MobileBehavior's Next Great Thing

Mobile Roundup: Most Tweetworthy Links from the Week of November 16

2009-11-19T22:39:38Z

1. The BBC demonstrates driving a car using an iPhone http://ow.ly/CLBx

2. Equatel Brings Text Messaging Payphones to the Developing World http://ow.ly/CPrG

3. Transborder Immigrant Tool helps Mexicans cross over safely http://ow.ly/CObH

4. Gartner identifies “Money Transfer” as number one of the top 10 mobile applications for 2012. http://ow.ly/Dowb

5. In a Connected Society, Comprehension Of Sociology Is King http://ow.ly/D7Ak

6. “The acquisition of Admob by Google is as big as the launch of the iPhone” http://ow.ly/BUWM

7. Tide’s Stain Brain for iPhone enables consumer to consumer conversation around the art of laundry. http://ow.ly/BVfc

8. (VIDEO) Never Stop Talking With Virgin Mobile’s Totally Unlimited Calling (Even in the Dressing Room) http://ow.ly/Do7y

9. ShopSavvy arrives on iPhone to provide a free barcode scanning alternative to RedLaser. http://ow.ly/DaM4

10. 45% of Mobile Users to Access SocNets by 2013: eMarketer http://ow.ly/CSTt

This is a weekly roundup of the most shared tweets from @MobileBehavior. We use HootSuite to share useful and inspirational resources and to view click through statistics. You can follow us on Twitter here.

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Anticipating The iPhone In South Korea

2009-11-19T20:58:01Z

Mashable reports the iPhone has been cleared for launch by the Korea Communications Commission, and it could be available for consumers in South Korea by the end of the month. Although Apple has not made any comments, a newspaper in South Korea, The Chosun Ilbo, states that KT Corp, a local service provider, “will begin taking online reservations from Thursday and distributing the smartphone starting Nov. 28.” KT aims to initially sell 150,000 iPhones at a price of approximately $215 to $260. Both the 3G and 3Gs will be sold in Korea.

[via Mashable]

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Humans as Sensors: Using Mobile Phones to Map a City’s Noise Levels

2009-11-19T18:19:01Z

Mobile crowdsourcing is being used to construct traffic maps and forecast crowd flow, now it is also beginning to map noise levels within cities around the world. NoiseTube provides a mobile application that lets users capture the surrounding ambiance through a built-in microphone, and if the phone supports it, tag it with GPS coordinates. Nicolas Maisonneuve’s goal was to “turn the mobile phone into an environmental sensor.” Using the results, city planners will be able to better realize how to fight noise pollution. Anyone can view the data on Google Earth, and compare sound levels between cities like Brussels and Amsterdam.

[via textually]

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Gmail Chat Now Includes Indicators for Inter-Device Communication

2009-11-18T23:18:12Z

To promote Android, Google is beginning to use its tech muscle with even the small things, like status indicators within Gmail chat. Now users will see a robot icon if their friend is online with an Android phone. Google claims that the addition is to differentiate between friends who are “online online” and those who are online while mobile. It brings up an interesting idea, as users will see these indicators and alter their communication accordingly. It is good thinking, as we will increasingly be conversing between devices with differing interface personalities.

[via techcrunch]

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WC3’s Mobile Web for Social Development Roadmap

2009-11-18T23:24:18Z

Earlier this week the World Wide Web Consortum released their extensive Mobile Web for Social Development Roadmap, examining mobile-specific web development conditions and guidelines. Its purpose is “to understand the current challenges of deploying development-oriented services on mobile phones, evaluate existing technologies, and identify the most promising directions to lower the barriers of developing, deploying and accessing services on mobile phones and thereby creating an enabling environment for more social-oriented services to appear.”

As the WC3 has served to set the standard for web development since 1994, there has been much anticipation for their release of standardized practices and development models for mobile platforms. As a first draft, the document has already received criticism for referencing information that is already dated and paying too little attention to important systems like mobile payments, and the document is sure to evolve as practices emerge from the mobile development community.

[via MobileActive]

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American Airlines to Offer Paperless Boarding Using Mobile

2009-11-18T20:10:02Z

While the airline industry isn’t at the highest moment of its history, it continues to innovate in the space that defines it: mobility. We’ve covered networked airplanes and Lufthansa’s MySkyStatus, now American Airlines has plans to adopt paperless boarding technology in the Dallas/Fort Worth airport. Upon buying a ticket online, the system sends an e-mail to a user’s smartphone containing an encrypted barcode to be scanned at flight check-in. According to Star-Telegram about 100,000 people a month already use paperless boarding. We can’t help but hope that Foursquare’s API be implemented like it has been with London’s Oyster card.

[via @pennylane14]

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Most Intriguing New (Mobile) Businesses

2009-11-19T06:05:52Z

BusinessWeek just came out with a roundup of the “Most Intriguing New Businesses,” which include a handful of mobile start-ups we’ve been watching. Here we get all meta and do a roundup of their roundup…

CitySourced

CitySourced’s iPhone application lets people snap pictures of potholes, graffiti, and other annoyances and send them directly to the right person at City Hall.

Also see: @TC50: Mobile StartUps that Build Upon Human Behaviors

Bump

One of the hottest free iPhone apps, this software from Bump Technologies lets users share personal contact information and photos simply by bumping two phones together.

Also see: MobileBehavior TV Episode 5: Will Mobile Kill The Business Card?

FitBit

FitBit sells a $99 gizmo that tracks movement, exercise, and sleeping patterns. The data zips wirelessly to a Web site, where you can chart your progress.

Layar

Layar has created free software that lets smartphones deliver “augmented reality”—text and images laid over scenes viewed through a device’s camera.

Also see: WTF Augmented Reality Parts One and Two

Sense

Sense Networks’ technology, which crunches real-time, location-based data from wireless carriers and cars, can be used to craft next-gen marketing and ad campaigns.

Also see: Find Your Tribe With CitySense

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