BB-less… Day 1: The Shock

It started like a normal morning, but when I reached my BlackBerry, I got a shock… Why was my screen blank? Pitch black. Pressed the power button. Red LED lit up – 3 seconds, then turned off. No response.

It was OK the night before! It was a BRAND NEW (3 months?) 9900 handset… THE TOP OF THE LINE… and I didn’t abuse it as much as my other Fruit Phone. Nevertheless…

So between that and managing the kids morning routine… long story short I gave up troubleshooting it. Need to go to the service center (“BlackBerry Expert Center” – so they call it). The good thing of buying non-black-market device is that you get a 100% support for mission critical device.

Yes, it’s mission critical. BBM, email, calendar, and address book. Of course the todo list. And my precious meeting notes.

I spent my precious lunch time with the support staff. Very friendly staff. The diagnosis came up after 15 minutes of trouble shooting. No response from the hardware… so “hardware problem, Sir, you’ll get a device swap, in 7 (SEVEN!) working days.”

WHAAAT? Seven days? Seven working days?

(Probably next time I should buy through my telco – I’m on corporate plan so I believe I got a good SLA. Hopefully including the device.)

Not really worried about the data. Got a one month old backup (sigh! I’ll lost some SMS). And got everything backed up OTA in the Exchange server.

Except my BBM contacts. And BBM Groups. And my history of very important BBM messages (“apel malang” and “apel washington” … hmm…). Hopefully my backup works well, when I restore it next week.

Now… WHAT TO DO for the NEXT SEVEN (fracking working) DAYS?

Option 1: Back to my Nokia N8 – now on Symbian Belle (much enjoyable and usable than Symbian^3).

So I got the Exchange ActiveSync running in less than one minute. Thanks to company’s policy of BYOD. (And No Thanks! If this were a corporate device, I could have just called IT and complained).

As I wrote this, address book and calendar information are being synced. It is a breeze doing it over home broadband. Tried it earlier, but OTA sync seemed to take forever, so I cancelled it and spent one day without access to my address book (HORROR!).

Potential problem is data overage. I’m on unlimited BB plan (BlackBerry APN), but not unlimited mobile broadband.

Upside is, I got a better camera for the time being (but no instagram?!?!)

Option 2: crossed my mind if previous idea doesn’t work. Sync my Android Tablet  to Exchange and access my PIM information from there.

Upside is I got an unlimited plan there. Downside… extra device to carry and imagine the cumbersomeness of manually doing address book look up in the tablet and calling from another handset.

Option 3: Dump everything on the iPhone, especially the address book… and risking duplicate address book entry (no, it is generous enough to tri-plicate, quad-plicate, quint-plicate my address book entries… common problem in many iPhones to Exchange sync, at least amongst my colleagues).

Managed to get over Day 1. Let’s see how Day 2 goes…

No more SMS spam, please!

After junk mails, junk emails, now we arrived to the era of junk SMS…

This is getting too far and too much. In this a very real example, six last messages that this poor guy received are promo SMS – some are so unrelated that can be categorized as spam!

My own experience is no different. I constantly got SMS from various cafes, credit card agents (offering credit cards and loans), bank promo, gadget promo (which I don’t mind – spam for some persons but not for me) and so much more… even scam!

“Selamat!!! Anda mdptkan hadiah undian XL MANIA :Rp.35juta, dari EXCELCOMINDO utk/info, Hub:07846647889 PIN:42ag9f577S Pelaksana:+878″

Can not blame anyone, because they’re just trying to make some decent money and business.

Somehow, somewhat, we might sign an agreement without reading the small prints, unknowingly selling our personal data to these organizations, permitting them to blast us with junks.

They thought they asked for a permission and we gave it.

Or not. Worse, they stole it. Violated my trust.

And I also noticed that the phone number that I gave to the credit card companies are the one which constantly getting bugged with telemarketing and SMS… the other one is still safe… ha3x…

But critically looking at this… is it healthy and good for the future of mobile industry in Indonesia?

Is this the so called mobile marketing? Mobile as the 7th mass media?

A wake up call!

Yes, a wake call. Let’s make the mobile marketing practice better. No more spam.

Send me SMS, yes, but of something that I care about (valuable, relevant, contextual, personal).

Send me SMS, yes, but of something so entertaining that I’m willing to forward and recommend (viral).

Send me SMS, yes…

“Bapak2 and ibu2 yg sy hormati berhubung nomor sy yg 085510… sdh terlalu banyak gangguan dr telemarketing, maka sy ganti ke nomor baru ini, mohon bisa disimpan ini sbg nomor sy” [courtesy of RP]

Mobilizing a Website

This week I was a bit shocked by the news that Mowser is pronounced dead by its founder. A perfect timing, because I was trying to do a short piece on services that can mobilize (format a website/blog for browsing in mobile phones) a website my blog (sorry guys, it’s very egocentric).

Basically, after browsing here and there, I know that there are a lot, really a lot of startups working in this area. Here’s what I found – the first 5 or 6 pages in Google search:

1. Of course, you can DIY. If you have a good hosting that can detect the user agent and a good CMS that can automatically convert the website. Or we can create a different website specifically for mobile phones. (Quite famous now with the m.* and *.mobi).

2. Then there is this transcoding like mowser and skweezer. These guys take a normal website and reformat it (including compressing the data/images) into a mobile website. I haven’t tried it with complex website though…

3. Next is the RSS to mobile web approach taken by mippin and feedm8. Instead of the full website, they fetch the RSS feed from a website (or blog, more appropriately) and serve it as a mobile website. Pretty cool. Mippin even gives you the option to monetize your site by inserting ads from AdMob.

4. Finally, a widget version of a blog. Made possible by the guys like mob-it, WidSets, and plusmo. Widgets are small applications that fetch content from the network – can be a java application or native applications (e.g. Symbian). WidSets is a good engine for creating a widget.

5. No need of mobile website: Opera Mini and S60 Browser can deliver a full web page on your mobile.

What do I prefer? Mowser (RIP) and mippin. Sometimes I need to have a quick and dirty browsing, so Mowser actually fit pretty well, compared to downloading a full website. Mippin works pretty good for a blog – because of its nature with RSS/feed.

MORE – MObile Reward Exchange

One page ad in today’s Kompas newspaper: MORE – MObile Reward Exchange. Launched today at Grand Hyatt Jakarta. (Several previous news coverage: here, sales pitch in mail-archieve, KCM, and Jakarta Post through BBG)

If I can summarize it, the core concept is to aggregate all diverse loyalty programs from whatever club/supermarket/dept.store/restaurant into a single platform (or membership card, if you wish). It’s an any-to-any: points collected from any participating loyalty programs can be spent in any participating vendors. Plus, more importantly, do this on your mobile phone!

How do they make money? I don’t know exactly. Should be two-sided (getting money from the users and from the merchants/partners). My guess are at least:

• the cut/commission from each transaction through MORE platform
• advertisement
• database analytics
• selling top-up voucher for MORE points

Value for user (let’s not generalize, let’s take my case) to enroll in MORE?

• On the practical side, if MORE can replace all the different plastic membership cards, I will use it. Typically, it’s a dilemma: I kept forgetting to bring the correct card, thus always regretting that I pass a discount or a certain special offer. But, I don’t want to fill up my wallet with 10-20 cards. So…
• On the economical side, if I can collect rewards while spending money, why not?
• But the Chinese side of me also warns me not to be too excited: which one gives you more: the point rewards from MORE or from the other brand?

Value for the merchants (both the loyalty program owners and the vendors where we spent the reward points)?

Fundamentally, how does a loyalty program helps brand owner? (Has loyalty program became a hygiene factor instead of satisfaction factor?) How to maximize it?

Does MORE platform help you, as a product/brand owner, to roll out a meaningful loyalty program?

Is this kind of alliance/aggregation common? Or is it new? I know that we can exchange points between a certain credit cards and airlines for example. But across the whole spectrum? Is this a similar model to the “discount cards” issued by a certain publisher that gives you discount in participating stores (you have to “buy” the membership to the card). How about “mall patronage card”?

To tell you frankly, I have more questions than answers…. (I do hope I ask the right questions).

I do not know yet the economics of this reward points business. It seems to be a good and interesting business. But how is the business model? How to compete? How’s the value configuration? I think I need to talk to a few friends to pick up their brains on this thing

Nevertheless, it’s a good sign that the mobile telecommunication will continue to enrich retail business.

I have some screenshots of the application: here in Flickr.

And the application that I downloaded today still has a serious bug. I can’t browse my catalogue… how’s that? What’s wrong?

Every time I openned the catalogue, there is an error message: “There are invalid files. Do you want to delete?” Deleting the file will result an empty catalogue.

Update: I reinstalled the application: delete the application and all user data, download a new one (I think there’s a version update 1.03), install it in Phone memory (previously in SD Card). Success. This time the application can download the complete catalog and show it properly.

Head on to my/mobilemonday-id Flickr slideshow for new screenshots. Will add a new post to review the catalog.

In-building Coverage

The rise (or surge) of cellular services have created many other economic advantages and business opportunities. One of them is the “in-building coverage” (IBC) business.

What is IBC? IBC is an infrastructure to “extend” cellular coverage inside buildings, especially in high-rise buildings, basement and elevator area. A building without IBC system usually has a bad cellular reception. For us the layman, we often spot this thing — white, UFO-shaped antenna on your office celling.

There are several options for cellular IBC:

1. passive DAS
2. active DAS (combined coax feeder + optic repeater)
3. leaky cable
4. pico- and femto-cell
5. WLAN/GSM interop
6. …

I think passive DAS is the most commonly chosen.

Previously, each operator will build their own in-building system. So it’s not uncommon to see 5 antennas next to each other (these are taken from Mall Artha Gading Food Court recently).

But recently, there are few companies that specialize as multi-operator IBC provider. They build, operate, and lease IBC infrastructure to the cellular operators. Their infrastructure system can accommodate multiple operators, multiple systems (wide-band components, typ. 800-2500 MHz – so even WiMAX?).

For the operators, this reduces the hassle that typically associated with dealing with building owners. For the building owners, this add value to their estate, reduces complexity and structural tension, and not to mention the revenue potential.

Tens of companies are in this business. Including companies established by the building owners (providing easy money to your own-brother). Apparently making a good money…. (until when?)

Key to success? Location, location, location – get as many “correct” buildings in our portfolio.

YM Tiny!

There are a couple of methods / applications that can provide you access to IM on your mobile phone. From WAP access to Yahoo! homepage, then free services such as Fring, Palringo, MovaMessenger, etc., to paid software e.g. Agile Messenger and IM+.

But if you’re using Yahoo! Messenger specifically, you might want to try YM Tiny. I think this is made by Indonesian. (Indonesian-sounding name, I think). It’s Java, so should be available for many phones. Download here (www.orisinil.com/ymtiny).

It’s tiny. Simple. Interface is, well, standard, not too fancy. And does the job (not for heavy duty messenger-ing).

Screenshots:

Rant: Data Connection QoS in Indonesia

I don’t understand what is the problem with data (wireless) connection in Indonesia. Wait… not only the data connection, but also the voice quality.

At one time, I can get EDGE in GSM/GPRS coverage and 3.5G in UMTS coverage. But at the other time, same day, same place, the network just refused my connection – voice and data. Then when I was doing un-resume-able download, the network just conveniently disconnected me while I was at 90%. Being on a metered access, that’s several MB of wasted bandwidth (and data “minutes”).

But, sadly, I kind of understand the dilemma that network operators are facing.

It’s a race between network capacity v.s. subscriber growth.

How to expand capacity? For 2G network (I’m not really an expert in radio planning, but at least here’s the idea):

• optimize the network through better frequency planning, coverage planning, etc.
• add more GSM carriers and then re-optimize the network.
• reduce cell size, add new BTS site
• add new 1800 MHz cell – if not already
• well, you can also go to 3G and then the above game repeats…

In short it needs money. A lot of.

Ideally subscriber growth also brings revenue growth for financing
network capacity expansion. But if we’re giving away services for free…
then it’s spelled T-R-O-U-B-L-E. No money to invest, lah.

And at a certain point, statistically, the network will give up. Can not support additional users. No calls can be made. Let alone data connection. And, sadly – like Kompas/detik.com reported few days ago – lives are lost due to unavailability of network for emergency calls…. [Links to follow]

I guess this is serious problem enough for operators and all the technologists and technocrats to think of solutions.

Hey, how do you expect VAS and data service to grow when the network is SOOO BAD….

Nokia Location Tagger

I know this is an old news, but I just got my N95 back. Following up my previous article on Ovi Share, I want to explore the GPS geo-tagging capability…

My verdict. In short: Nokia Location Tagger works… for beta testers… . There is a list of desired features in the Beta Labs blog… a long list already. (I mainly look forward to getting security/privacy features, indoor capability, delayed/manual tagging, and smoother integration with Gallery/Camera).

Now, interests in Google Earth, Picassa Web, Flickr, and all the other photo sharing websites that support geo-tagging should be growing faster. Including new services like: Panoramio, and mobile-enabled services: Locr, Shozu, Psiloc’s Photo Tagger and Locatik. Mobile will be an important device in geo-tagging definitely.

Anyway, doing this with Flickr is pretty nice:

When will Ovi Share have this functionality? Probably when the geo-tagging experience in Nokia phones are smooth and closely integrated with the camera applications? Curious….

Update:

Well, the good thing about starting late is that I got the second beta of the application which gives the ability to integrate with Nokia Maps — there’s a “Show On Map” option. Here’s a couple of Screenshot – the Early Adopter short guide for Location Tagger:

Start the Location Tagger, wait for GPS lock, then press Hide to put it in the background.

Go to Camera, notice the small green logo on the upper left corner of the screen. Shot a picture.

The photo will be geo-tagged (after a few seconds delay). Go back to the Location Tagger to see the Log.

If you press Option, there is “Show on Map”

Shown on Map…

Interestingly, Log is cleared after we restart the app (which I don’t like, because I lost track of my geo-tagged photos… probably will behave differently in the future).

Telkomsel… where are you?

The good thing is Telkomsel (50%+ market share) is not jumping the price war bandwagon… sort of…

But they might feel the heat a bit, especially in the lower end segment. So recently promoted is "call for 2 minutes and get 3 more minutes free" for Kartu As (low-end prepaid).

Attractive? Probably not so, compared to XL. Let's say for 5-minute on-net call, Telkomsel charges Rp 20/sec x 120 sec (the next 180 sec is free) = Rp 2400/5-minute; while XL charges Rp 600 sampai puassss.

Anyway, they also launched a promo for post-paid subscribers.

• free minute for on-net, up to 60 minutes (T&C applies, I think depends on your monthly usage)
• free "You've Got Mail" feature (Rp 15.000/month)
• free TelkomselPoin bonus (kind of credit card reward points/frequent flyer miles)

A bit difficult for Telkomsel. They are the market leader, dominant position. Need to plan their moves carefully, so that they are not violating anti-monopoly / anti-trust / fair-competition acts/laws.

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Look Ma, no tables!

Intensifying the price war… Indosat strikes back at XL. Position themselves as "no t&c" which is an irony for XL (previously known as no term and conditions).

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