#netprophet coming tomorrow May 12, 2010

Madam Geek, She’s the Geek and the RLabs team will be attending the Net Prophet 2010 tomorrow.

A bit of history of the this inniative is:

Net Prophet was started in Cape Town, South Africa by the RAMP Foundation – a non-profit entity created by the RAMP Group as a means for social investment within the local Internet based economy.

With government backing education and development in the areas of science and technology, RAMP Group recognised the need to build a culture of entrepreneurship and innovation, particularly in the area of web-based business, essentially aiding those with the right aptitude for ‘Making business $ense of the Internet’. The name Net Prophet was decided on, as it would give credence to the quality of our local industry leaders (as an added bonus, it doubles as both ‘Prophet’ & ‘Profit’ when spoken of!).

The Vision

Take the most innovative/successful/creative/ambitious thinkers and entrepreneurs in the Internet space, and ask them to share their stories, ideas and predictions for the future in a format that is fresh, relevant and engaging. The result: Net Prophet.

We will be tweeting and blogging from the event, so stay tuned!

The Apple experience – One bite had me Hooked May 11, 2010

This a guest post by: She’s the Geek

Thank you She’s the Geek for sharing your experience with us.

Last week MadamGeek packed up her iPhone and gave She’s the Geek the opportunity to Review her Gadget for a few days. It truly was an amazing experience and every Geeky person’s dream come true.

The iPhone is the first of a new generation of phones: it’s a touchscreen smartphone running Apple’s OS X operating system. Instead of using buttons, joysticks, etc, the iPhone has icons that appear on the huge touch-sensitive screen. The screen is enormous, and the user interface is simply breathtaking.

When playing with the user interface you can begin to believe the hype. Touch the Phone icon on the screen and the address book appears; tap on a name and the iPhone makes a call. Touch the Photos icon and your photo album glides onto the screen.

Using the iPhone for me was simply an amazing experience; it was Love at first touch and hard to imagine ever going back to a normal phone.

The iPhone is an iPod too of course; you can download songs from iTunes on the move. 8 Gbytes is enough to store 2,000 songs. Other great features include the Safari web browser, Google Maps and built-in Wi-Fi support.

So, what to conclude about the iPhone? It’s clearly not just any phone, it’s a Revolutionary Phone and virtually a must have.

My twitter is “broke” May 10, 2010

For those of you who are on Twitter, you would of noticed that tonight Twitter is showing zero followers and following. I have taken a few tweets from my Twitter stream to show you what people are saying around the world about the Twitter downtime.

My twitter is “broke”

View more presentations from Rene Parker.

Is the N900 a phone? May 9, 2010

If I had to describe the N900 in just under 10 words it would read: “Cutting-edge technology packed into a sleek, compact design”.

After using the N900 for a full 3 days I have come to the conclusion that everyone has their own style, preference and needs. I could carry on and on about all the features like:

Display

• 3.5 inch touch-sensitive widescreen display
• 800 × 480 pixel resolution

Language support

• British English, American English, Canadian French, Czech, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, French, German, Italian, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Spanish, Latin American Spanish, Swedish, Russian

Connectivity

• 3.5mm AV connector
• TV out (PAL/NTSC) with Nokia Video Connectivity
• Cable
• Micro-USB connector, High-Speed USB 2.0
• Bluetooth v2.1 including support for stereo headsets
• Integrated FM transmitter
• Integrated GPS with A-GPS

Battery

• BL-5J 1320mAh

Processor and 3D accelerator

• TI OMAP 3430: ARM Cortex-A8 600 MHz, PowerVR SGX with OpenGL ES 2.0 support

Memory

• Up to 1GB of application memory (256 MB RAM, 768 MB virtual memory)

Size and weight

• Volume: Approx 113cc
• Dimensions: 110.9 × 59.8 × 18 (19.55 at thickest part) mm
• Weight: Approx 181g

Mass memory

• 32 GB internal storage
• Store up to 7000 MP3 songs or 40 hours of high-quality video
• Up to 16 GB of additional storage with an external microSD card

Keys and input method

• Full QWERTY tactile keyboard
• Full QWERTY onscreen keyboard

Colour

• Black

Operating frequency

• Quad-band GSM EDGE 850/900/1800/1900
• WCDMA 900/1700/2100 MHz

Data network

GPRS class A, multislot class 32, maximum speed 107/64.2 kbps (DL/UL) EDGE class A, multislot class 32, maximum speed 296/177.6 kbps (DL/UL) WCDMA 900/1700/2100. Maximum speed PS 384/384 kbps (DL/UL) HSPA 900/1700/2100. Maximum speed PS 10/2 Mbps (DL/UL) WLAN IEEE 802.11b/g

Call features

• Integrated hands-free stereo speakers
• Call waiting, call hold, call divert
• Call timer
• Logging of dialed, received and missed calls
• Speed dialing via contact widget
• Virbrating alert (internal)
• Side volume keys
• Mute/unmute
• Contacts with images
• Conference calling with up to 3 participants
• Internet calling

Email & Messaging

• Supported protocols: Mail for Exchange, IMAP, POP3, SMTP
• Support for email attachments
• Support for rich HTML
• SMS and Instant Messages as conversations
• Support for Nokia Messaging service
• Instant messaging and presence enhanced contacts
• Multiple number, email and Instant Messaging details per contact, contacts with images
• Support for assigning images to contacts

Web browsing

• Maemo browser powered by Mozilla technology
• Adobe Flash™ 9.4 support
• Full screen browsing

Camera

• 5-megapixel digital camera
• Carl Zeiss optical lens
• Dual LED flash
• 800 × 480 resolution video recording

The main focus of the N900 is the simple to use screen. A wide home screen (three home pages and a separate extra screen for further customisation) with a wide variety of places to put your favoured icons. There’s a choice between widgets and simple icons, with the former offering larger icons for applications like the calendar and RSS reader so you can interact with the phone’s core functionality without having to open up the program.

But the thing I liked the most is the multi-tasking screen. Not only is it nearly always accessible through the double-rectangle symbol in the top right-hand corner, but it also allows you to see thumbnail panes of each of your open applications. Shutting them down is as simple as hitting the cross on the window in its top right-hand corner, and the whole system works very, very smoothly. If you decide to open more than 9 screens it does slow down.

So to answer the question above: Is the N900 a phone?  My answer would have to be no it is not. It is so much more.

And then to comment on my earlier blog post titled: Apples are not the only fruit… Apple might not be the only fruit out there but for me it sure is. I’m still an iPhone gal

Do you know the Apple story? May 8, 2010

Found this interesting slide presentation on Slideshare.

Apple Story (from 1976 to nowadays)

View more presentations from thomas.ezan.

Blogging with She’s the Geek!

This morning She’s the Geek facilitated the Cafe session at RLabs for the MOM3.0 session.

Here is the presention used by She’s the Geek when she introduced the moms to the world of blogging.

Blogging presentation

View more presentations from Monique Ross.

I decided to go check out their blog posts. The moms were very excited this morning and a bit nervous as it was the first time many of them have ever blogged. We hope to see them start creating their individual blogs soon.

Apples are not the only fruit… May 7, 2010

So today was Day 1 of the N900 review challenge by my friend She’s the Geek.

Just over 20 hours ago I packed up my iPhone and became a N900 user. The pic below is me receiving it. You see the broad smile. That excitement was short lived.

After putting in my sim card and looking for the power on button, I was ready to go. Now you have to remember I have been (and still is) an iPhone gal and it was love at first touch for me and my iPhone. Just after a few minutes of touching the N900 I must admit it does feel good in your hands. Amazing how important the sense of touch is. My overall feeling of the N900 in your hand is: sleek and sexy. Well done Nokia!

Please don’t think that that’s all I did was look at the N900 and touch it. (It is very easy on the eyes)
Last night I only had time to familiarise myself with the full touch device and the side-sliding QWERTY keyboard. Just to mention that the full touch screen is a TFT resistive touchscreen, 65K colors and not at all as sensitive as the iPhone. After being used to tapping gently and lightly I had to switch to using force and it felt as if I was being aggressive with the phone. At least it did not break.

And of course I had to get connected, I decided to use the wi-fi thinking thought that it will be faster than the 3G. It might of just have been the wi-fi at home that was slow but boy was it slow to connect to my social media sites. Facebook was first on my list and then Twitter. I had to update something before I went to sleep. Unfortunately I did not manage to access either one of those sites.

This morning I woke up with a new sense of adventure and enthusiasm. First thing I did was search for a Twitter app to use. Found Dabr and thought it was good enough for me. While tapping away on the touch screen the phone rings and it is the first time I have to answer a phone call on this device. Very funny story: I end up switching the phone in all directions and cannot quite figure out where the front or top of the phone is as I had it in slide mode. Neither can I figure out how to answer it, I finally hit the green answer button but found it strange that it was so soft and I could hardly hear the person on the other end of the line. Marlon (who I poked fun at for not being able to answer my iPhone time and time again) bursts out laughing and takes the phone out of my hand and it turns it the other way. I was talking into the wrong side of the phone. He says on my facebook profile: “Marlon Parker
FTW: @Rene got her first call on #N900 and tried talking through the ear piece 😉 So loving this. Hehe”

Well after that little slip up (maybe not so little seeing that the whole world read it) I decided to get down to business and crack the N900.

A few things I used the N900 for today:
1. Updated my Twitter with a twitpic
2. Uploaded photos and videos to Facebook
3. Commented on peoples statuses
4. Shared a video link from youtube
5. Took a photo with the N900 uploaded it with tags
6. Visited the Ovi store
7. Chatted on gtalk and other IMs
8. Made and received calls and SMSs

Tomorrow I will talk about the actual features of the N900, but today I have learnt that Apples are not the only fruit…

Title sponsored by Monique.

Packed up my iPhone May 6, 2010

Packed up my iPhone and getting ready for the hand over later tonight. Next time I update it will be from a N900! @shesthegeek are you ready?

Coming Soon: N900 in 72hours

Over the next 3 days Madam Geek will review the N900. I do feel honoured to be intrusted with Marlon Parker‘s N900 for a full 3 days.

Madam Geek will review the N900 covering: the good, the bad and the ugly! The gloves are off and we are quite prepared for the Nokia lovers retribution. As an iPhone Gal I do feel a bit strange agreeing to be objective about a non Apple mobile.

She’s the Geek and Madam Geek has agreed to embark on the next 3 days reveiwing an iPhone and N900 respectively!

She’s the Geek will be reviewing Apple’s iPhone in 72hours. You can follow the Twitter updates by She’s the Geek on the progress of the review.

I Now Pronounce You Black and White Winner!! May 5, 2010

This is a very exciting time for RLabs. We are all part of the launch of the new movie.

RLABS is doing the Social Media Strategy for the movie: I Now Pronounce You Black and White. We had a competition running on Facebook to win two sets of tickets to the Cape Town Premier of this movie. Today we did the draw and have two lucky winners.

The winners of the two sets of tickets are Lee Williams and Naasirah Dollie. Congratulations to you guys and we will be seeing you there tomorrow evening. The premier will be hosted at Cinema Privee,Canal Walk. Viewers can expect to see the first screening of I Now Pronounce You Black and White at their local Nu Metro cinema from 14th of May 2010.