Press Releases

BBM Music free for six months

BlackBerry has kicked off a limited time holiday promotion for BBM Music. Customers in the United Kingdom that download the app before January 4^th, 2012 will get the first 6 months for free. RIM are also pleased to extend this offer to those who have already downloaded BBM Music, extending your current subscription to four months.

Music is Better with Friends

With this holiday offer there has never been a better time to introduce friends to BBM Music – so that you can share and discover music together.

With BBM Music, you can create a music profile of your favourite songs that all your BBM Music friends can listen to – and in return you can enjoy all of your friends’ profile selections. That means the more friends you have on BBM Music, the more music you and your friends can enjoy! You can listen to full tracks, create playlists, have conversations about music, and even listen to music offline.

BBM Music is a cloud-based BBM-connected music service that enables viral music discovery and social interaction, allowing music fans to connect on a whole new level. BBM Music allows users to enjoy an evolving, community-based music library together with their BBM Music friends. The size of a user’s music library continues to grow as they invite friends to join their community. Each user can select music from a catalog of millions of songs from Universal Music Group, Sony Music Entertainment, Warner Music Group, EMI, IODA: Independent Online Distribution Alliance, Merlin, VidZone Digital Media and The Orchard.

Application requirements:

• BlackBerry OS 5 or higher
• BBM 6.0 or higher
• User must have access to BlackBerry App World
• SD card is recommended for caching songs

Posted by: James

50% discount on BlackBerry DevCon Europe tickets

The countdown is on to BlackBerry DevCon Europe 2012! The inaugural BlackBerry DevCon Europe 2012 takes place on February 7^th and 8^th in Amsterdam. RIM are kindly offering our readers a 50% discount. Whether you’re new to developing for the BlackBerry platform, or you’re an experienced app master, take up this offer and you’ll be able to attend at half the cost to learn all there is to know about developing for 70 million-strong BlackBerry community.

By attending BlackBerry DevCon Europe 2012, you’ll also receive a free BlackBerry PlayBook tablet.

To get your 50% discount, visit online registration now, using this unique code before December 24^th: DBRM02

To find out more about the event sessions, and how you could help shape the future of BlackBerry apps, visit http://www.blackberrydevcon.com/europe/content/sessions/topics

Posted by: James

Xperia and Box give the gift of online storage this festive season

Sony Ericsson today announced details of a new promotion that will give every Xperia owner 50GB of free file sharing and storage in partnership with Box.  By simply logging into their Box account through the Box for Android application in the Android Marketplace, Xperia owners globally will be able to enjoy free cloud storage and file sharing for life.

· 50GB free online storage for digital content such as photos, music and video for all Xperia users with Box for Android

· Log into Box for Android just once to access for lifetime of account

· Year-long promotion runs from today until end of 2012

The Box promotion begins on 15 December 2011 through until December 31, 2012, and is available to all consumers worldwide who own any Xperia smartphone including and released after Xperia X10.

LG announce the Prada 3.0

With a heritage of producing handsets that combine the best in style and substance, PRADA and LG today unveiled the partnership’s latest must-have smartphone, the PRADA phone by LG 3.0. This highly anticipated handset is the third phone to come from the collaboration and represents a key design venture for both companies.
The PRADA phone by LG 3.0 combines PRADA’s distinctive style with LG’s innovative technology, including one of the biggest and brightest screens in the world with 4.3inch and 800-nit screen.
Styled with PRADA’s clean and sharp design philosophy, the handset features a full glossy touchscreen to the front and PRADA’s signature Saffiano pattern to the back, all finished in classic black. With every detail designed for chic simplicity, this handset also boasts LG’s signature Floating Mass Technology, optically enhancing the thinness of its already impressive 8.5mm depth, with minimal hard keys completing the sleek simple finish.
As effective as it is striking, the PRADA phone by LG 3.0 boasts a 1.0GHz Dual-Core/Dual-Channel architecture for high-speed performance, and dual-band Wi-Fi for high-speed surfing on the go.
The smartphone’s sleek design is also reflected once switched on. The PRADA phone by LG 3.0 offers a specially created user interface featuring a unique black, grey and white menu and icons. Through this interface users can enjoy all the latest benefits of Android’s Gingerbread OS, with a future scheduled upgrade to Android’s Ice Cream Sandwich.

Kasabian to stream live on YouTube thanks to O2

O2 have announced that they are opening up access to their exclusive NYE:Rewired event at The O2 this New Year’s Eve, by live streaming it on YouTube. The event will also be supported by a major through the line advertising campaign.
The NYE event will be streamed live to a dedicated O2 and NYE:Rewired branded YouTube Channel at www.youtube.com/theo2nye. The live stream will also be available on YouTube’s homepage, in the masthead area. This is the first time in the UK that a live musical act has been streamed to the YouTube homepage masthead.
The complete performance will remain available for 48 hours after the event and then for a following two weeks as individual, on demand tracks giving a great opportunity for those at the gig to relive the experience afterwards, and for those that missed out to catch up on what is guaranteed to be a fantastic night.

Microsoft updates OneNote for iPhone and introduces iPad version

Today, Microsoft announced the release of an update to OneNote Mobile for iPhone (to version 1.3) and a version of this app tailored for iPad. The Lync 2010 for Windows Phone app is also available today, and Lync 2010 clients for iPhone, iPad, Android and Nokia Symbian have been submitted to their respective mobile app marketplaces and will be available as soon as they have been approved. 

Updated features in OneNote Mobile for iPhone v 1.3 include easier navigation, table viewing, and improved reliability and performance. The new Lync mobile clients deliver features such as instant messaging, calling features and audio conferencing using your Lync ID.

Are you a OneNote user on iOS? Let us know your thoughts please.

Posted by: James

Lease a phone from O2

O2 today announces O2 Lease, the first smartphone leasing service in the UK. Available initially through O2 retail stores and over the phone, O2 Lease enables new or existing O2 customers to lease a new smartphone for one year with no upfront payment for £55 per month including insurance, 750 minutes, unlimited text and 500 MB of data*. Small businesses will also be able to take advantage of O2 Lease with a range of business tariffs. O2 Lease is unique in the market today.

O2 Lease puts the latest smartphone technology into the hands of the people who want it with minimal barriers, little long-term commitment, no upfront cost, no two-year contracts and crucially, at £55 with insurance, minutes, text and data an affordable price point. It provides certainty and predictability of costs for customers, a genuinely new way of engaging with those that want the latest smartphone and the latest technology every year, but either can’t afford the relatively high upfront cost of a normal 12 month contract or don’t want to be tied to a long contract. O2 Lease is the first tariff model available to all O2 customers that reflects the lifecycle of the smartphone industry.

Kik messenger now on Symbian

Those of you using Symbian devices may be pleased to know that the Kik cross-platform IM app is now available for your devices. You can download and install from the Ovi store or by heading over to the Kik website.

Press release follows:

We’re proud to announce that Kik Messenger for Symbian is available for download in the Ovi Store. Go get it now!

We think the millions of Symbian users around the world deserve pretty, responsive, reliable apps, just like any other mobile platform. In that spirit, we built Kik to be the fastest and most beautiful messenger available for Symbian today.

A special ‘thank-you’ goes out to our beta users, who not only gave us valuable feedback but also freely shared their enthusiasm for Symbian. Your spirit is infectious.

So, Symbian users: Go give it a try and let us know what you think.

Symbian OS versions supported: Symbian^3, Anna and Belle

Posted by: Matt

GALAXY Nexus now available from Vodafone

The GALAXY Nexus, the world’s first smartphone to feature Android 4.0 – Ice Cream Sandwich – the latest Android platform, is now available to buy from Vodafone.

Android 4.0 brings an entirely new look and feel to the operating system, including improved multi-tasking, notifications, Wi-Fi hotspot, NFC support and a full web browsing experience. The GALAXY Nexus also features software navigation buttons and integrated Google+, which allows you to ‘hang out’ with friends, and talk over Google+ Messenger. It also gives you access to 300,000 apps and games available on the Android Market.

The GALAXY Nexus is available free on £41, 24 month plans – including 900 minutes, unlimited texts, and 750MB of mobile data.

New and upgrading pay monthly customers will benefit from Vodafone Data Test Drive which lets them use as much data as they like, for whatever they like, for three months so they can fully explore what their brand new GALAXY Nexus has to offer. They can also get up to £270 for their old phone with Vodafone Buyback.

We know our customers lead busy lives and may not wish to wait for their phone to arrive at their home. They can choose to collect their new GALAXY Nexus in a store convenient to them – we’ll let them know when it’s there. When they come to collect it, customers can have all the contents of their old mobile transferred to their new GALAXY Nexus using Vodafone’s innovative RED Box.

For more information on pricing, visit the Vodafone online shop

Posted by: James