While the “mobile phones can make popcorn explode!” viral was a nice attempt, this example from No-Evil is even better. You have may have already seen it, since it’s been out since May 31st, but I’d hate to deprive anyone of the sight of it.
The only thing scarier is the stupidity in the flood of Youtube comments.
Despite the multiple gadgets, doo-hickeys and add-ons you can purchase for practically every handset on the market, don’t expect to make a living off of selling them.
An NPD showed that despite 60%+ of US cell-phones being bought in stores, complete with pestering desperate salesmen, 39% of all buyers refuse to purchase any accessories. The stats get even more depressing when looking at what people actually bought: only 18% picked up a Bluetooth headset or other peripheral device and only 2% bought music kits (despite 60% of phones having mp3 functionality).
Most articles covering the statistic seems to think that this means there’s a great opportunity to be made selling them. My reading’s the simpler idea that maybe most people don’t need bells-and-whistles but I’m not the financial analyst here.
Air your views on Accessories in the mobile phone forum: unnecessary or not?
Crass English stereotypes mean the words “German” and “social” rarely appear in the same sentence, but now, for a limited time only, they will: Nokia has bought German social-network Plazes.
Like most social-networks, the site seems to offer little in the way of originality, except better map integration and comedy speech bubbles. The demo cartoon features a needy moppet named Mario who whines at a girl who organises a group of friends to join him at a bar to legitimise his attempts to drown his pain with alcohol. From the looks of it, Mario and the other moppet-girl would have had more fun without a huge crowd of people, but, who am I to judge the drawn out romantic exploits of two-dimensional characters. And maybe more people would have shown up if she’d just started a Facebook Event.
Ridiculous ringtone stories usually start and end at Crazy Frog but here’s something just as absurd but far less homicide-inducing.
Dwango is offering NTT DoCoMo ringtones that only dogs can hear. In Japanese, that’s “Inu ni shika kikoenai chakushinon”, which makes it sound much less silly. If you sign up for their premium rate package you can get all the inaudible files that you fancy.
On the plus side, this will give me an excuse for anyone who claims my phone never rings.
Serendipitously coinciding with Pete’s look at inadequate nerds using their iPhones to pick up women, here’s another story concerning the sex-lives of the iPhone-men.
‘Time’ reports on the upcoming “pornucopia” that iPhone-owning perverts have to look forward to. The magazine claims that the industry is moving from till “images, racy text services and ‘moan tones’” to Youtube-sized clips, bolstered by the handset’s download speed and considerable screen-size. And though Google Trends is hardly an accurate barometer, searches for “iPhone porn” have been rising steadily throughout the year.
While Apple bans adult content from official applications, just as they forbade it from the podcast section of the Apple Store, they’re certain to benefit from thhe trend (especially since 75%+ of iphoners are men, mostly with disposable incomes)
None of this helps inadequate nerds who still haven’t got an iphone. We’ll have to stick with using flashy sportscars to cover up our numerous personality flaws.
In case you didn’t believe my last article about the overwhelming and unfortunate male-domination of the mobile world, here are two new releases that’ll open your eyes.
Exhibit A: ‘Top Gear: The Mobile Game’. In case watching middle-class middle-aged penis-envying bores make up for their lack of personality by obsessing over shiny things isn’t enough, now you’ll get to play them! Though the game would be much better as a beat-’em-up (or just a ‘beat-JeremyClarkson-up’), it’s, surprise, a racing game. Now you can drive FAST CARS around a test track to prove your MANLINESS by getting the TOP SCORE on the leaderboard. Gameloft will be publishing the game shortly, but for now you’ll have to play ‘Darts With Cars’ on the Top Gear website
Exhibit B: ‘Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition’ is coming to the mobile phone! Visa Vision will launch a special slideshow application dedicated to the franchise, allowing users to access images far back into archives. Perfect for if you ever need to settle a debate about what Veronica Varekova actually looks like. And very little else.
Exhibit C: … to be determined. Probably a fart machine.
When I think of Switzerland, I think of Heidi, William Tell and Ursula Andress, but not bees. However, the Swiss government is currently buzzing (!!) about an apiaceous apaetesis!
Apparently, mobile phones have taken over as one of the most likely causes of the sharp decline in the bee population of Switzerland. Wireless signals are alleged to scramble a bee’s internal sense of direction. The government are considering this to be a “national ecological crisis.”
I consider it a Mother Nature’s payback for Jerry Seinfeld’s ‘Bee Movie’.
PS: ‘Bee Movie’ was still better than Michael Caine’s ‘The Swarm’ but I can’t remember if that was about bees or wasps and I’m guessing only about 19 people would remember it.
The Internet has always been a virtual sausagefest, as the preponderance of scantily-clad ladies, misogynistic social bookmarkers
and useless ephemera should prove. Accordingly, it may come as no surprise that, even when the Internet is taken out into the real world, it’s still dominated by guys.
A survey from web-browser company Opera, from a study of web behaviours from February to June, has shown men outnumber women almost nine to one, with 88.1% of its users being of the gruntier sex. Though overall use is up 23% since March, that seems to have done little to even the gender gap. Perhaps one day, mobile’s ubiquity will even things out but for the moment, it’s a man’s playground.
So think carefully before you visit the mobile version of Match.com!
Holy Handsets, Batman! American Batfans will be pleased that a limited edition Nokia 6205 is being made up in the style of their favourite superhero, making it an attractive addition to any Bat Utility Belt.
The handset comes in a “mysterious black” colour, emblazoned with the ‘Dark Knight’ emblem and full of wallpapers, screen-savers and videos for anyone who can’t get enough of them on the Internet already. The boxes come with “Joker Playing Card” provinding a link to the FightForGothamCity.com website.
Unfortunately, this phone isn’t available in Europe, probably due to the villanous doings of arch-mastermind Transatlantic Man. Let’s hope this phone doesn’t bomb…
If you were unlucky enough to see Rob Zombie’s atrocious remake of ‘Halloween’, you’ll remember all the unnecessary scenes of Malcolm McDowell as Michael Myers’ psychiatrist trying to understand the obsessions of the twisted little freak. In the real world, it’s more likely Malcolm would be dealing with children with a very different kind of obsession: mobile phones.
Two children, aged 12 and 13, have been sent to a “mental health institution” to combat their addiction to their beloved mobiles. Dr Maite Utges, who was in charge of their recovery, goes so far to suggest they “both had serious difficulties leading normal lives”.
But after three months of rehabilitation, their bad habits, such as lying to get money for phone-related purchases, appear to have been squelched.
Hopefully the men in white coats won’t be after our phone-obsessed Omio staffers but if some of them start mysteriously disappearing at least you’ll know why
