T-Mobile was told to see the headmaster and returned with a derrier rouge after making exaggerated claims about its “web’n’walk” mobile Internet service.In a wave of PR-driven hyperbole last October, T-Mobile claimed that their Service – which let customers access the web from their mobiles – would “redefine the mobile Internet market” letting people access the net “Internet wherever you are”. (You may also remember that at the time Guy Kewney wondered if Google were behind the service).
Arch-rivals Orange clearly didn’t like the look of this new service and lobbed a sizeable spanner in the works, lodging an objection with the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) on the grounds that T-Mobile had overstated the availability of the service.
Orange gleefully pointed out to ASA that with T-Mobile only managing 86 per cent coverage in the UK, the advert was giving a false impression about the availability of the service.
T-Mobile had a valiant stab at a defence, arguing that their advert was all about making the distinction between Ye Olde Crappe WAP and their new, full Internet-access, web’n’walk service, adding that they had included the line, “subject to coverage”.
The ASA was having none of it, despatching T-Mobile’s team with a plague of fleas in their ears, firmly pointing out “the unconditional and geographical nature of the phrase, ‘the Internet wherever you are’.”
As heads lowered amongst the T-Mobile team, the ASA statement continued: “We considered the use of such unconditional language to be contradictory to the qualification stated in the coverage disclaimer.”
To the sound of a salvo of slapped wrists, the statement concluded that the ad, “was misleading because readers were likely to interpret the claim to refer to geographical network coverage. We told T-Mobile to avoid making such unconditional claims in future advertising.”
(PS. Don’t tell Orange, but T-Mobile’s website is still making the claim, “Stay one step ahead with web’n’walk and access the Internet wherever you are.”)
Elsewhere, big-boy ISP Wanadoo also felt the harsh crack of ASA leather as it was criticised for ads promoting its “up to 8Mb” service which were seen to fall far short of its claims.
Now holding the record for the fastest-selling debut album in the UK, the success of young British indie-rockers Arctic Monkeys shows how the Web has changed both the way in which bands promote and market themselves and how people find new music.
For less than the cost of a handful of flyers, bands can set up their own Websites, offer free downloadable tunes, sell merchandise, maintain free email mailing lists and invite a dialogue with their fans.
With a growing fanbase clambering for more, it wasn’t long before record companies were begging to sign up the band, and last week’s album release on Domino Records saw the Artic Monkeys record-breaking leap up the charts.
How do ‘Normal’ phones work?
Using VoIP over the Internet is a hit and miss thing. We know the Internet is fantastic at coping with problems – if there are network errors, the data is re-routed around the black-spots, and when the error goes or traffic gets congested, it just re-routes the data somewhere else. It’s best to think of the Internet as a loose collection of around 30,000+ networks that happen to interconnect at various places. 
VoIP in an ideal world
Security implications and therefore costs are a significant issue. The increase in network traffic that VoIP can bring can have other cost implications, such as ensuring firewalls are “chunky” enough to support the VoIP traffic.
In a significant new development, Channel 4 will be allowing their viewers to watch their new comedy program, ‘The IT Crowd’ online and on-demand in advance of their TV broadcast.
The online debut is a first for a terrestrial broadcaster in the UK and apes a similar strategy employed by US network NBC, which launched the US version of The Office online last year.
Channel 4 are saying that this is the first time that they’ve premiered a full episode of a new series, adding that they find it “particularly exciting ” to be airing such a “high profile and apposite programme.”
The program has already received substantial online coverage already with sites like MSN, Yahoo! and Wanadoo running features, and Channel 4 are hoping that the coverage will help in pull in viewers.
Opera Software have announced the worldwide release of 
As a result of the compression technology, users can surf the Web faster – and those paying for their data traffic can dramatically reduce their bandwidth costs.
“With Opera Mini most people can start surfing the Web with the mobile phone they have today,” purred Jon S. von Tetzchner, CEO, Opera Software. 
Opera Mini can be freely downloaded by pointing your phone’s WAP browser in the direction of 
According to figures released by French Web metrics firm XiTi, the open source Mozilla Firefox browser has now grabbed a massive 20% average market share in Europe, creating a growing challenge to the current leader, Microsoft Internet Explorer.
Over here in Blighty, it seems that the Brits are yet to be wooed by the might of Mozilla, with the country recording one of the lowest proportions of Firefox users in Europe – just 11%.
Other Web metrics companies have produced somewhat less spectacular estimates of Firefox’s market share, with OneStat.com reporting in November last year that the browser had notched up a global market share of 11.5%.
Friday afternoon distractions.
Internet auctioneer eBay have cancelled their plans to allow live pets to be sold on its Web site after receiving a barrage of complaints from users.
As company spokesman Hani Durzy explained, users were concerned that the listings would encourage unsanitary ‘puppy mills’, where animals are sometimes bred in less-than ideal conditions, and that it might prove difficult working out legitimate animal shelters and the get-rich-quick scamsters.
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.
For techie-obsessives like the Digital Lifestyles crew, keeping connected when we’re away from home is right up there with finding a roof over our heads, so when we went off to New York, we made sure we packed our Sony laptop and Wi-Fi enabled smartphone – even on holiday.
One rather unfortunate side-effect of all this free connectivity was that once-bustling cafes turned into conversation-free libraries, with rows of transfixed surfers staring intently into their screens, with the silence only broken by intermittent bursts of keyboard activity.
On the street, one handset seemed to be stuck in almost every New Yorker’s hand: the Palm Treo 750. They love the phone!