Vodafone’s own-brand handsets are new, not very improved
Vodafone set a new benchmark for own-brand phones with its Smart Ultra 6. The handset is actually a fiver more expensive now than when it launched almost a year ago, and yet it’s still one of the best pound-for-pound devices available in the UK. The problem with setting benchmarks, though, is that you also set expectations — expectations that the next cycle, starting with the Smart Prime 7 released today, are measured against. At £75 on pay-as-you-go, the new handset is as easy on the wallet as the Prime 6 that came before it. The problem, though, is that the Prime 7 barely counts as an upgrade.
It’s not that the Smart Prime 7 is a bad phone. Despite being an all-plastic affair (available in black/silver or white/gold) and quite light at 128g, it’s a sturdy, well-built device. You get a 5-inch, 720p display, 1GB of RAM, 8GB of expandable storage (only 4 gigs are for you), the latest version of Android 6.0 Marshmallow, 8- and 5-megapixel cameras, 4G and NFC. The quad-core 1.3GHz Snapdragon 212 at its heart isn’t the fastest processor around, but it’ll handle everyday tasks with relative ease and get you through an Asphalt 8 race on low graphics settings.
For £75, that’s an agreeable enough rap sheet. But compare it to the year-old Smart Prime 6, which can also be had for £75, and those numbers start to look less appealing. In fact, the Smart Prime 7 is almost identical to its predecessor, apart from its newer version of Android and a better front-facing camera. Fair enough — not every new generation needs to blow the last out of the water — but then why does the Smart Prime 6 actually possess the more powerful, quad-core 1.2GHz Snapdragon 410 processor?
And therein lies the problem with the Smart Prime 7: In that one respect, it’s a step back. That said, it still represents pretty good value for money. Pay-as-you-go alternatives at the same price are limited, though O2 is selling the slightly better-specced Alcatel Idol 3 for a discounted price of £80 right now. The Smart Prime 7 is also available for free on contracts starting at £16 per month, but Sony’s Xperia M4 Aqua, LG’s G4c and Motorola’s Moto G are the same price, not to mention similarly competitive phones/contracts at other providers.
The Smart Prime 7 isn’t the only new own-brand handset Vodafone launched today. The 3G-only Smart First 7 has also made its debut, with specs that more or less attest to its £25 price point. We’re talking a quad-core 1.3GHz processor, a 3.5-inch (480 x 320) display, 512MB of RAM, 4GB of expandable storage, a 2MP camera and Android 5.1 Lollipop.
Again, though, the older Smart First 6 (also £25) actually has a superior display on paper, even if it does lag behind in the performance department. However, you only need to look in the direction of EE’s 4G-ready Rook — which is now only £20 on pay-as-you-go — to see where your money would be better spent.
The new ‘Ace Attorney’ lands in September
Phoenix Wright and his band of lawyers, circus performers and spirit mediums are making their way to North America and Europe. The newest installment for the courtroom-slash-visual-novel franchise Ace Attorney will be released in the West in September this year. It’s called Spirit of Justice and will (unfortunately) only be available as a digital download from the Nintendo eShop, just like Dual Destinies, for $30 (£25 / €30).
The 3DS game is set in the Kingdom of Khura’in, where lawyers are persecuted and trials are conducted by spirit séances. Best thing about it is that it’s bringing back beloved characters from the older installments, including Miles Edgeworth, Ema Skye and even Wright’s original ramen burger-loving sidekick Maya Fey. What would make it even better, though, is if its success leads to the North American and European release of The Great Ace Attorney. Because we’re sure a lot of fans would love to play Wright’s ancestor and solve cases with Sherlock Holmes.
Source: Capcom
Some YouTube users now have access to its in-app messenger
YouTube has developed an in-app messenger, and according to Wired, it’s now rolling the feature out to small number of users. The video service’s director of product management, Shimrit Ben-Yair, said they created the feature, because her team believes it would result to even more sharing. Messages remain in a separate tab that can be accessed anytime, giving people a quick way to toss links, say of an amusing music video or a Let’s Play playthrough, to a whole group of people.
If it catches on, it could cut out the middleman (i.e., other chat apps) and make videos trend even faster. It’s also probably a way for YouTube to ensure users are spending more time on its website and apps in an effort to squash current and upcoming rivals. While only a lucky few are getting in-app messaging today, those who do get it can spread the feature further by inviting friends and contacts to chat.
Source: Wired
Barclays offers its own app as an Android Pay alternative
When Barclays confirmed it wasn’t planning to support Google’s Android Pay service when it launches in the UK, it said it would instead focus on the development of its own platform. Turns out that customers won’t have to wait long to see what the bank has planned, after it confirmed today that it will roll out a new version of its banking app with support for “Contactless Mobile” in June.
Like the Barclaycard app, which has NFC payments since January, Contactless Mobile detects whether a customer’s Android phone supports NFC and has eligible Barclays credit or debit cards associated with it. If it does, customers can make payments of up to £30 by tapping their phone against a retailer terminal, without needing to open the app, enter a PIN or verify with a fingerprint.
The platform will also support payments between £30 and £100, which involves first tapping the phone against the terminal, entering the card’s usual PIN and then tapping again.
Barclays says that when Contactless Mobile arrives next month, the roll out will be “phased over a number of days.” Customers will be notified as soon as the service becomes available. It could come before Google’s own platform, as long as it’s not as drawn out as the bank’s Apple Pay implementation.
One of Apple’s earliest Siri engineers reportedly leaves for GE
Apple hasn’t had a great time holding on to the original Siri team, and we don’t just mean the founders — there are precious few of those core members left. And today, we’re learning that one of those last remaining pioneers may have walked out the door. The Information’s sources claim that Darren Haas, a Siri co-founder and Apple’s head of compute-focused cloud engineering, has left the company to join GE a few weeks after one of his fellow Siri alumni, Steve D’Aurora, reportedly did the same. The two are believed to be working on a similar cloud platform at their new employer.
There’s no official confirmation yet (both employees still list themselves as Apple employees on LinkedIn), so take this with a grain of salt. We’ve reached out to Apple to confirm the move. If true, though, it’s not exactly heartening news for the team at 1 Infinite Loop. While this is unlikely to be a fatal blow when many people are still working on Siri, it’s a symbolic loss for a company that was one of the first to embrace intelligent voice commands in the mobile world.
Source: The Information
Republic Wireless gets serious about its phone selection
Republic Wireless’ promise of extra-affordable cellular service has usually come with a big catch: the phone selection. Outside of the occasional gem, you’ve had to settle for browsing a tiny collection of so-so budget devices. That won’t be a problem after this summer, though. Republic has announced that it’s adding seven more phones to its roster this July, and most of them are reasonably up to date, high-end models you’d likely be happy to have. The Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge are in the mix, as is Google’s current Nexus line and the Moto X Pure Edition — you can even get last year’s Galaxy S6 if you’re striking a balance between cost and cutting-edge. The prices are generally on par with what you find elsewhere, such as $699 for the Galaxy S7.
The provider wants to spice up its plans, too. In step with its move to a more standard GSM phone network, it’s introducing a $20 per month plan that bundles unlimited talk and texting with 1GB of data at LTE speeds ($5 less than before). It’s still not ideal for everyone (you can’t bring your own phone, for example), but the combination of good phones with better rates might just reel you in if you’re more concerned with cost than absolute flexibility.
Source: Republic Wireless
Sunrise shuts down its calendar app on August 31st
If you guessed that Sunrise’s calendar app wasn’t long for this world after Microsoft bought the company… well, you guessed correctly. Sunrise has revealed that it’s phasing out its fan-favorite software. The app itself will vanish from digital stores over the next few days, and it’ll stop working entirely on August 31st. Like it or not, you can’t keep it around for the sake of familiarity — you’ll either have to switch to Outlook (which has some of Sunrise’s DNA) or find an alternative.
The team describes the cutoff as a practical move. Simply speaking, it can’t support the Sunrise app going forward. There won’t be any more bug fixes or feature additions, and the developers would rather move on than give you a sub-par experience. That’s understandable, but there’s also no doubt that some fans will be miffed. Outlook just isn’t the same as Sunrise, and there will be some who’d rather try something entirely different when their old standby isn’t available.
Source: Sunrise Blog
Google adds commenting capabilities to shared albums in Photos
Google is rolling out two new features for its Photos service: the ability to comment on shared images and albums, and a tool that suggests photos to add to specific albums. The commenting ability allows users to leave messages on albums and pictures that have been shared with them — without leaving the app. Google Photos isn’t a social networking service on its own, but the new functionality takes cues from sites like Facebook that allow commenting on images.
The second new service offers “smart suggestions” for shared albums. Google Photos will analyze your uploaded images by time and location, and then determine which ones might belong in an album that’s been shared with you. This should streamline the process for grouping together pictures from multiple people taken during weddings, birthdays, road trips, school projects and other events.
Google Photos doesn’t use facial recognition to make these suggestions, TechCrunch notes. That’s probably a good call, since Facebook is currently in hot water over its own facial recognition systems, particularly those used in Moments.
Source: Google
Google Translate now works in apps on any Android phone
If you hate having to paste foreign language text into Google Translate just to understand it, your worries are over. Google has updated Translate for Android to introduce Tap to Translate, an expansion of the translation-anywhere feature it introduced on Marshmallow last fall. Anyone running Android 4.2 or later can now decipher unfamiliar text on the spot simply by copying it — helpful if you frequently run into messages or social posts that aren’t in familiar tongues.
There’s more rolling out over the next few days, including things for the non-Android crowd. Translate for iOS now includes offline support, giving you a way to communicate in other languages when you don’t have data service (say, on vacation). And if you regularly visit China, you’ll be glad to know that camera-based Word Lens translation on both Android and iOS now supports simplified and traditional Chinese. If you’ve ever struggled to make sense of a Beijing restaurant menu or a Shanghai street sign, you can rest easy.
Source: Google Play, App Store
Nintendo’s new mobile games will be free-to-play
Nintendo’s upcoming smartphone renditions of popular franchises Fire Emblem and Animal Crossing will be free to play, according to DeNA’s Chief Executive Isao Moriyasu.
The actual terminology Moriyasu used is “free-to-start,” meaning you won’t have to pay anything to get started with either game, but they will of course be monetized. Given Nintendo’s efforts in the handheld realm and the increasing number of mobile apps arising from the partnership between Nintendo and mobile company DeNA, this could very well be the norm going forward.
Unfortunately no additional details were given surrounding how the apps will utilize the free-to-play model. Animal Crossing on its own uses “bells” as a currency for players to purchase items, pay off their in-game homes and more, so it’s very possible there could be a similar model in the mobile app. Fire Emblem is a strategy role-playing game notorious for featuring game modes where members of your party can succumb to permadeath, but perhaps a freemium model could offer options to bring them back for a fee.
This is an unsurprising move given the company’s recent track record of releasing games like Pokemon Shuffle and Pokemon Rumble World as freemium options, both available via 3DS/2DS and mobile titles. Both rely on “energy” to continue playing if you run out of the allotted currency. Games like Nintendo Badge Arcade offer free plays each day and dangle additional badges to collect in the faces of those unwilling to pay further to explore, and Rusty’s Real Deal Baseball gives players the option to haggle to purchase in-game minigames.
It’s not clear how Nintendo will handle these high-profile franchises just yet, but free-to-play will almost certainly get more consumers invested than premium pricing. We’ll have to wait and see what happens.
Source: WSJ
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