Yahoo! Go 2.0 today launched in the United States and has gone beta in 13 countries. The 2.0 technology is designed to enhance the mobile Internet.

“People want easy access to the Internet on their mobile phones (and) we believe that Yahoo! Go will be a catalyst for broader adoption of the mobile Internet,” said Marco Boerries, executive vice president of Yahoo’s Connected Life Division.

The beta versions, now in such countries as France, Canada, United Kingdom and India, include the same functionality as the U.S. version.

By the end of July, Yahoo! Go will be supported by more than 200 different mobile phones. Yahoo! expects to expand that to 400 before the end of 2007.

Yahoo! Go

After we posted about Novarra’s partnership with Vodafone to power their mobile Internet services, critics of Novarra’s transcoding application - including Kevin McCloskey of MobileAware - charge that the technology is a common denominator solution that “often destroys the look and feel of a company’s website, thereby diminishing their corporate brand and identity.” The debate continues to rage on the issue of how Web sites ought to be rendered on mobile devices. Is Novarra’s solution a step backwards as some critics claim? We asked the executive team at Novarra for their take.

Mobile Crunch: Ever since the deal was announced between Vodafone UK and Novarra there have been those who have expressed feelings that it is a move in the wrong direction for mobile Web searching. What do you say to those detractors, who are claiming that this application will make using some sites more difficult?

Novarra: It may be that these people have used a product of this quality. Most people find it is quite a compelling Web experience on regular, average handsets across commerce, news, mail, skiing…you name it. Next time you are stuck somewhere waiting to go back to the laptop to look up something on the Web; you may remember this thread.

Novarra has operator customers across America, Europe and Asia on both 2.5G and 3G networks. In these deployments, the consumers use the service regularly and have no complaint, and the operators are happy with the consumer uptake and usage.

Most operators have deployed many high-tier handsets and PDAs with full Web browsers for the last 3+ years. Novarra shipped the full browsers on the Palm platform since mid 2002. These products try to provide the full Web on phones.

We believe that there is a role for “created for mobile” content as well, both legacy and future. However, one cannot miss the obvious. The power of the Web is the millions of sites, each relevant.

Mobile Crunch: How long was the transcoding technology from Novarra in development, and how many handsets was it tested on?

Novarra: Novarra’s web transformation solution is the result of 7 years of product development and 5 years of commercial deployment. It has been validated on 100s of handsets. Transcoding is one piece of the solution. Network optimization, handset usability, network platform integration, content optimization, etc. contribute to transforming the desktop experience for a mobile user. All mobile specific content is also supported.

Mobile Crunch: Is the transcoding application continually being refined to address issues that users may encounter with various Web sites they try to view?

Novarra: It is correct that the problem is quite vast. As the Web changes and evolves, the solution is continuously upgraded. The industry is starting the next phase of a journey that started way back. Novarra has a commitment to that vision, which is why we are where we are today. Central to our vision is placing quality and user experience at the heart of everything we build; which will help us address the evolving Web.

Mobile Crunch: Remembering the 1.0 launch of the Web in the mid-1990s, there was an opinion that there were things you couldn’t do, because the Web wasn’t designed for commerce, video, interaction, etc. So do you see some of these same issues cropping up with the mobile Web? That is, that people are saying, “you can’t do these things on the mobile Web,” and it is up to innovators to again make it happen?

Novarra: Absolutely. There are many myths, fears and theories. With innovation and solid products these hurdles are removed.

Mobile Crunch: While we’re hearing a lot about Web 2.0 for the PC, are we really at that point with mobile? It was stated recently that we’re really at Web 0.5 on the mobile, that we have a long way to get there. But suddenly people discover they can use the Web on mobile and they want everything and they want it today. So, can mobile really deliver everything?

Novarra: Consumer habits can change very quickly. Novarra’s products are so easy to deploy to existing consumers and their handsets that it lends itself to a broad and quick adoption.

The rate of progress in bringing the web to the mobile is changing rapidly and is catching up with the capabilities for regular Web capabilities (e.g., video). What may prevent some of things coming to the mobile are commercial decisions made by the different players: content providers, operators, handset manufacturers alike. Bandwidth is a vastly more limited commodity on mobile networks than fixed, and this will affect pricing and business models.

People will want everything they can have – at the right price. It’s the nature of the internet and it’s the nature of technology in general.

Mobile may not deliver “everything” tomorrow, but the potential is to deliver something even more unique and different, as an additive to the internet today. Certainly, Web 2.0 is a clear possibility.

Novarra

mPoria, a provider of mobile commerce solutions for retailers and service providers, has teamed with PayPal in order to integrate the latter’s automated mobile payment system with their GoMobile m-commerce platform.

Dan Wright, mPoria’s CEO and co-founder, believes the integration will “offer easy and secure checkout capabilities to one of the largest and most active purchasing communities on the Mobile Web.” With PayPal on board as a third-party payment system provider, customers will be able to shop using their credit card, bank account or existing balance in their PayPal account.

mPoria

Exit Games has signed on with Vivendi to collaborate on mobile games, especially in regards to providing VoIP and other voice and integrated features. The first offing of the agreement will be a new version of Naval Battle. A user’s phone will also ‘wake up’ if someone on their friend list challenges them to a game.

“The incorporation of Neutron technology will deliver a sophisticated multiplayer gaming experience that will have widespread appeal among mobile gamers,” said Vivendi Games Mobile’s president, Paul Maglione.

Exit Games’ Neutron 4.0 powers live games in more than 50 countries.

Exit Games

Namco Bandai has inked a deal with FremantleMedia to bring the latter’s Idols TV format to Europe, the Middle East and Asia Pacific in the form of mobile games.

“Idols is one of the biggest television formats in the world, with millions of fans who will soon be able to interact with their favourite show anytime they want,” said Masaji Okubo, managing director of Namco Bandai Networks Europe. The musical talent search program is one of the most successful television franchises in the world. This is a multi-year deal.

Namco Mobile

3 will launch headsets based on Qualcomm’s BREW solution. The deal will enable 3 to offer feature-rich applications and exploit over-the-air downloading capabilities.

“Using BREW, we can embed applications on the handset to deliver a single integrated user experience, which in turn will encourage take-up of our services,” said Frank Meehan, Hutchison Whampoa’s (3’s parent) director and general manager, global 3G handset and application group. The move “will extend an integrated mobile Internet experience,” added Bob Briggs, senior vice president and general manager, BREW for Qualcomm Internet Services.

3
Qualcomm

It’s hard to resist a joke about USA Today’s bite-sized news becoming byte-sized, but I will anyway. USA Today, the nation’s top-selling newspaper, is combining print news, text messaging, mobile advertising and mobile search.

Users signing up to USA Today’s text alerts for news, sports, gossip, etc. will receive real-time updates and a sponsored interactive ad. Short codes appear daily in the print edition of the paper. Matt Jones, director of mobile strategy and operations at Gannett Digital (Gannett owns USA Today), said the service “allows us to take a non-interactive platform, a newspaper, and make the print product interactive.”

via DM News

Auto manufacturer DaimlerChrysler is donating the proceeds from the sale of 3,000 cell phones to The Lighthouse, a local Michigan charity.

The Wireless Service, based in Oakland County, Mich., recycles cell phones on behalf of assistance programs and functions as an intermediary between corporate and charitable clients. They are handling the DaimlerChrysler phones.

More than 135 million cell phones end up in landfills each year. “You don’t want these things to end up in landfills,” said Dave Knuth, DaimlerChrysler’s voice and wireless operations manager. “Just like computers or any form of electronics, if cell phones are not handled properly and end up in a landfill, they create tremendous amounts of toxic waste.” Out-of-service cell phones can be re-purposed for secondary markets, the proceeds of which are donated to charities. The Wireless Service scrubs the personal data from each phone.

Citing public interest, the International Association for the Wireless Telecommunications Industry (CTIA - The Wireless Association) has sent a letter to President Bush asking him to veto the U.S. International Trade Commission’s (ITC) recent decision to ban the importation of certain Qualcomm chips and chipsets.

In the letter, CTIA President and CEO Steve Largent argued the ban would hinder 911 emergency communication, cause “economic disruption,” and “force the redesign of virtually all handsets that utilize the chips.” Largent asked the President to support the decision of ITC Chairman Daniel Pearson, who dissented from the Commission’s resolution. The ITC determined the Qualcomm chips infringed a patent held by Broadcom. According to Largent, the chips are critical to wireless networks owned by AT&T, Verizon Wireless, Sprint/Nextel and T-Mobile among others.

CTIA

Hip Hop has been a popular choice for ringtones and ringbacks, and it has been a leading genre of full-length downloads of songs and even videos. And now a new player is on the block, as Hudson Entertainment has announced an exclusive deal with Good Hands Records, which will include recent and upcoming releases from the indie hip hop label including Killa Priest’s new album The Offering (due August 2007), and Camp Lo’s Black Hollywood. Catalog tracks include Reef the Lost Cauze and Chief Kamachi & the Juju Mob.

This deal will give Hudson Entertainment the right to distribute the full-length tracks and music videos as well as ringtones and ringbacks. Hudson, the North American publishing arm of Hudson Soft, has similar deals with Death Row Records, TVT Records and Gangsta Advisory Recordingz. Additionally, Hudson has an exclusive partnership with hip hop magazine The Source, which provides a mix of music and other mobile content.

“This deal with Good Hands is yet another example of Hudson’s ever-expanding hip-hop catalog for mobile phones,” said John Greiner, President and CEO of Hudson Entertainment. “We’re thrilled to be bringing these amazing artists to a new medium and look forward to working with Good Hands to do so.”

Hudson Entertainment Company