Mobile Apps and Websites

Since about two weeks I am the proud owner of a new mobile phone, a Nokia 82. Actually that’s my first phone which can be used for real mobile internet applications. Yeah right, most of you use those phones since several months, if not years already, but it’s really a revelation considering that my last handset just had a tiny screen and was only capable of WAP. Not much fun, even reading emails was a little nightmare. So it’s cool to have a device which is much more powerful and convenient. Admittedly, I had problems getting used to all the features and settings of the N82 at first. I am not even sure if I know all of them by now.

Good Mobile Sites

Now what’s really cool on a mobile phone is Twitter. It’s really fast - well, mostly - and there are features available that only work for phones (at least I think so), tracking keywords is one of them. I started tracking “openid” yesterday and got some valuable information by reading those text messages. It’s just like Google Alerts. Very good. However I get a lot of text messages now and often in languages I don’t understand: Italian, Spanish, some Asian ones,… I want a language filter!

Other cool mobile versions of websites include:

• Remember The Milk
• Ma.gnolia
• Google Maps
• LinkedIn (went public today)
• 30 Boxes

I just wish my blog was also available as a mobile optimized site. Are there any plugins or themes for WordPress?

Mobile Applications

There are also some very useful applications for mobile phones. Here are some I really like already.

One of the best apps so far is fring. Basically it lets users add their IM accounts and access them from their mobile phones. I added my AIM, Google Talk, and Twitter accounts to it; Skype, SIP accounts, and other IM accounts can be added as well. It’s also possible to make free calls to other IM users.

But why add Twitter to fring, you may ask? There is a mobile version of the site, and also text messages are available. Well, fring automagically updates Twitter. No need to refresh a browser window or send and receive text messages. That might be especially useful for users in the US. If I got it right, people have to pay for receiving text messages in the US, while that is free of charge for us on the other side of the pond. So installing fring will save costs, provided a data plan is available for a low price.

ShoZu is also really neat. It lets me post pictures directly to Flickr and other photo sharing sites; or to my blog. It’s also possible to post videos to YouTube. I have only set up my Flickr account with ShoZu, which works smoothly. I even get my friends photo streams on my phone. So maybe I will post more pictures to Flickr now. ZoneTag (by Yahoo!) is a similar application and also really good but somehow I like ShoZu better.

Streaming videos from your mobile phone? That’s possible with Qik and it works better than I had expected. Videos are streamed to the Qik website and it allows streams to be public or private. I won’t use this app very often, I guess, but it’s good to know to have it on my phone.

I have mentioned Zyb on the blog already. It syncs my address book and calendar entries with the Zyb server. Very easy, very quick. Highly recommended.

Is there a decent PIM available for Symbian phones? I heard good things about Papyrus. Anyone running it? Also I should go and buy Opera Mobile, I guess. But I will wait until the new version is available. Are there any other apps worth checking out? What about blogging to WordPress?

Related posts:

• Public Transport Tickets by Mobile Phone
• Social Network on Your Mobile Phone
• Zyb Adds Microformats
• Microformats on Your Mobile Phone
• Germany, Spring 2007