduce those development and deployment costs. Manufacturers of devices from medical equipment to pens to even stereo systems are likely rushing right now to incorporate this technology into their products and release widgets to simplify application development for control of their devices.

So, what will be the big device winners? Send me your thoughts. My guess is that it will start with medical, move to field service automation, then move to consumer devices. I’ll try to blog up on unusual device applications that I hear about.

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