According to paidcontent.org Nokia is in talks with Facebook about a potential partnership and investment.

Nokia and Facebook are in negotiations about porting Facebook on the home screen of several Nokia handsets. This deal could be huge, since Nokia is the world’s largest maker of mobile phones. Nokia already tartgeted some mobile services for their devices:

• Ovi (mobile web service)
• Mosh (mobile social network)
• Navteq (location based services)
• Universal (music)
• Avvenu (file sharing)
• Twango (media sharing)
• Enpocket (mobile advertising)

This deal could help Facebook expand in the European market. Nokia is also looking into purchasing a stake of Facebook.

Talks are still very early. A senior Nokia executive declined to go into details: “There is talk of a partnership in the works it’s safe to say we’re testing the waters and things still have to be worked out.”

So no specific details have been released yet, but maybe mobilemag.com is right with “The giant just got bigger”.

Sources:
mobilemag.com paidcontent.org

Yesterday we went to the Bloggertreffen in Munich which was loosely related to the DLD. Thanks to the sponsors Hubert Burda Media (the organizer of the DLD event), and Telegate (11880), every guest received an 18 EUR voucher. So, beer and food were free.

It was a nice event and a good opportunity to meet some people (not only) from the German blogosphere. We had some interesting talks with people from the CCC, Focus, Townkings, BlogWerk and Xing. Almost the whole CScout team was there too.

Many thanks to Klaus Eck for organizing this event!

There are some interesting events coming up:

• Bloggertreffen: Jan. 20, 2008 starting at 7:30 pm, Munich, Germany
• Mobile Monday Norway Peer Awards 2008: Jan. 21, 2008, Latter, Aker Brygge, Norway
• Mobile Web USA: 22-23 January 2008, San Francisco, USA
• Mobile Monday “Open Portals, Open Platforms, Open Communities”: Jan. 28, 2008, Munich, Germany
• Mobile Monday “Mobile Ticketing”: Feb. 11, 2008, Frankfurt, Germany
• Mobile Jam Session: February 12, 2008, Barcelona, Spain
• Mobile Monday: Feb. 18, 2008, Berlin, Germany
• Mobile Monday “Mobile Advertising”: Feb. 25, 2008, Frankfurt, Germany

Are there some other events coming up in the next couple of weeks? Please let us know!

I recently wrote an article for dev.opera.com about Mobile Ajax and how the Frost Library can deal with that. There is a lot of introductory stuff in there and it might will be the longest and most comprehensive article I have been writing on the topic, there’s even code snippets in there. So it might be a good read for anybody interested in the topic of Mobile Ajax.Thanks to David and Chris from Opera for making that happen and giving me the opportunity.You can read the article at dev.opera.com.

- Mobile TV via DVB-H will start in Germany on June 1, 2008 - just in time for the European Championship in Soccer. There is still a lack of content which has to be adapted for the small screen sizes. It will be interesting to see if this version of mobile TV will be successful.

- China Mobile, China’s largest mobile operator, called off iPhone launch negotiations with Apple. Supposedly the negotiations were cancelled due to disputes about Apple’s share in downloads and other content sales.

- Nokia is to close its German plant. The closure of the Bochum facilities is planned for the middle of this year. The production will be shifted to more competitive locations (such as Romania and Hungary).

- Google has got the approval by the FCC (Federal Communications Commision) and is now one of the 214 qualified bidders for the 700Mhz frequency spectrum auction starting on Jan. 24, 2008.
Sources: http://www.golem.de/0801/57045.html (Mobile TV), http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/101733 (iPhone), http://blog.wired.com/business/2008/01/china-mobile-an.html (iPhone), http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/101797 (Nokia), http://www.golem.de/0801/57012.html (Nokia), http://www.engadgetmobile.com (Nokia), http://www.ft.com (Nokia), http://www.informationweek.com (Google/FCC), http://www.golem.de/0801/57029.html (Google, FCC)

In the first post this year we wish all of you a happy and successful year 2008!

We have not blogged in a while. The good thing about this is that we were busy working on our first product, Groupile. Groupile will be a productive networking tool for groups. It is going to be ubiquitous, mobile-focused and web based. There will be a beta test soon, so make sure you sign up for that at groupile.com!

Another thing that we’ve been working on was our Mobile Ajax Library, Frost. We booked a domain for the project and installed a very basic homepage. http://frostlib.org will from now on be the official home of the Frost library providing all the available information about the project. A pre-release version of the library is available for download there too.

Wizzl, a Dutch company, is preparing to launch its all-in-one virtual phone. Users (“Wizzlers”) can talk, chat, have direct access to live TV, Internet radio and web games. Or as written on their website:

“Wizzl has developed free communication software which will allow its users (‘Wizzlers’) to make free voice and video calls over the internet, and calls to local and international phones and mobiles from only 1.5 Eurocents per minute. And it doesn’t stop there; with Wizzl’s all-in-one virtual phone, Wizzlers will have direct access to live TV, internet radio stations and the most popular web games around. Personal photographs, music and videos will also be at users’ fingertips.”

The official (worldwide) launch will be at GamePlay, the largest game event of the Benelux, between 23 and 25 Nov. 2007.

You can test their (Windows) software on your desktop PC here: http://www.wizzl.com/intl/en/download. First-time downloaders get up to 10 minutes of free calling time to landlines and mobile phones across the world. Wizzler-to-Wizzler voice and video calls are completely free of charge. “The current beta version works on desktops and laptops only. In the very near future, Wizzl will also be available for mobile phones.”
Sources: http://www.wizzl.com http://www.gameplay.nl

I read an interesting article on us.blognation.com about mywaves, a mobile video service. mywaves was founded at the end of 2006, is led by a team that includes veterans from Yahoo, Napster, Danger, PayPal and TiVo and is financially backed by Menlo Ventures.The Sunnyvale, California based company revealed some quite impressive numbers. mywaves reported 1.25 million visitors per month. Honestly, I didn’t know that there is already such a big market for mobile video out there. According to their press release they got an average of 4 visits per month per individual. These visits lasted an average of 20 minutes.
How does it work?
First you have to sign-up for the service. Then you can discover, choose and personalize your on-the-go entertainment on their website that will be automatically delivered and updated to your mobile phone. mywaves also sends text messages alerting you about content updates in their channels. The service is free and works globally across all 3G, EDGE, BREW and EV-DO carriers as well as most video-capable mobile phones.
Marketing
In May 2007 they announced their partnership with Admob to enable click-to-video advertisements for AdMob advertisers.In July 2007 mywaves announced that Alltel Wireless will be the first North American carrier who launches mywaves service allowing Alltel customer to watch videos from their phone for 3.99 USD per month. Customers can easily download the application from their phone via the Alltel Axcess Shop and customize the content.
Sources:http://www.mywaves.comhttp://us.blognation.com

- Vodafone sued T-Mobile in Germany over its exclusive contract with Apple. That’s why Vodafone had issued a “restraining order” against T-Mobile for offering the iPhone exclusively. Another German carrier Debitel had also complained to the German telecommunications regulators about the exclusive deal (which ties the iPhone to a single carrier).
T-Mobile announced yesterday that they will now also sell the iPhone in Germany without the 24-month contract as well as without SIM lock. T-Mobile’s unlocked iPhones (without a contract) will cost 999 EUR (1473 USD).
Customers who sign up for a 2-year T-Mobile contract get the device for 399 EUR (588 USD) plus (at least) 49.99 EUR/month.

- The new version of the mobile Opera browser - Opera Mini 4 - was released on Nov. 7th and had already had over 1 Mio. downloads in the first ten days. Incredible! Congratulations to the Opera team!
Download Opera Mini 4 here: http://www.operamini.com/download/
Sources: http://www.betanews.com http://business.timesonline.co.uk http://www.heise.de

Not the latest, but still some quite interesting news:

• Apple plans to release an SDK for the iPhone and iPod Touch in February 2008. The company wants to create “a vibrant third party developer community around the iPhone and enabling hundreds of new applications for (their) users”

• Orange will sell the iPhone in France without SIM-Lock, because the French consumer rights forces Orange to offer the iPhone also without contract and without SIM-Lock

• Google bought Jaiku

Sources: http://www.apple.com/hotnews/ http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/97556/from/rss09 http://www.jaiku.com http://www.heise.de/newsticker/meldung/97537/from/rss09