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MOBILE CONTENT WRITERS - BLOGOSHPERE |
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September 24, 2007Wireless and Mobile News LaunchesBy Lynn WalfordThe secret's out: Wireless and Mobile News is officially launched and is linking to this blog. Click back often to see easy-to-understand updated Wireless and Mobile News. |
 Blog Archive Previous Posts: 09/18/2007 The Secret's Out 09/06/2007 Vacation's Over 08/21/2007 Texting While Bi 08/14/2007 Where U At? -- Loopt 08/08/2007 Amp'd Ax'd 08/01/07 99 Cent Store Dictionery Disaster 07/31/07 And the Winner is - Apple 07/21/07 Taming of the Text 07/19/07 Texting + Driving = Dying? 07/17/07 Expression Web Expressed 07/09/07 Mobile Dreamin' on a Summer's Day 7/03/07 No Fireworks 4 iPhone or 4th 06/30/07 iPhone Not My Phone 06/23/2007 The Write Compliments 06/22/2007 Mobi-email Ubiquity 06/19/2007 Intercontinental Mobile Disconnect 06/18/2007 More about Books/Mobile 06/15/07 Learning from Books 06/14/2007 Last Comic Texting 06/12/2007 News Releases News Views 06/08/2007 Touch Technology Disabled for People with Disabilities 6/07/2007 Too Many Clix Blox Content Pix 6/06/2007 How Many Words/Lines Per Mobile Page/View? 5/31/2007 Is Winking Linking Web 2 Cells? 5/25/07 PR 2.0 Tricks Revealed 5/24/07 Lost Clues in Cell Phone 5/22/07 Twit Happens 5/21/07 Is Web Expression the Best Web Developing Software? |
September 18, 2007The Secret's Out SoonBy Lynn WalfordAs with all things Web, it always takes a longer than you think. Wireless and Mobile News is in an Alpha almost Beta state. It is destined to be the best of the best of Wireless and Mobile News. |
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September 6, 2007Vacation's Over New Project SoonBy Lynn WalfordAlthough it looked like I was vacation according to the posts here. I have been working on a very challenging and promising project, which will be announced soon. It will definitely be something you will want to read. You can find our more, later. |
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August 21, 2007Texting While Bicycling? By Lynn WalfordToday, I saw a feat of pure balance, guts and maybe stupidity. A twenty-something guy was riding a bicycle downhill on my busy street. With his hands off the handle bars, he was texting into his phone! He was somehow steering the bicycle with the balance of his body as cars zoomed by. Finally, he put his phone in his pocket and his hands back on the handle bars. I thought texting while driving was dangerous. My lasting texting viewing was at McDonalds in between packing French fries and burgers, the server checked her text messages. |
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August 14, 2007Where U At? -- Loopt By Lynn WalfordThe latest GPS service that is claiming it's the next killer app is Loopt. They say the number one question friends text each other is "Where are you?" So these highly-funded Stanford students in Mountain View created a GPS application sold on Boost and Sprint to locate and map where friends are, exchange messages, photos and profiles. Personally, I don't want to know where my friends are all the time, I've got my own life to lead. If they are in my vicinity they can call me, if they want to see me. I'd rather know where the closest gas station is or the cleanest restroom. I had a good laugh, on the safety page, where they state, "Call 1-877-LOOPT-ME (1-877-566-7863) if you lose your phone so we can suspend your Loopt account until you recover your phone, or get a new one." Hmn, with GPS in the phone shouldn't they know where the phone is? |
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August 8, 2007Amp'd Ax'dBy Lynn Walford When I first read about the demise and
bankruptcy of Amp'd Mobile, the MVNO that was one of the top purveyors of
content for the young and broke, I had no opinion. The Hollywood
Reporter reported, "The bankruptcy filing said that nearly 80,000 of its
175,000 subscribers were "non-paying." The content providers were assuming that only the young and hip would buy mobile content and mistakenly assuming that would pay their bills. How about high-income adults with a need for help or entertainment? Yesterday, at my local coffee house there was a group of twenty-somethings congregating around four tables, smoking cigarettes, while a few looked at their cell phones. Of course, someone was Googling something on an iPhone. Were they buying mobile content? No, they were buying coffee. |
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August 1, 200799 Cent Store Dictionery DisasterBy Lynn WalfordSometimes it is very important to spell things correctly, no matter what the medium, either mobile or print.  I understand that when working in a graphic mode, text is forgotten. While reading email requests from Indian writers who wanted to write for Mobile Content Writers, I could tell immediately that they were foreign born by the many misspellings. None were as funny as this one! For a photo of the full page ad click here. |
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July 31, 2007And the Winner Is - AppleBy Lynn WalfordD  uring a recent super market opening, I won an
iPod Shuffle. Everyone, I have told about my win, is very impressed.
It costs approximately twice of what similar MP3 players cost with the same
capabilities, but it has so much more panache. The postage stamp-sized
player, made me "special."Last night, when a group of friends went out for a late night snack, the guy with iPhone got a lot of positive attention and feedback. "Is your brother cute, Jim?" a girl asked. "Let's Goggle him and see," I suggested. Within seconds we saw a photo of Jim's brother, from his personal website on the iPhone from someone who had never used the phone before. Even, I was impressed. What Apple sells is more than just technology but tech prestige. The iPhone owner beamed as we quizzed him about the iPhone. Even though, the bottom of the screen broke after two weeks and he had to liv  e without for
three days until it was replaced, we could tell he
loved his iPhone. He used it to show a map to where he used to live
nearby the restaurant and showed us how the accelerometer worked giving us
better views of the photos.He also gave me a better view of mobile. There is something to say for perceived prestige, panache and pulchritude. Something we should remember when we create mobile content. We want it to be hip, stylish and be perceived as so hot it is cool. |
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July 21, 2007 Taming of the TextBy Lynn WalfordWhile attending a local production of "The Taming of the Shrew" in the park, last night, I noticed an audience member with light coming out her hands. In the final climatic scene when Kate succumbs to Petruchio's love, the audience member was texting. Yes, texting while "Taming of the Shrew." Could the messages have waited until after the curtain call? Surely, yes. Just like the teenagers killed on the highway could have waited until they got off the road. In Shakespeare's time if the audience didn't like the play, they'd throw vegetables, now bored audience members send little lighted text messages of their boredom. |
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July 19, 2007Texting + Driving = Dying?By Lynn WalfordNew York State Senator Carl Marcellino is sponsoring a bill to make texting while driving illegal in New York after the deaths of a driver and four recent high school graduates, possibly due to text distractions. The cell phone of a seventeen year-old driver shows that text messages were sent moments before the crash. Twenty-eight percent of teens admit to sending text messages while driving, according to a study just released by the American Automobile Association and Seventeen magazine. There must a way to prevent these kinds of tragic deaths. There are breath testers that do not allow a car to start while a driver is drunk. How about phones with GPS that don't allow text sending or receiving while the car is traveling over 5 miles an hour? |
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July 17, 2007Expression Web ExpressedBy Lynn WalfordIn one of my first post pages I asked "Is Web Expression the Best Web Developing Software?" I was hoping to give you an  answer
when I received the whole suite of products Expression Studio.
Unfortunately, I was recently told even though I was promised a review copy,
there was a long waiting list and I would not receive one, yet.This website was created with Web Expression and a whole bunch of design programs I still have on my hard drive from the pre-Dot-com-bomb days, Corel Draw and Fireworks. Although, I knew Microsoft FrontPage very well, I was befuddled on how to do some things I really wanted such as centering layers and settled for good basic styling. All-in-all, Expression Web is a major upgrade from Excel mainly due to Cascading Style Sheets and Dynamic Web Templates. The template feature saved me a lot of time even though I was pulling out my hair when I wanted to remove an area from an earlier version of the template. What was left was big blue patch where the removed area formerly existed. I tricked it by keeping the editable area, leaving it blank and moving onto the bottom of the page of the template. The most time consuming graphics functions occurred when I had two or three other programs open to tweak images. It would be really nice to have a graphics program that worked seamlessly with Web Expression, like Fireworks did with Dreamweaver. Here's another instance where I can write, "I'll keep you posted." Or maybe it should be "I'll blog you later..." |
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July 9, 2007Mobile Dreamin' on a Summer's DayBy Lynn Walford I seldom remember my dreams, but after doing web research for two different clients for several days, I found that I was dreaming in clickable web pages with images! I can't remember now what the images were. There was no message or text. It got me thinking that what we continually look at and think about enters our subconscious. When we create mobile content that is viewed frequently it could change the way people think and dream. I'd love to hear from people who continually look at their mobile phones and if they have ever gotten a text message, MMS or video in a dream. What is the ultimate mobile dream? |
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July 3, 2007No Fireworks 4 iPhone or 4thBy Lynn Walford We
are in the midst of a drought in Southern California and for the first time
the city put signs up warning people about setting off fireworks. I
hope it works.I was also hoping that I'd be blown away by the iPhone but I wasn't. After my posting on the 30th, I was out walking the dog, carrying a huge tote bag and a blanket from a concert when I passed the Apple Store. To be polite, I carried my weighty but absolutely adorable yorkie-poo, Ewok into the store and didn't have to wait long to get my right hand on a iPhone. I attempted to send email and browse the web while holding the bags and the pooch in my left hand to no avail. For any advanced function other than answering the phone, the iPhone requires two hands or some kind of special mounting. After I put Ewok down on the floor, I was able to do most of the operations shown in the commercial but even with my tiny hands and adroit fingers, the entering of text was very tedious. They have split up text rows on the screen requiring an extra tap to get to the number row and @ sign. Another added problem was that the phone itself was very hot, almost has hot as Tamale! If I had thrown it into (which I couldn't because there was security cable attached) the dry brush it may have started a fire, like the kind that can occur from fireworks... I was very impressed, however, with the clarity of the YouTube video of O.K. Go on treadmills and the people at the Apple store were envious of me, because I found the keyboard. They crowded around me and thought I was very "cool." One Macaholic asked me "How'd you get the keyboard." I was honest, "I don't know," I answered which proved the interface was intuitive. Now I realize that the keyboard shows up for text oriented functions. Okay, so I will admit the iPhone is "hot," but only as hot as a steamed Tamale or quesadilla fresh from the grill. |
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June 30, 2007iPhone Not My PhoneBy Lynn WalfordI was trying to avoid writing about the iPhone because I wrote about some of its features in January for Wireless Week, but the media hype has been so huge, I can't ignore it. Only four journalists received review iPhone units, the rest of us have to speculate. The journalists were not wireless or e telecommunications writers but "tech" gadgeteers with computer and Mac backgrounds. Not to mention the front page story in my local paper of the the line outside the Mac store. The one thing Steve Jobs does well is give people what they want and develop graphic software. Before mobile content writers jump on the iPhone bandwagon we should remember that there are billions of phones out there with capabilities that we can develop very useful content for. Just the other day, I received an email from a mobile content provider in India. Although I barely understood their form of Panglish, it looks like they wanted to outsource to Mobile Content Writers! They are particularly lo  oking
for Vaatsu Tips (Indian Feng Sui) and breaking Cricket news.Forget, the iPhone let's get the 178 million mobile phone users in India their Vaatsu, so they know where to put their furniture and plants. Then develop a Cricket Mobile Wiki of Cricket stats. It's interesting to note according to th  eir
PowerPoint presentation, that their number one category for MMS is
"Greetings" birthday, festivals, general, love and New Year.Maybe some day, we'll have an iPhone Festival and we can develop the greeting for it.  |
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Please feel free to call (626) 345-9910 9:00 am - 6:00 pm Pacific Time on weekdays. |
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