Why My UK Mobile Bill Is So Low?

I'm very happy with my new mobile phone provider smarty.co.uk

It's a piece of cake to sign up, transferring my number went like clockwork and now I'm only being charged for the data I use.

If you're into excellent customer service, an easy bananas UX on the website and fairness and honesty I can recommend these guys.

It's not just about the money. 

It's about being treated with respect instead of billing me if I don't use all my data or immediately cranking up the bill if I go over the limit. That's just pick pocket mentality and there's too much of it in business.

If you use this link to sign up, you get a free month, and so do I.

Phonebloks - Mobile Technology Designed To Last

Disposable electronics aren't a very good way to respect the planet. They poison the environment and the just in time distribution logistics are a huge burden on the Earth's resources, even though the products are small.

They also fund a lot of conflict in places like the Congo (DRC) but you wont hear about that as the media are too busy telling people that Israel is the important country where the Master Race now reside. 

More important than the six million who died in those mineral conflicts anyway.

Oh and don't forget the 100 000 rapes a month when you stroke your next new, touch screen electronics purchase.

Phonebloks is a simple idea and I hope people can get behind it. I've long been uninterested in the latest mobile though I do look at tablets from time to time and ask myself. 

Do I really need it?

Usually the answer is no. But maybe you're into Alicia Keys being a phone when she's not touring apartheid Israel as a black entertainer.

The Real Mobile Phone Wars - Democratic Republic of Congo & Rare Earth Coltan

I don't expect you to boycott buying or using a mobile phone because of the Coltan that is mined in the DRC Democratic Republic of Congo formerly known as Zaire. I do expect you to know that over 5 million died in a civil war that is largely framed around the mining of this material. I'm just posting the better produced and more informative videos I'm coming across to save you the time of working through lesser quality ones.

In this video a story is narrated of a twelve year old girl kept in a pit for six weeks and raped daily by unspeakable men while a friend was eventually killed and left to rot beside her in the same pit for some four week after. During this time the surviving girl became pregnant and realised this as she continued to be raped and returned to the pit with her decomposing friend.

All of this for Coltan. A material that contains Tantaulum that makes tantalum capacitors which are unique because of the amount of energy they can store despite their size. That's the price we pay for convenience isn't it? Pregnant raped twelve year old girls in pits with decomposing friends. Day after day after day.

It was also explained to me for the first time why rape is used as a weapon of division in the Congo. It's like a hard core version of the fake left right politics that divide us in the West. Divide us and keep us distracted from what is really going on. Watch this documentary if you get time.

Nice Consumer Electronics, Shame About The Genocide

It's probably unrealistic to ask people to demand their mobile phone isn't using rare earth Congo (DRC) Coltan but I think people should know what goes into making that smart phone. 

Every single mobile phone uses it and at least five million people died from the usual death and destruction the power elite use to amass wealth from exploiting the earth through division, war, death, misery and destruction.

Rwanda and Uganda come out of this looking bad. Not to mention the Western backing from Washington D.C. and London who as you know are silent over this genocide. 

The corporate media said so little. 

Rare Earth Coltan - The Smart Phone Material 5 Million Died In The Congo For

Ten minutes ago I didn't know why the DRC war happened or what Coltan was. Now I know.

The war beginning in 1998 that pitted the armies of Congo, Zimbabwe, Namibia and Angola against those of Uganda and Rwanda induced the largest humanitarian disaster since World War II, with an estimated four million Congolese lives lost. Congo's first national elections since 1965 have taken place, but true peace and democracy remain elusive goals.

Disconnect to Connect

The Thai advertising for DTAC, a local mobile network carrier (with strong Scandinavian shareholding) is making waves in China for its Disconnect to Connect brand advertising.

Rural Telecom - India

View more presentations from Futurescape.

My friend Syamant has written a nice ready reckoner on the India rural telecoms landscape. A part of the world that culturally and geographically I'm fascinated by primarily because there's so much unspoiled strangeness and mysticism (unlike China's uber-rational homogeneity) which I think makes for a fascinating ethnographic topography as it collides with the 21st century. 

There are many who bemoan India's irrational  contradictions and yet deep down I view those same frustrations as a much more meaningful organic flowering of humanity for the future. 


I've no evidence for this and I also am probably guilty of varnishing some tough realities such as poverty and health indices with some sort of Caucasion cultural posturing though I mean it with the best of intent.

Season of the Witch

I'm hearing good things about Windows Phone. If the UX really lives up to the endline then Microsoft might just have thrown themselves a life line through the window. The American launch ad that follows (up) has that typically didactic but youthful tone of voiceover that I find patronising but it's still a strong point of view that I'm interested in.

Test Post Via Email/Mobile

Test Post via email.

http://www.charlesfrith.com 

+66 869 930 870

+44 792 344 8067

"The east shall shake the west awake

And ye shall have night for morn"

- James Joyce / "Finnegan's Wake"

 

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Beyond Hotmail — see what else you can do with Windows Live. Find out more!

Follow Your Instinct

Just follow it. The ad is in your hands (don't forget to click in the Youtube video to direct the narrative - It's a new format)

Via Digicynic

Snakeskin feel, golden touch

Yeah I know, I kind of like its unashamed sleaziness, but then as I said way back here I thought the Razr which was the must-have mobile phone of 2005 is the product that Motorola slashed its corporate wrists on. Via Maddison Boom

Chasing Chip

China's cities are tiered according to their size and development and yesterday we headed out to a tier 4 city called Ba Zhou, and then even further afield into the rural economy to get a feel for what it means when a household mobile phone purchase requires a few months or more of saving. I've really been looking forward to this part of our work because as I've pointed out before it doesn't take too much effort to win over the cosmopolitan elite with bells and whistles but the solid working people from the rust belts and further afield work hard for their money and it takes considerably more respect and sensitivity, not to say thinking, in order to understand more fully the contexts of their lives. The pampered classes like you and I are a pushover in this respect. First off I was struck by the polythene sheeting for the windows of one household above. It was pretty chilly but warm tea was served and we were treated as welcome guests with apples and oranges and even cigarettes left by a clean ashtray.

Cooking is done with a coal fired oven and I got thinking of Graham and his Pheasant plucking which took 45 minutes over here, and how much more work it woud take to cook the thing, not to mention the cleaning and maintenance. I regret now that I didn't get a shot of the steaming dumplings under the lid of this one. Its not quite the same as taking a phone call over the new Smeg Oven while peeling off the cling film wrap from some Sainsbury's pork chops is it?

Yes it's a huge living room compared to many city dwellers but all I could think of was how much harder it would be to heat up with those polythene windows. Good for the kids to crawl about in the summer though. On the right is one of those huge posters depicting a non existant idylic rural scene such as smoky waterfalls, that are so popular right across Asia.

There are two types of coal used in these parts and this is the lumpy stuff that gets broken down to feed the oven. Behind me is the local coal dealers stock pile.

Which is purchased by the households and then kept in dryer conditions because gas mark 5 to get the frozen pizzas nice and crispy isn't so easy to achieve when dealing with damp fuel.

Then there are the coal briquettes which are used for the relatively primative central heating. They are more efficient in terms of quality and the size that allows them to burn stronger but also for longer. I was particularly excited by the winter cabbages being stored here because when I heard about the whole 'stocking 200 heads of cabbage' for winter in Chinese households I couldn't quite imagine how it worked but in the cold of winter its practically a fridge outside and so they are maintained. I'm also rather fond of cabbage in soups, as well as buttered with some creamy mustard. Out here though its pretty much a staple food.

I couldn't help but imagine that this scene hasn't changed since the the middle of the century and further back really. It wouldn't take too much to knock out a Hovis inspired Ad for those phones evoking the romance of a bygone era would it? Point being its far from gone yet.

This Gentleman was the happiest and simplest guy I've met in ages. Only recently married his house was decked out with all new mod cons including the winter bed behind him which is harder than the summer bed because of a thinner mattress to allow the heat from the oven outside to permeate through. When oil reaches three hundred dollars a barrel maybe we'll all be a bit more frugal with how we use energy with ideas like this. It was also interesting figuring out why he'd switched from three consecutive international mobile phone brands to his intention to buy a local brand next. Initially his reasoning was that all technology is the same so why pay a premium but with some thoughtful probing it turned out his new wife was now in charge of the purse strings. Fair play to him I thought. Women make for great houshold finance directors, although I'd be inclined to communicate that those local brands are in fact a false economy.

One more oven shot from the Gentleman above, you can tell I like them can't you? I got the feeling that this one would be less frequently used to begin with, as he and his new wife took communal meals with his parents who live close by after building him his new home. I forget the Chinese word for this style of living. I like the way that relationships are maintained through meals though. They don't share the living space together but food helps to keep a sense of familial involvment doesn't it?

And here is their equivalent of a 7-eleven convenience store for those last minute veggie purchases maybe forgotten to be picked up at the local weekly market shop. There were quite prominent mobile phone operator tariff communications in that establishment too.

Those ovens do require feeding with some decent kindle to get that coal going, and this 53 year old woman seemed to be making reasonably light work of the load needed for her household. All in all it was a fascinating day but I got the feeling that I'd like to have done a couple of nights braving the winter chill and getting into the routines of their lives to really understand what it means to sell a liberating and democratising piece of technology such as a mobile phone to these folks.

Nokia N95

I'm road testing the Nokia N95 which means I get to take a load of pictures and videos so here's a sample of the what I've been up to. (Update: Few format probs to sort out here)

First I went to Oulu in Finland 200 Kilometres south of the Artic Circle.


But it wasn't snowing so it looked like this really

and this

The we paid a visit to the Nokia Future Labs where they get to play with lots of cool shit like M does in the Bond films.

And I was so loving this dog that I forgot what the connection with mobile phones was, but it must have been good right?

And a phone that can sort the shopping out for the fridge can't be all that bad a replacement for shopping lists can it?

But with so many toys around the joint there's a serious charging job to do.



And of course you need some kick ass remotes as well.


Not to mention some heavy duty mobile command telescopic spying devices


The engineers enjoy a certain genre of postcard. I couldn't figure out the name though.



And of course testing those phones means they have as many chargers as we get lumbered with


But it's OK for them because after all that 'where's my charger' action the Finns take their saunas quite seriously (it's a religion I overheard), and they are all over the work place, like here on the third floor


and here on the fourth floor in case you need to relax on the way up the stairs ;)

But they are into the coolest stuff


Which is ace by me because those software scientists and Nokia guys are developing the killer app to end all killer apps for people like me who are learning to speak Chinese but will probably never be able to read it well. A phone that can translate Chinese text on the go. Awesome!

There was loads of other stuff too that I can't talk about, because if I did I'd have to kill you or send over one of my Ninja guys to take care of things if you spilled the beans. You know how it is. More on that review later because I've got a whole lot more to say on the N95 and it aint gonna win me brownie points.

Mobile Life

Losing mobile phones is something I do so well that without wanting to come across as achieving enlightenment on a detachment level I think I’m entitled to say that for some time now each phone loss now feels as disappointing as say having a pint swiped in the pub. It happens, at least 20 times or more now. Yes it’s annoying but there’s no point beating myself up. I’m a complete loser (or champion winner) at losing stuff, and mobiles top the list.

It does feel beyond absurd though when I’ve resorted to calling my number once I get home, on the off chance I can retrieve it by negotiating with cab drivers to bring them back for a price that suits us all. Often they just switch it off once I start calling. Its me thats in negative equity, not them.

Haggling for something that belongs to the owner anyway is something everyone should try at least once in their life for the humility it fosters.

Some time back I also lost my Sony T1 camera and predictably a while later my mobile phone too. Some time late last year after all this; an amazing local Thai brand called i-mobile brought out a 5 mega pixel camera phone pretty much before anyone else so I thought I’d go for it. I lost that too eventually but not before many enjoyable attempts at experimenting with it.

Anyway, just before a trip to the middle Kingdom last week that I couldn’t Blog about because China is a bit fussy over Blogs, I unexpectedly met a cashier acquaintance at the new Boss Bar in Phrathunam, who I’d inflicted with some amateur photojournalism using the i-mobile 902 late last year. I promised to post the pictures I’d taken so here they are plus a few others (thats the girl on reception crashed out in the wee hours above, plus erm my foot ) from a phone that despite some shortcomings and an all too brief relationship was a brilliant bit of kit that makes me yearn to get back into the kind of spontaneous photography that only a mobile phone camera delivers comfortably.

The i-mobile 902 phone also had an FM radio, voice recorder, and mp3 player with speaker, blue tooth and few other features that I’ve probably forgotten about.

www.bedsupperclub.com

OK, I know Rob hates Bed Supperclub but its a great design and some mates DJ there on a Monday, plus we laugh at all the Friday and Saturday night cattle class clubbers just as much as him and usually turn up for the last hour to watch the preening set get silly on too much alcohol and questionable happy hardcore bollocks.

Brunch Bites

aburt

Mike Butcher organised one of his Brunch Bites yesterday and I popped along thinking it might be a good idea to broaden my digital gene pool. It was held at the Dana Centre which is housed by The Science Museum in South Kensington. I thought it was a lovely place for this type of event as there is plenty of room, gratis Wi Fi and for me it's a convenient couple of tube stops from Victoria Station.

I was hoping to catch up with Steve Bowbrick as I spotted him attending on upcoming.org and/or facebook but it looks like the King of Shaves won't get a chance to see my longest beard yet, and instead I got a chance to say hello again to the Buddha of digital suburbia, Lloyd Davis and the frighteningly erudite Al Robertson who is coming close to the final edit of his book.

The people I got chatting to might have been unrepresentative 0f the 30 or so folk there but apart from one programmer, absolutely everyone around me was connected to the mobile phone as media business. In particular I'm thinking of the wonderfully geeky Imp of A consuming experience who is the most techy blogger I've met.

Brunch bites is an excellent occasion for dipping into other digital worlds and seeing people get together to talk and network. The coffee was generously paid for by Trusted Places who must be the obvious candidate to use if the location has to change for the next occasion! Pop along if you get a chance.

GOODBYEMOTO

Ben Ward

A couple of nights ago I met up with the Creativistan gang at The Commercial Tavern. It was good to catch up with London's young creative talent and get an idea for people who I may one day be working with. If you are looking for a creative break in advertising you should really make an effort to meet Wal who organises these things because he's got a bright future ahead of him and is a social hub for young creative talent. One small criticism aimed squarely at the British creative wannabes of adland is that none of you were present on this night and frankly were conspicuous by your absence. I met Germans, Scandinavians, French, Baltic States, Italians, Russians and more, all speaking spot-on English but no Brits; which tells me something about our ability to broaden the creative gene pool. I've said it before that homogenous advertising agency cultures produce homogeneous work. I think there were three planners there, that I knew of which confirms something about 3rd Millenium Planners too. We're a much more social bunch than the old guard because there really is no better social research than socialising.

And on that subject of research, I met a young man outside The Commercial Tavern who worked as global research for insights with Nokia. I've been rattling on a bit lately how Nokia have their shit together because of their ability to embrace social sciences into the corporation and putting people over profits as the objective which of course is a more profitable long term strategy as I wrote about over here and which you can watch a related online video over here.

Anyway we got talking about Motorola who are clearly having a hard time of things over in Chicago. Knocked off their number two spot by Samsung for market share and having just posted their second quarterly loss I guess the iPhone is starting to look like a corporation killer. I hear the CEO is on his way out too, no doubt with one of those Platinum Parachutes that the American corporation magnificently rewards failure at the highest level.

I started to recall when the Motorola Razr arrived because it was a huge hit in Asia - absolutely massive and unprecedented. The first one I saw belonged to my German boss while we were running around The Philippines, Indonesia, Malayasia and Thailand. I was fascinated how he had developed an automatic reflex to keep the screen clean of smudges, flicking the screen open, wiping, check and closing; a case of techno design-lust I guess.

Nobody could deny that for style it was a killer phone and for a time it was THE must-have accessory. But what struck me later when I got talking to Jens about the product, provided me with a valuable insight. He told me that the camera was rubbish, the interface so difficult to use that he didn't bother to learn all the functions, and that the only reason for purchasing it was style. Style of course is great but style over substance is a long term problem. Pretty much like putting money before people I guess. So 100 million phones later the Razr has been gang raped into submission by the relentless demand for volume sales and profits by Motorola and is now less of a supermodel and more of a crack whore thrown into a mobile tariff plan for free. I believe even the chavs are reluctant to be seen with them these days. Ironic really if the Razr phone is responsible for Motorola slashing their corporate wrists.

Update: I first saw the RAZR in Penang, Malaysia where Motorola have a plant manufacturing wireless radio products. It was just after the Tsunami which clipped the island I was on so that was around January 2005.