06 December 2007

Nokia World '07, from the high-level presentations
to the food, with text, pictures, and videos

A morning after the party, it was hard to keep eyes opened ;)

If you are interested in I guess you already know all about the event, lots of press releases rolling around and most of you have to be well informed, very well actually, but anyway, I thought that you would like to hear something from the first hand, from the floor, some freaking impressions after four days in Amsterdam.

So, first of all, sorry again for not keeping you informed well, I gave my best on the forum section, but it was really hard to find some spare time and good connection to upload materials and keep front page up to date, so, sorry once again.

Anyway, lest start with some parts from the unpublished article that I wrote but didn’t find enough time to publish it.

I’ve just came from the Nokia after party, I got cold just before the trip and unfortunately pills didn’t helps that much and I am still a little bit sick sleepy and tired as well and I should leave this article for tomorrow but I can’t, I just have to keep you informed although I haven’t so much to say about.

So speaking of the Nokia event, the first day, I have to be honest and say that its hard to find something really exciting in all the speeches that we’ve heard it today, just a general opinions about the Nokia strategy and the future of the mobile phones with a highlights on the relation between the newt web generation and mobiles devices.

Actually the only really news is hidden behind the presentation slide with “Comes with music" slogan, the idea is to get the music altogether with a device, once when you'll buy device you'll actually be sable to subscribe and get unlimited one year access to download and keep what ever you want.

The service is introduced together with the Universal Music Group and Nokia is in discussions with other major music labels and they'll try to include more players into this.

In my personal opinion this is the most important news, the breaking news actually because Nokia and Universal will allows you to GET and to KEEP music for FREE and it will not disappear once when the subscription is over and actually the only question is how much music you can get in this period in a good wi-fi environment ;)

What else to mention.. .. .. oh yes, the winners in the first “Open C Challenge,” a global mobile application development contest encouraging open source and freeware developers to port innovative software applications with Nokia’s Open C environment to the S60 mobile platform.

To be honest, I got impressed only with the winning application, the MobiTubia application, and he definitely deserved the grand prize for the 35000 lines of code in less than 10 weeks.

In short, MobiTubia is a Flash Lite video player and YouTube portal application with real-time decoding for the S60 platform, developed by Sittiphol Phanvilai of Bangkog, Thailand, a graduate student in the Master of Engineering program in Computers at Chulalongkorn University.

MobiTubia enables mobile users to access flv clips using several different methods. Additionally, the application allows users to browse and search for specific content on YouTube. The developer ported 25,000 lines of code to the Open C environment to make the application compatible with S60 on Symbian OS.

Furthermore, Nokia confirms that Star Wars will be available soon to the N-Gage platform. I have to be honest and say that I am not a really fan of this saga but I’ve tried the demo of the “The Force Unleashed” on the Nokia N73 and I have to say that game looks pretty impressive, the graphic actually and I can talk that much about the game play, I should need more time for that and I am not an expert for this kind of games.

Star Wars: The Force Unleashed puts players in Darth Vader's "Secret Apprentice" position, promising to reveal new secrets about the Star Wars world. The game brings an expansive story, set throughout the unexplored period between Star Wars: Episode III Revenge of the Sith and Star Wars: Episode IV A New Hope.

In development by Universomo, THQ's studio based in Finland, the mobile version of Star Wars: The Force Unleashed will offer players exclusive community features: tournaments, score uploads or downloadable content, all via the N-Gage Arena services.

"We're proud to be able to deliver the next chapter in the Star Wars saga on the N-Gage platform", said Gregg Sauter, Publishing Director, Nokia. "Star Wars: The Force Unleashed Mobile game will take advantage of the N-Gage platform's robust native development environment to provide the ultimate mobile gaming experience, including powerful graphics, connectivity and community elements."

"THQ Wireless is dedicated to creating an awesome mobile Star Wars experience that delivers on the concept of unleashing the Force", says Adam Comisky, vice president of THQ Wireless. "The N-Gage platform makes it possible for us to release a rich mobile gaming experience to entertain as wide an audience as possible on N-Gage compatible devices."

What lese to say!? Nothing especially, just to mention that there Nokia Internet radio has been released as well. "Most new music discovery occurs while you're listening to the radio," said Tommi Mustonen, head of the Nokia music business.

"By offering the Nokia Internet Radio service on mobile devices, the radio experience becomes more accessible, giving people new ways to find music."

Apart from the covering these high-end presentations and announcements I also feel obligation to mention the nice food, friendly atmosphere, great hospitality, lot of freaks, Symbian Freaks to be precise and especially already mentioned afterparty.

This is my 2nd Nokia party actually and I am free to say that Nokia really knows how to make a good and successful party to relax people after the long busy day. We was a little bit skeptic about having a beach party in the December with outside temperature below the zero but Nokia surprised us with a warm and cool “virtual” beach.

It was totally awesome night, definitely one to remember, when Nokia throw a party, they really do throw a party, and the food was just totally unbelievable, crazy cocktails and unlimited free beer to wash it down.

The coolest part of the part was the beach volleyball; Vinu had fun playing beach volleyball in the December in Amsterdam, quite impressive isn’t it ;)

The only bad aspect of this party is the fact that several liters of coffee didn’t help, it made it worse actually and I was finding it very difficult to stay awake during the morning speeches.

Last but not the least; I have to mention the appointment and discussion with some of the Nseries production managers that has produced lot of interesting ideas, suggestions and conclusions in a very friendly conversation. I just hope that they will accept some of our suggestions, there is still lot of room for improvements.

All in all that’s it, I only have to mention the great presentation at the end of the shows from the Nokia Research Center leader (Bob Iannucci), that was extremely interesting especially the part about photography and capturing technologies that supposed to be already build in the just released Nokia N82.

Especially thanks to my Friends, Martyn, Vineeth, Mihai and Murray for accepting the invitation and representing the SF here, it was real pleasure to meet and spend few great days with them.

All in all one great event and I am relay proud because I am part of this, thank you Nokia in the name of the SF community and especially in the name of team that has represented Symbian Freak community on this great event, thank you once again.

I’ve promised to those girls that I’ll publish this photo, so here it is ;)

Forgive me if I have forget something but that’s all for know, keep in mind that I have lot of materials and that this story isn’t finished, I’ll upload and publish more, photos, videos and impressions straight from the flour. Currently working on the photo/video story, so just be a bit more patient, will be online as soon as possible.