All too often articles about the things teenagers are interested in are written by people old enough to be their parents. Teenage thinking isn’t represented. Lawrence Dudley gives you a point of view that you won’t find in other publications. You see, Lawrence is a teenager.
Woof … I mean, Hello?
There’s loads of relatively serious articles on media and technology all over the Internet nowadays. This isn’t one of them.
Mobile phones are reaching into all sorts of new markets, often, not just reaching but forcing, with operators seemingly desperate to reap more profits. There’s the mobile for kids, the Firefly, and the mobile phone controlled kettle.
Of course, this can’t possibly be enough… and come on, the dog feels left out when you go to Carphone Warehouse and there isn’t a Carphone Kennel to match. The answer to this is, of course, the PetCell.
Come on, admit it: When your dog is late, possibly because it is busy peeing against a tree somewhere, don’t you wish that you could give it a quick ring to check it’s OK? Yeah, didn’t think so. Nevertheless it exists, so I guess some overly-pet-protective marketing drone somewhere decided that it was a viable product.
From what I gathered, the device lets you set a fixed area in which your dog is allowed to be. If your dog goes outside this area, the unit sends you a text message. I personally think that this is kind of like shutting the door after the horse (or dog) has bolted.
I mean, you notice your dog’s missing, and, look at that, how helpful, your mobile phone confirms it! What a useful bit of technology!
Of course, it only does this while the battery isn’t flat or the dog has decided to go for a swim. I’m guessing that it will be marketed as waterproof when it is released in 2006, but as with all “waterproof” devices, I seriously doubt it really is.
I’m guessing that there will be different models too, so that the dogs with the cool phones have something to show off to their mates. The mocked-up image at the top of this piece is what I imagine two cell-phone equipped dogs to act like, shown on an advert for Carphone Kennel.
I’m sorry if I sound a little negative this week, but I am sick of these tacky technologies coming out which serve no particular real-life purpose. And this is coming from someone with a passion for gadgets, don’t forget.
I mean, who’s really going to call up their dog to find out which lamp post he’s peeing on? And I guess those people who would, probably also wouldn’t mind paying an outrageous monthly subscription for the service, which is no doubt how the service will be paid for.
Now if only one of these could be invented that’s small enough to be fitted on valuable items like my laptop, or my wallet. Now that would be useful, and save me looking for either of them when they get stolen. And when they do get stolen, I will know where they are and possibly who stole them.
The problem with that, of course, is that this would constitute genuinely useful technology, something which the gadget industry has an extremely bad grasp of.
Shame really.
Takeover mania isn’t confined to one side of the Atlantic; Liberty, the media group that includes QVC and holds a majority stake in IAC/Interactive Corp, is buying Provide Commerce whose mission is “To become the leading e-commerce marketplace for the delivery of perishable products direct from the supplier to the consumer,” whatever that means.
The Liberty purchase, is subject to approvals from US regulatory bodies as well as Provide Commerce shareholders, if all obstacles are cleared then the acquisition should complete in the second quarter of 2006.
Bill Strauss Provide Commerce’s CEO was equally direct,
Both Vodafone and France Telecom are now considering a rival bid for Virgin Mobile, following a “unanimous” decision by the Virgin board to reject the starting offer from NTL. Financial sources say both companies have asked to look at the Virgin Mobile books.
From Australia, Forbes quotes Branson as saying that the new company will be formed and will be called Virgin TV – all it will take, he added, is a small increase in the offer. He said the current offer under-valued the company in the eyes of his fellow directors, but that “the difference between what they’ve asked for and what NTL has offered is not considerable in financial terms.”
California based telecoms company, SureWest Communications, is set to become the first company in the USA to offer HDTV commercially over its Internet Protocol (IP)-based fibre-to-the-premise (FTTP) network.
“Through our HDTV channel lineup and launch of HDTV over IP, we are showcasing our dedication to providing customers with the highest-quality programming, sharpest picture available and a variety of emerging video products,” he added.
On HDNet, SureWest viewers can, err, thrill to original series like “HDNet World Report,” “Face 2 Face with Roy Firestone” and “HDNet Concert Series,” and if that lot doesn’t set you packing your bags for Sacramento, there’ll also be showing Warner’s “Smallville” series and a load of live sports productions include Major League Soccer games.
NBC Universal and Apple have struck a deal to make NBC-owned television shows, such as “The Office” and “Law & Order,” available on the iTunes music store.
The shows will be available from next week, downloadable from the iTunes Music Store the day after they air for $1.99 (£1.15, €1.70) per episode
Say hello to the LG SB130-KB1300 handset, a clever-clogs, do-it-all device that can do play and pause live TV as well as deal with every multimedia-type task you can lob at it.
This memory can apparently fit up to an hour’s worth of broadcasting before it starts writing over the oldest bits with new content.
The aerial’s a bit of a beefy affair too, but we doubt if the geeky market the phone’s aimed at are going to mind.
Creative are set to take on Apple’s video-enabled fifth-generation iPod with their new Zen Vision:M player, due to be announced tomorrow.
Creative claim that the rechargeable battery can keep punters entertained for four hours in video-playback mode – twice as long as the iPod’s two hours.
It’s a shame seeing a company as, err, creative as Creative coming up with a design so obviously ‘inspired’ by the iPod, but perhaps it’s a sign that they’re signing up to a philosophy of, “if you can’t beat them, join them.”
The Digital-Lifestyles office is in a state of total confusion over major UK broadcaster, 
The school leavers departing since the wide use of the Internet, will not have to resort to third-party services – the majority of them will have an online presence, allowing direct contact, if desired.
Another benefit will be letting ITV have access to the 12m members of FR, allowing them to expose the online FR audience to promotion of ITV’s programming, if they’re UK based. Later this can be expanded to on-demand sales.
Friends Reunited and ITV have decided to make it legal; after a short romance, a deal’s been agreed. Rumours they’d been seeing other suitors that included BT, News Corp and that bastion of middle England the Daily Mail & General Trust, did little to cool the ardour of an excited ITV.
“When ITV approached us we immediately clicked; they share our values, they’re a national institution that is trusted and well loved, and by joining with them, Friends Reunited will become the UK ‘s 8th most visited site giving us access to a vast audience so we can connect even more of you even more of the time.”
“A powerful consolidated online advertising sales proposition. 53% of Friends Reunited users are in the ABC1 demographic and 40% are in the 16-34 age range – both key audiences for advertisers. It will contribute additional advertising synergies as ITV Internet sales will have increased scale, becoming a one-stop-shop for media agencies in the online space.”
Japan Sharp and NTT DoCoMo will be launching the SH902i FOMA, their funky new 3G clamshell phone in Japan this week.
As ever, there’s a veritable feast o’multimedia bolted on board, with the all-swivellin’, all-flippin’, shiny handset coming with an impressive 3.16 megapixel autofocus camera, an MP3 Player and the highly rated NetFront Web browser. 
The phone goes on sale in Japan on December 9th with no date set for us technology-starved folks in Britland.