Amazon’s entry is only rumored but I think the description of it is detailed enough to be credible. The day after the scoop with Amazon, Baidu announced the Yi platform. Baidu is the sixth most visited site in the world, so it’s not a bit player and it makes as much sense for Baidu to have a mobile platform as it does for Google.
Mike Bostock visualizes mobile patent lawsuits, improving on a graphic from Thomson Reuters that wasn't so good. Dashed lines are resolved suits and green ones are licenses to the company.
In Gartner’s latest mobile market report, the research firm indicated that over 428 million mobile devices were sold in Q1 of this year, representing a solid 19% year-over-year increase.As usual, the growth is attributed to the continued spike in smartphone sales– which Gartner pegs at 100.7 million for Q1, up 85% year-over-year. Android remained the top dog, which soared past Symbian to capture 36% of the market. Nokia’s Symbian is in second place with 27.4%, followed by Apple’s iOS with 16.8%, RIM’s BlackBerry with 12.9% and Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7 with 3.6%.
Search result annotations:Bing now displays which search results your friends have liked. This is shown with annotations and small thumbnails under any link that your friends has liked.
Surfacing content from Likes: Let’s say Mashable or Cooks.com comes up in one of your searches, and your friends have liked specific articles or recipes from those websites. With Bing’s new Facebook integration, that content will surface right under the Mashable.com or Cooks.com search result. Bing says that this makes it easier to find the “good stuff” within core search.
Changes in search rankings:Facebook Likes now affect search rankings. An article that might have normally surfaced on the second or third page of search results may appear on the first page if friends have liked it.
Looking to the Future
As much as native and Web are pitted against one another in this debate, the likely outcome is a hybrid solution. Perhaps we'll see computing as inherently networked and (this is my sincere hope) free for anyone to access. We already see signs of a native Web: WebGL recently proved that in-browser 3D gaming is possible, even running Quake III!
In the meantime, software makers must balance the Web-vs.-native debate based on an application's primary objectives, development and business realities, and the opportunities the Web will provide in the not-so-distant future. The good news is that until all of this technology makes it into the browser, hacks such as PhoneGap can help bridge the divide. I encourage developers not simply to identify software development trends but to implement them! If the Web doesn't fulfill a capability your particular application requires, you're presented with an exciting opportunity to contribute and close the Web/native chasm in the process.
This is just the last paragraph of a very comprehensive article.. Highly recommended reading..
Samsung's Nexus S smartphone using Android 2.3 Gingerbread. Photograph: Albert Gea/ReutersAbout half of the world's smartphones will be using Google's Android operating system by the end of 2012, according to the research firm Gartner.
Google will lead the race with Apple, BlackBerry maker Research In Motion (RIM) and Microsoft by the end of this year and take 49.2% of the market in 2012, Gartner forecast on Thursday.
Nokia's tie-up with Microsoft's new Windows Phone 7 operating system would also be a success, Gartner predicted, with a 19.5% share of the smartphone market by 2015 – leapfrogging its rivals to the number two spot. That finding concurs with forecasts from analysts IDC and Ovum.
Worldwide smartphone sales are expected to reach 468m units in 2011 – a 57.7% increase on 2010. The explosive growth in affordable smartphones will see annual sales top 1.1bn by 2015, Gartner said. Sales of PCs, by comparison, will reach 387m this year, a 10.5% increase on 2010, the research firm predicted last month .
Microsoft plans to include mobile-payment technology in new versions of its operating system for smartphones as part of an effort to narrow Google Inc.’s lead in handset software, said the people, who asked to remain anonymous because the features aren’t public. The first devices boasting these features may be released this year, the people said.
The company joins a growing list of software providers aiming to benefit from rising demand for ways to purchase products and services on the go. Mobile payments may be used in $245 billion in transactions in 2014, up from $32 billion in 2010, according to Gartner Inc. Chief Executive Officer Steve Ballmer is under pressure to regain mobile-software market share lost to Apple Inc., maker of the iPhone, and Google’s Android.
The phones running Microsoft’s new software will be based on so-called Near Field Communication, which lets devices communicate wirelessly with objects immediately nearby. NFC technology enables payments and also lets consumers use a handset for other tasks, such as redeeming coupons and loyalty points at local merchants.
The infographic was created by www.icrossing.co.uk and we spotted on the excellent Posterous site "Cool Infographics" maintained by Techmeme editor Mahendra Palsule.
Click on the image below for a larger version.
Here’s the meat:
- Plans for a broad strategic partnership with Microsoft to build a new global mobile ecosystem; Windows Phone would serve as Nokia’s primary smartphone platform.
- A renewed approach to capture volume and value growth to connect “the next billion” to the Internet in developing growth markets
- Focused investments in next-generation disruptive technologies
- A new leadership team and organizational structure with a clear focus on speed, results and accountabilityWindows Phone to become Nokia’s primary smartphone platform = huge. Microsoft reportedly offered Nokia hundreds of millions of dollars to make that switch.
Nokia will use Bing for search functionality across its devices, while Nokia Maps will become core to Microsoft’s mapping services. Nokia’s content and app store will be integrated with Microsoft’s Marketplace. More info about the partnership is available here.
