Pepcom also known as Mobile Focus was held Monday before CES opened.  It was the biggest I’ve ever seen it and I was a bit overwhelmed by the magnitude of it.  It was like a little trade show unto itself.  Anyways, I was able to snag Vlingo’s CEO Dave Grannan for a quick video.  Come to find out they’re making Vlingo for TV’s.  And what I heard blew me away.  I can’t write most of it just yet but Vlingo is doing well, very well.

I was also able to chat with Vimeo’s crack web developer Joe Schmitt who showed off their new video editor for the iPad.  I can’t tell you how excited I am about this and it might just make it possible for me to bring only my iPad to trade shows now.  Take a look at what Joe had to say.

I was very excited to wake up this morning to read what Nokia had announced.  I’ve been stewing on it all day and intentionally not commenting.  I was pretty sure I wasn’t going to like let alone be impressed with today’s announcements.  I’m still bitter about Nokia fumbling Symbian so badly and going with Windows Mobile.  It may be petty but I’ve been a Nokia fan since 1997 and I don’t like big changes all that much.

I didn’t think Nokia would be able to pull it off, I didn’t think they would show up with guns blazing and deliver the goods.  Well I’m happy to report I was seriously WRONG.  Nokia has done it again.  Nokia launched 2 pretty darn good devices from what I’ve seen and heard.  I’m impressed and that’s not easy anymore, I’m genuinely interested to give the Nokia Lumia line a shot.  I’d like a chance to play with one to really decide for myself, right now I’m just reading what my trusted friends are writing and making assumptions from that.

I am happy to be able to say that Nokia may have done the unexpected and created a line of devices that the masses will want and the masses may be able to afford.  Nokia may also have in the meantime made been able to shine some much needed light and life into Windows Mobile phones.  They had been looking a little lackluster to me though I must admit a tad tempting (of late).

I can’t wait to get my hands on the Lumia 710 and 800 and give them a real play with, until then I’m not going to pass any greater judgement.  Congratulations Nokia and credit is due for cranking out 2 impressive devices in such a short time.  I’m happy to see you back on the world platform.

Image Credit to Ben Smith

My good friends and the heros to developers around the world WIP (Wireless Industry Partnership) are stepping up their game.  They aren’t just helping the thousands of developers who can attend a WIPJam or a “Muther of all Hackathons”, they are doing 1 better and bringing knowledge to the folks who may not be able to travel, they are hosting a webinar series, from August 29 – September 9.  The theme is Android ABCs and you’ll find out the secrets to making great apps.  I can’t promise you you’ll get new letters after your name but you might just come away with the knowledge to create the next Angry Birds.

Here’s a link to all the information you’ll need, if you’re a developer I really suggest you check this out.  http://www.wipconnector.com/wipjam/entry/back_to_school_webinars

For transparency sake I rented a bed from them last February at their gorgeous MWC ’11 Barcelona headquarters.

I got a little news today

1. Boingo is launching retail and commercial services.  Chicago is just the first city and I’m sure it will grow.  Boingo will be covering convention space as well as showrooms.  I’m not sure what they mean by showrooms but I do know that if folks can pay for Boingo instead of the outrageous fees for internet at trade shows there will be some very happy customers.

2. The other piece of news I got today is from PayPal.  This is the second time they scared me.  Each time I get a call from them I think OH NO someone hacked my PayPal account and all my money is gone.  That hasn’t happened and it’s their PR folks calling to update me on something.  Today it was that PayPal is now in open beta with their online payments library for the iPhone and iPad.
I usually wouldn’t cover this kind of thing but they were so nice on the phone I just decided to.

I’ve been wanting to blog about some Truphone (one of my favorite services) news for days now and I’m finally getting to all the news.  Instead of writing 3 different posts I’m just going to condense it down to one short post.  Let’s get to it.

1. Truphone is in an MVNO relationship with Vodafone UK.  Meaning they buy minutes/data from Vodafone.  This gives them the ability to resell it to you when you use one of their nifty new sims.  This is great for people roaming in the UK, make sure to check it out otherwise you may get hit with one of those $700 roaming bills that we’ve all heard stories about.

2. Truphone Local Anywhere is also a great service for folks roaming around the world.  You will also use Truphones new sim and get reduced rates for your calls, sms, and data.  This is exciting to have another one of the big boys in the roaming sim game.

3. Truphone is releasing a new build for Android and this will make it the first VOIP app on the new Google Nexus One.
Update on the release for Android: It has some kind of glitch, but instead of sitting on their hands Truphone is working hard to get out an update ASAP. Personally I love when a company listen to their users and react quickly instead of pretending they don’t know about problems.

This Thanksgiving (a US holiday) Truphone is offering free calls to US mobile and land line numbers for 12 hours.

Truphone is sharing the holiday spirit by giving anyone with Truphone the ability to call anywhere in the United States during the day.

What does this mean for you, you ask?  It means that you should download Truphone onto your mobile phone if you don’t already have it and to wild and call everyone on next Thursday, November 26.  Take advantage of Truphone’s kindness and go crazy.

Here’s a link to the page on the Truphone site explaining the promotion.  It also has a drop down to help you calculate what time the promo is running in your area and the ability save the times to your calendar.

Enjoy on Truphone’s dime!

Guess what everybody, I’m coming to SF and I’m putting a party together.  Nimbuzz, Attack Marketing, and GoMo News are sponsoring and we have a great lineup of stuff going on.  We have beta apps to give out, product launches and announcements coming.  In less then the 24 hours the event has been public we have more then 50 people coming.  You don’t want to miss out so head over to our Facebook page or if you don’t have FB then out to EventBrite and RSVP.

The details are that it’s this coming Tuesday Nov. 10 at the Thirsty Bear in SF.  The address is 661 Howard St. and we will be there from 6:30pm till at least 9pm.

Thanks to our sponsors above and our media sponsors: GoMo News, Into Mobile, PhoneDog, Brilliant Expos, GuerillaSushi, MobileBeyond and US Mobile Industry

Don’t forget, this is a BrilliantExpos production…. That’s me.

A friend of mine just brought this to my attention. Livestream is launching the Livepack (video automatically plays).  What is the Livepack you ask???  It’s a satellite television truck in a back pack.  You have an HD video camera connected to your Livepack via firewire.  Inside the Livepack is all kinds of technology I don’t know anything about but what I do know is that there are 8 yes 8 wireless modems that connect to the 3 biggest carriers here in the US.  This gives the user the ability to broadcast in HD quality anything their hearts desire to their own Livestream web page and the kicker is it’s wireless.

Specs and details I was able to glean: