WebProNews

Tag: Mobile Technology

  • A Look at Google’s Location-Based Mobile Alerts Patent

    As pointed out by Endgadet, Google owns the right to a patent that, according to its title, is a “Location-based mobile device alarm,” an idea that will surely please those of you who worry about the collection of location data and Google’s apparent assault on the world’s privacy. The patent’s description also reveals some potential uses for the location-based mobile technology:

    The alarm application may be configured to automatically surface various information upon activation of the alarm. User interest in a particular subject or piece of information may vary depending on the user’s environment. For example, a user waking up at home may find it useful to review news traffic and weather. In contrast, a business traveler may be interested in a flight status, taxi availability, and information related to travel plans. In order to better serve a user, the wireless device may be configured to support various configurations responsive to a user’s environment so that a user at home receives home environmental information and a business traveler receives travel environmental information.

    To get such capabilities from your future mobile Android device, you would (hopefully) have to opt-in to it, which means as long as the unnamed service is active, Google, or at least its Android OS, will know where you are anytime your device is on. Are consumers willing to give up their privacy in order to receive alerts that are tailored to their location? Certainly, there are some who would opt-in, but considering the outcry Google’s faced anytime their commitment to privacy is questioned, there are many who probably would decline.

    What about using this technology for location-based ads that are actually useful? Would consumers opt-in for that kind of notification? Say, for instance, you’re out shopping with your family and, thanks to location-based technology, an ad pops up informing you of a two-hour sale at a store that wasn’t in your planned rotation? Would that be intrusive or something mobile technology was created for.

    How you answer depends, in large part, on how much you depend on mobile devices in your day-to-day life.

  • Angry Birds Going After China

    While reveling in their recent success — 140 million downloads, ya’ll — Rovio announced their next move for the Angry Birds franchise. The target? The far east; China, to be exact. The goal for the company behind Angry Birds isn’t that much different than their U.S. strategy: Domination of the mobile device gaming market.

    Thanks to a report at AppleInsider, the Angry Birds plan for Chinese domination was revealed during the Global Mobile Internet Conference in Beijing earlier this week. During the presentation, Rovio executive Peter Vesterbacka was quite boastful of Angry Birds, saying the brand has grown faster than any before it. Owing this confidence to the Angry Birds ever-growing downloads total, it’s easy to see why Rovio thinks their game will just as successful in China.

    It also helps that China has over 300 million mobile device users, giving the Angry Birds a lot of potential targets. Rovio’s goal for the Angry Birds takeover of China calls for 100 million downloads, and with so many members of the Chinese population using mobile technology, that goal isn’t so far-fetched.

    As for Angry Birds’ current success story, Vesterbacka thanks Apple and its ability to distribute content for the opportunity to prosper:

    “Apple created the distribution for us that we didn’t have before. All of a sudden, great games mattered,” said Vesterbacka. “We are seeing smartphone growth explode, and we are riding that wave.”

    He also credited the game’s popularity to the character designs, using Pixar’s track record with memorable characters as a template for Angry Birds. Oddly enough, however, while heaping credit on Apple’s environment, Vesterbacka was none to friendly to the Android market, calling it fragmented and a “very Google centric ecosystem.”

    Because, yeah, Apple’s mobile architecture has such the reputation of being open and accessible for all devices… Nevertheless, it’s pretty easy to see why Rovio is so indebted to Apple. Without the iPhone platform, Angry Birds would most likely have the designation of being just another game.